Stats are good, results are better.
It’s true, social media is a tough sell for business – and understandably so. Execs want numbers, data, percentages… something other than opinions on how spending time and resources on Facebook or Twitter is worth the money – ROI.
To illustrate, allow me to share a brief conversation I had last week.
As I was finishing a social media workshop, someone waiting outside asked me, “are you a web designer?” Huh? This person knew the workshop had nothing to do with web design. Then she continued to explain that, for her, web traffic was the only way you could make the case social for media to business. Hence, it would only make sense that those who use social media in business would come from a web design background…
True, web traffic is a good indicator of the ROI on social media. But increased visits to a site is not always the goal. Plus, increased visitors doesn’t necessarily mean increased conversions, and businesses know that.
So do you justify time and resources for social media if you can’t predict clear results? How do we make the case for it?
Here are 3 ‘other’ arguments for social media:
1. Consider the other ROI (Risk Of Inaction).
It’s not a good idea to ignore major trends. Having a plan is better than experimenting, but doing nothing is just plain risky. When you see big, medium, and small businesses from different industries jump on a trend, you know something is coming. Or as Sun Tzu says, “When there is dust rising in a high column, it is the sign of chariots advancing…”
2.Think about other investments that are difficult to measure.
How do you measure the ROI for media coverage, public relations or employee relations? You’ll find this discussion has been a hot topic since… forever. The between these and social media is time – established industries like PR have been out there for decades while social media is still being born.
3. It’s cheap!
30 seconds on cable TV can cost about the same amount as a couple of full-fledged, year-long social media campaigns… I know, you can probably think of better comparisons, but you get the point.
The best way to measure success with social media, though, is to measure your bottom line. It doesn’t matter if your web traffic has quintupled if you’re not selling more, getting more subscribers, nor making more money.
So, what are your arguments for social media?
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I enjoyed this article as it does identify that ROI is a difficult sell for social media. Those that hide behind spreadsheets and colored bars may even be doing us a disservice by positioning our work alongside a Nielsen rating or Gartner report. .
The “Risk Of Inactivity” is a real and tangible discussion you can have with your client. Not participating means that demographics that you seek to engage must be somehow engaged in yet another form of advertising. For example, “Right now we don’t spend money on Social Media, but we have college roadshows at 30 different campus’ each year” This takes you back down to #3, It’s cheap. If times are tough and the college road-shows are scaled back or eliminated, you have an opportunity to provide great substitution value to the client with Social Media offerings.
I’ve posted about how I recommend marketers think about social media: (http://www.michaelmyers.biz/CRUCES/think-of-it-as-a-branding-excercise)
In a nutshell, we are back to a craftsmen like relationship with our customer base (from Cluetrain Manifesto) and if you aren’t going to build your brand this way then you will be at a competitive disadvantage.
Thanks for the comments Michael.
I’m sure ROI and social media have a long way to go. I’m sure you have more than one example of people steering away from SM just because they’re scared or don’t understand it. My guess is that as social media proves itself to the non-believers selling the idea will also become easier.
Thanks for the comments Michael (hm, deja-vu?).
I agree, customer relations is changing with all this social media hokus pokus. It’s going to be interesting how things are going to work in a decade. 🙂