You’ve Got Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Now What?

Dear Mr. or Ms. Business-to-Business Company:

Congrats!  You’ve got your Twitter account, your LinkedIn profile and your Facebook company page up and running.

You are regularly blogging (right?) and sharing all that great original content via regular Tweets, posts and updates.  You’ve set up goals for your social media program (like increased web traffic or improved SEO results) and everything is humming along nicely.

 

For the sake of argument, we will assume the scenario described above.  We will also assume that you’ve set some specific goals you hope to achieve through active social media marketing.  Now it’s time to measure success!

To help get you started on the path of measuring for social media marketing success, offered here are three useful links for a “return on social” culled from all the resources available out there.

Insight from Forbes

This recent interview is a good place to start. This Forbes interview features authors of a new report on measuring social media. While the book and interview is targeted to nonprofits, this post shares useful insight for the business-to-business sector as well.  Definitely worth the read, the in-depth Q&A looks at the “secrets” to measuring a return on social media engagement.

“One Stop Shopping”

Check out this handy list of resources and blog posts from those smarty-pants at Social Media Examiner.  This information serves as “one stop shopping” for the latest in tools and techniques. You’ll see all the latest insights and background related to the importance of measuring a “return on social” from these trustworthy and knowledgeable folks

3 Can’t-Miss Tools

Now that you’ve done some background reading, your next step is to roll up your sleeves and get started.  This post from B2B Inbound Online (guest authored by yours truly) shares three basic tools for measuring social media success.

Addicted to Metrics: The First Step is Admitting There’s a Problem

The first step in any well-respected recovery program is admitting there’s a problem. 

When it comes to business-to-business marketing and monitoring social media metrics, this serves as public admittance of a potential problem.

The smarty-pants at Hootsuite, the social media management application, now offer robust reporting metrics showcasing the return on investment and value of social media marketing for Twitter.  (They offer this reporting for Facebook as well, but I’m not actively managing client social media on that platform, thus don’t run FB reports.)

In the case of Twitter, real-time reports show relevance of Twitter followers, usefulness of Tweets, and number of followers who click through any links embedded into a Tweet, along with other addictive analytics.

HootSuite Social Analytics from HootSuite on Vimeo.

Most Popular Links

Over the last few months, one report has become extremely addictive. 


The “most popular links” summary shows the number of click throughs followers take for anytime a link is embedded in a tweet.

As more clients request social media management of b-to-b Tweet streams, the more this addiction will get out of control.

Got Relevance?
In my mind, no matter the client, the report serves as a key way to measure relevance on Twitter.  

Another way of looking at the report is that it demonstrates that the higher the click through (Ie higher the number of people who click on the link), the more the content resonated with followers.  

As long as a Twitter program stays on topic; is consistent in frequency of Tweets; includes key words and hash tags related to the topic, and as long as the account has built a following of relevant followers, the “most popular links” report should be a joy to read.

There are so many important reasons to be thoughtful and strategic in social media management.  In business-to-business social media programs, the focus is on connecting and relating to like-minded folks, thought leaders, potential prospects, etc. in a professional way.  (Of course, I’m making the assumption that this is the overall goal…many folks have gotten into big trouble when using Twitter for other more sensational reasons, like celebrities and certain members of the US Congress) 

Simply put, tweets and comments must stay on topic to attract relevant followers. 

These same concepts are covered in a previous post about using Twitter as a branding tool.

In Search of Value

Think of it this way:  if you signed up for a conference or webinar about the latest industry trends in physical therapy, why on earth would a presenter stand up and devote a presentation to thoughts about movies, what they ate for dinner, or what funny thing their kid did yesterday? Why would the attendees find this content of value? And what motivation would participants have to connect, engage, or pass along this kind of irrelevant information?

There are other social media outlets for that kind of sharing other than a business-to-business Tweet account.

A Better Way

These useful reports show the value in staying strategic when B-to-B Tweeting. 

Attract a relevant community. Stay on topic to those who found you.  Cultivate a relevant following via consistent management; share information of relevance that offers context; reach out and connect to other relevant folks; and measure the effectiveness of such an engagement.

Now I’ve got to close this post up  – it’s been a day since I ran that Hootsuite “most popular links” analysis and I’ve got an itchy Twitter finger!