This is might appear to be a bizarre question about a social media campaign. Social media marketing isn’t about returns, its about “adding value”, contributing and other non-tangible results (so many experts say). And for the fast majority of campaigns that is exactly right, it would not be proper or even possible to attach a dollar value or achieve a tangible goal. I want to propose today however one possible social media strategy that you can easily evaluate the effectiveness of.

How?

Good question. I think the first place to start is to only focus on as many networks as you can. You should not aim to have a presence on every network known to man, you would not have the time to build credibility and trust on it without it chewing away every working minute possible. A practice that we have found that works well is assigning a network specialist (I refuse to use the word “Guru” *shudder*) to represent the brand on that platform. No confusion and it leaves more time to focus on what matters the most.

What networks should you pick then? It really depends on your target market. If you don’t know where your target market are spending their time online, the easiest and quickest way to find out is to just ask them. Plain and simple.

Ok, I have my networks & assigned people to them, now what?

Get them to participate. And by participating you should be monitoring what people are saying about you (as a person) and about your company and its products. A key point to know as well that your social network persona extends beyond just your work life, but you are representing you as a real person, that just happens to work for a particular company. You cannot be someone on a network that is not you in real life. It will just lead to confusion and distrust if you were ever to meet those in your network at a function.

Some good tips for participating I have included below:

• Share what you are reading with those in your network
• Mention what you are up to in your job – a new product/service you are helping with, achieving a milestone, etc
• Interact with others in your network by commending them or adding to the conversation with your point of view
• Never go crazy with blatant self promotion.

Oh No! We were misrepresented on a network!

Inevitably you will have a client or random individual say something about your product or brand online that you probably didn’t want in the public domain. And this is where I believe you can have a measurable strategy. I recommend taking the following steps:

1. Each day take note of how many comments are made about your brand or product/service online.
2. Spilt that list of comments into a file, labelling them Positive, Netural, or Negative.
3. Begin to interact firstly with those that are negative. This is because most of the time these concerns are voiced on a network, they are looking for a solution. And rather than go through your call center or rep, they feel they can touch the people that matter the most online. Your aim should be able to clearly define the real problem they are experiencing with your organisation.
4. For those that commend and applaud your organisation, you should really thank those individuals, and when/if possible, reward them in private for their kind words. This will continue to motivate them to sing your company praises.
5. For those that are neutral, the best way is to engage them in public and address their concerns or queries. We have found much better success when this is done by an individual’s personal social media account, rather than a brand’s one. However, there are exceptions to this rule, so feel free to use your discretion.
6. It would be wise for the negative respondents, if they aren’t really looking for a response to let them be, and add them to a list to interact with at a later date.

How do you measure the success of the campaign?

I think this is the easiest part. The aim should be to increase your tribe. We want to see an increase in positive comments across all targetted networks.

We want to see every neutral response turn into someone that will at least consider the product, if not follow our sales process all the way through to a client.

We want to see the negative posts neutralised and have their problems resolved. It is not reasonable to believe that you can remove all negative comments from the Internet. Stick and focus to the goal of solving the needs of individuals.

Social Media doesn’t need to be smoke and mirrors. It can have goals and metrics to evaluate the progress of the goals. If you can rectify 80% of the negative feedback of your organisation online and receive 5% increase in the amount of positive mentions, I think that is a fantastic result for your business. Don’t you?