Turning News Into Knowledge

Today there are far more “influencers” than ever before. An influencer is simply someone with an audience who can influence the buying behaviour of that audience. The ultimate example is Oprah—when she endorses a product or service, millions flock to it.

As magical as that would be for any business, it’s definitely not easy to be endorsed by Oprah. The good news, however, is influence isn’t just for celebrities anymore. There are hundreds and likely even thousands of influencers blogging and on social networks who can get the word out about your product or service and in a beneficial way. Think of it as an extension of media relations.

However, it’s not exactly like media relations—influencers usually aren’t journalists, and many don’t take nicely to an unsolicited pitch. So how can you reach influencers and get a positive return? Here’s a few pointers:

• Make sure it’s the right influence: Don’t be fooled by numbers—these days people can build up large numbers of Twitter followers, but still not carry a lot of influence. Influence involves a lot more than big numbers. Google the person, find out what others say about him or her and most importantly make sure his/her audience is relevant to what you do!

• Forget pitching, build real relationships: If the influencers you’re targeting are involved in your industry, you should have no problem finding common ground. Invite them for coffee, seek them out at trade shows, stop pitching and take the time to really get to know them first!

• Create a spark: When people talk about products they really love—it’s obvious and that passion is what attracts others to follow suit. So instead of asking an influencer to talk about your product, consider giving him/her access and guidance. Hopefully she/he will fall in love and want to talk about it. Also, look to your existing user base for influencers, if they’re already there and in love, approach them about making the love more public and offer to help.
  

• Be weary of paying for influence: Many do, and I’m not saying it can’t be a successful strategy, but know what you’re getting into first. Last year, the FTC passed a law stating that bloggers are required to disclose payment or other perks received from companies. The reason for this is because readers are less likely to trust an endorsement if money is involved (and probably rightly so). If you do choose to go the pay route, make sure you know the law and won’t get yourself (or your target influencers) in trouble. Also be sure to measure the impact and ROI of paying for influence and make sure it’s worth your investment.

• Measure your success: While it’s important to measure the buzz generated from an influencer’s endorsement, make sure you can trace it back to your bottom line as well. A great way to do this, is to offer a discount to the influencer’s readers and provide a unique discount code. Or simply ask the person to use a custom URL to measure traffic and how it converts.

from Katie D. Paine's blog

Still winding down from an exciting day at #Meshmarketing in Toronto yesterday (huge thanks to the organizers for a great event). I sat in on four fabulous presentations, but the highlight for me was Katie D. Paine‘s “Social Media Analytics – What, Why and How.”

All day, there were lots of questions about social media ROI and what to measure, both in the presentations, and in talking with other attendees. Katie’s presentation at the end of the day wrapped it up perfectly: The main point was “yes, you CAN measure social media ROI”

She explained the seven steps to social media ROI, you can find all this and more in her presentation, but in short they are:

1. Define the “R” – What are the expected results?
2. Define the “I” – What’s the investment? (She also points out that social media is not, in fact, free–”Do you work for free?” she asked)
3. Understand your audience and what motivates them
4. Define the metrics  (what you want to become)
5. Determine what you are benchmarking against
6. Pick a tool and undergo research
7. Analysis – because research without insight is just trivia

The best part about these steps is that they don’t *just* apply to social media, but any type of measurement.  The challenge with social media is it’s not yet widely adopted, but now you’re equipped to go out and lead the way, so what are you waiting for?

If you missed Mesh Marketing, but were in Ottawa, I hope you were able to catch Katie at Third Tuesday Ottawa. If not, I encourage you to check out the slide presentation or follow her blog.

e-Marketer today published a study saying that social media measurement lags adoption. The difference was quite large: while 86% of respondents had adopted social technologies, only 16% were measuring ROI.

Shocking, yes. But does this tell the whole story? While ROI is a great metric for tying efforts to a dollar value… It’s not the be-all end-all of social media measurement. In fact, if it is the only metric you’re looking at, ROI is actually poor measure of social media efforts.

If you are using it to its full potential, the real value of social media is in the relationships you build with customers and potential customers. The stronger these relationships are, the more likely they are going to turn into money–either directly or through referrals. This is what is often referred to as community building, and why many companies are hiring community managers. The downside to community building, from a measurement point of view, is it’s not an immediate gain… It’s not easily measureable and it’s definitely not easily turned into an ROI figure.

How can you measure community building? Engagement–Look at who is talking about you and how often. Sentiment–Are people talking about you positively or negatively? If you do it well and track these relationships over time, you’ll likely see them turn into dollars.

It should also be mentioned that community building is not just about posting to Twitter/Facebook, blogging and creating Youtube videos. It’s also essential you have a solid product or service and excellent customer service to succeed. This is another measurement obstacle, because you can have the best community manager in the world, but still fail if your offering is not up to par. This problem can’t necessarily be captured in ROI or any other metric unless it’s overwhelmingly obvious (it’s often not).

I can’t comment on whether or not the respondents in the study are measuring more than ROI, but I would hope so. What do you think? Should I be more worried about the lack of ROI measurement?