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(More customer reviews)ROI - Doesn't Mean Return on Ignorance - it means Social Media Marketing Return on Investment (ROI)
As someone who teach Social Media Marketing in San Francisco and online (Google 'Jason McDonald' or click on my Amazon profile to connect), I eagerly awaited the UPS man with her delivery of a book claiming to help us measure the Return on Investment of Social Media Marketing. I wondered, would the measurement by an increase in Twitter followers, Facebook likes, LinkedIn connections, YouTube views, or perhaps the Holy Grail of marketing - actual conversions to a sales action, like purchasing our product? Many are engaged in Social Media Marketing, I thought, but few are engaged in the actual measurement of their Social Media Marketing ROI.
Blanchard makes some great points throughout the book, beginning with the title. Even if measurement of ROI is difficult, that's no excuse not to set up basic measurements for a Social Media Marketing campaign. Before / after is an obvious split - do we have more Twitter followers today, or more tomorrow after we honestly and eagerly create a Twitter marketing plan? URL click thru's is another - if we Tweet a URL, blog it, post it to our Facebook page - do people actually click thru. Bit.ly is a great free service for quick URL tracking. And, finally, if our ultimate goal is to sell something or drive registrations for a free consultation, webinar, or download - is our Social Media Marketing driving those conversions? Blanchard touches on all these topics, but doesn't provide a great framework for setting up measurement.
Ultimately, the book - despite its title - isn't really about ROI. It's more about weaving Social Media Marketing into your organization. That's really pre-ROI, if you think about it. And that, dear reader, brings us to the year of our Ford.
Social Media Marketing in the Year of Our Ford
In Huxley's famous dystopian novel, Brave New World, the future society is organized around principles of mass production, modeled very much after Henry Ford and the factory metaphor. Ford is so worshiped in the future society, that people speak of "our Ford" much as people today speak of "our Lord" or say "Jesus" when they just missed a close call in an automobile.
Blanchard, like so many in Social Media Marketing, worships at the feet of our Ford. Many of his examples, connections, reviews come from major companies - companies such as Ford. For example, on page 23, Blanchard discusses the head of Ford's Social Media strategy (Scott Monty) and how Ford reacted to the negative PR about the auto industry bail-out's. Ford wasn't a recipient, yet its brand was damaged, so Monty went into social media overdrive to address brand damage during the financial crisis. Is this important? Yes? Is it relevant to a small business? Not so much. Few of us have a brand as big and powerful as Ford, and few of us are ever even close to receiving Tarp money.
Why is this relevant? The issue is that the examples drawn in this book, plus in many others, draw on high profile names and brands (names and brands that help authors sell books, give books credibility by name-dropping...) but ultimately are not very relevant to small businesses.
Small businesses need social media advice on issues such as how to respond to a negative review on Yelp, how to get to the page 1 of a Google search using Google Places, how to get your products into Google Merchant Center, or the tricks and tips to success of review marketing on Amazon.com. In this, the book disappoints because it worships at the feet of our Ford.
Furthermore, much of the book is really addressed to large companies, with large teams, and large brand issues. Many chapters read at a very high level, executive discussion - when most small businesses need hands-on, direct advice on how to implement social media marketing. Is this bad? Not particularly. But if you are a small business struggling with social media marketing, much of this book is clearly not written for you. It's written for executives at multinational corporations such as Ford, not the mom-and-pop watch shop in New York City that needs to encourage Yelp reviews.
Back to ROI Measurement
Leaving aside the middle chapters, focused on more abstract, big company issues, Blanchard returns to the topic that best propels his book to your attention: ROI, and the measurement of social media marketing ROI. His high-level advice is very good for companies, big and small -
* Keep an eye on objectives and targets
* Monitor, measure, report.
* Maintain a list of everything you can measure.
* Maintain a list of everything you must measure.
* Test, measure, learn, adapt, repeat.
The final measurement chapters have great food-for-thought examples, such as connecting changes in sales performance with social media mentions. They lack a clear list of tools for measurement (especially free social media marketing tools), as well as a clear "to do" list that connects abstract concepts to practical measurement. That said, the ROI discussion is one of the first I have seen in a book, and therefore this book will stay on my Social Media Marketing bookshelf - as a remember to a) not worship at the feet of Ford, and b) measure everything!
Click Here to see more reviews about: Social Media ROI: Managing and Measuring Social Media Efforts in Your Organization (Que Biz-Tech)
"Blanchard is demanding. He won't allow you to flip through this book, nod your head, and leave. If you're in, you're going to have to invest to get your rewards." --Chris Brogan, president of Human Business Works"Social media isn't inexpensive; it's different expensive. The human effort required to do it right is significant, and not knowing precisely how social media helps your business and how to gauge that progress is a dereliction of duty. In Social Media ROI, Blanchard provides the missing playbook for sensible, sustainable, profitable social communication. It's about time."--Jay Baer, coauthor of The NOW Revolution: 7 Shifts to Make Your Business Faster, Smarter, and More Social"Social Media ROI gets down to the heart of the matter: How will social communications positively impact my organizational goals? Olivier takes us through a journey starting from the start, creating a strategy to achieve objectives, and in turn, the means to measure return on investment. If you want to get serious about online communications, you can't go wrong with Social Media ROI."--Geoff Livingston, author of Welcome to the Fifth Estate and Now Is Gone "Olivier explains the intricacies of building a social media-influenced company for every layman to understand. It is important to understand reach, attention, and influence for social media ROI. This is the book to help with that understanding."--Kyle Lacy, principal at MindFrame (yourmindframe.com) and author of Branding Yourself"Ladies and gentlemen, the social media code has officially been cracked. In Social Media ROI, Blanchard reveals how companies can apply the massive power of social media to achieve equally massive results. Incredibly practical, yet supremely enjoyable, this book offers a clear roadmap to growing your revenue in the dizzying world of tweets and retweets, likes and shares, connections and comments."--Sally Hogshead, author of Fascinate: Your 7 Triggers to Persuasion and Captivation"If you know Olivier, you know he goes beyond the bullshit. He 'gets it.' This book will put you in the mindset to successfully plan and achieve real business objectives with social media. It's a hard fact that good business decisions depend on real results. Olivier avoids the fluff with clear-cut ideas that will help you produce results."--Brandon Prebynski, social media strategistUse Social and Viral Technologies to Supercharge Your Customer Service!Use this book to bring true business discipline to your social media program and align with your organization's goals. Top branding and marketing expert Olivier Blanchard brings together new best practices for strategy, planning, execution, measurement, analysis, and optimization. You will learn how to define the financial and nonfinancial business impacts you are aiming for--and achieve them. Social Media ROI delivers practical solutions for everything from structuring programs to attracting followers, defining metrics to managing crises. Whether you are in a startup or a global enterprise, this book will help you gain more value from every dime you invest in social media.You'll learn how to:Align social communications with broader business goals and functions
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