The Socially Savvy Advisor + Website: Compliant Social Media for the Financial Industry

Chapter 20How Do We Measure Social Media ROI?

One of the biggest questions on the subject of social media is: How do you measure your return on investment (ROI)? How do you find out where your time and dollars are going on these various networks?

When you're dealing with investments and direct marketing campaigns, it's easier to measure the results of your spending, but this can be more difficult with social networks. The social media ROI concept is still in its infancy, but there are many tools and tactics on how to measure the return, or at least how to analyze how effective your social media presence is.

Defining Success With Roi and Kpi

There is no doubt that figuring out your ROI is an important factor in determining where to put marketing dollars. If you're not getting tangible, direct results immediately, why spend the money on it, right? Well, not really. As marketers struggle to wrap their heads around how and where social media plays a role in marketing efforts and budgets, there is a shift to start analyzing what really matters for long-term success: the value of the relationships acquired and maintained through social media.

Instead of trying to calculate the exact dollar amount acquired from each new client that you gained solely from social media compared to the dollar amount spent on social media assets (technology, staff, time), try changing the metrics. When it comes to social media and digital marketing, the measurement needs to encompass factors that are ...