Social Media Analytics #casesmc

This is a live-blogged post during the 2012 CASE Social Media conference. This session was presented by Andrew Gossen from Cornell and Patrick Powers from Webster University.

Examples of measurable objectives

• Increase engagement by __% 
• Drive __ people to the website
• Secure __ applications
• Prompt __ people to inquire

KPI's

• What are your key performace indicators?
• Feedback (likes, comments), Total and unique views, Website referrals, Follows or subscribers, Conversions
• You must determine which of these hold value for you
• Don't measure everything, just the things that matter.

Google Analytics

• Dashboard: shows general trends.
• Break into advanced segments, like Facebook and Twitter.
• Social Interaction Tracking: look at Google's Help page to get this set up on your site. This will help streamline content on your site.
• Use Google's URL Builder.

Facebook Insights

• Total Likes: The number of unique people who like your page.
•  Friends of Fans: The number of unique people who were friends of people who liked your page. 
• People Talking About This: The number of people in a week who have created a story about your page.
• Weekly Total Reach: The number of unique people in a week who have seen any piece of content from your page.
• Page Posts: This will help you measure the type of content you are putting out there.
• Reach: The number of unique people who have seen your post.
• Engaged Users: The number of unique people who have clicked on or viewed your post. 
• Talking About This: The number of people who have created a story about your post.
• Virality: Percentage of people who saw your post and created a story from it.
• The real gold in a Facebook page is mined from the exported data. It will break down consumptions by content type. It will break down data by organic, paid, and viral reach. And it'll show you the type of content that is turning people off. It's really important to understand what people don't like about you.

Twitter

• Followers, Following, Tweets, Listed is what you get.
• Use a link tracking service like bit.ly or Hootsuite to see what content is resonating with your audience.

YouTube

• Breaks down data by views, demographics, likes, comments, etc.

Foursquare

• Institutional partners have access to an incredible amount of data.
• Patrick sees Foursquare as a branding opportunity.

Create an Internal Report to show your thoughtful review of all of this information and break it down for people in your institution who need the information. Make it easy to read and provide context to explain any data that is particularly interesting.

Patrick Powers suggests that you spend at least 40 minutes a day looking at analytics. 20 minutes in the morning and 20 minutes in the afternoon.

Klout

• An algorithm that measures your "influence" online. You create a profile by connecting your social media accounts.
• Can use Klout to benchmark yourself against peer and competitor institutions. Warning: this won't always be apples-to-apples.
• Use Klout to measure yourself against past performance. Fast dropping or increasing scores can help you identify a change that requires your attention.
• Kred: similar to Klout but the scoring is transparent and you can see individual interactions and how that changes your score.

"Tools that measure online activity can provide clues if you know what you're trying to accomplish first..." - Brian Solis

Merge online and offline analytics

• Livestream events. Andrew shared an example from Cornell about a high-profile event that was invite only.