The purpose of any piece of data you use in your business is to help you make better decisions. These decisions can be very simple, such as replying to someone's tweet about your brand or to a comment a customer posts on your Facebook page. Or they can be very complex, such as launching a new product. Whatever the case, data is supposed to help you make those decisions faster while getting better results.
When implemented correctly, social media campaigns on Facebook, Twitter, and other social networks enable brands of all sizes to track sentiment, spot trends, filter and analyze data, collaborate with fans, and improve ROI. These tools empower companies to start and maintain conversations, deliver first-class customer service, and drive sales - immediately, at the click of a button.
If you really want to get results from social media, it begins with creating a process. The process is based on setting a goal, and then aligning the resources and activities that you think will help you accomplish that goal. It's very important to have a specific business goal in mind - not just increasing your number of Twitter followers or Facebook fans - and determine how to achieve that goal by integrating social media.
uberVU has an interesting guide for marketers called 4 Pillars of Social Media Success. Monitoring, analytics, engagement, reporting, and collaboration are part of a feedback loop uberVU calls the Social Media Lifecycle. To accomplish your business objectives by using social media, you need to go through this loop over and over again. Included in the white paper is an examination of how some brands use this social media feedback loop to reach their goals and how they measure progress. It explores why more companies aren't reporting great results from their initiatives, and the reasons that contribute to lack of success.
uberVU created the infographic below from the data they collected for the white paper, which is a must-read for CMOs, marketers, social media specialists, and anyone who wants to learn how to use social media to achieve business goals and track key performance indicators.
Key takeaways:
- How to use the Social Media Lifecycle: The key steps that get you from monitoring to decision, action, and results
- Best practices for monitoring, analytics, engagement, reporting, and collaboration, modeled after the most successful brands in social media
- What Social Media ROI is, how to think about it, and ways to measure it