Chief Financial Officers don't care about the number of views or likes that your marketing campaign achieved and they aren't particularly excited by a trending hashtag or a fresh batch of comments. CFOs hold social media outreach to the same standard as any other marketing tactic -- the amount of revenue it brings in. Sure, social media is important for branding, but that won't make your CFO's eyes twinkle. Explain your campaign in terms of leads and projected revenue and you'll find it much easier to get your CFO to jump on board.
Here are the 5 social media metrics that CFOs actually care about:
Who's Actually Buying?
When analytical tools were still in the early stages, companies had to gauge their social media success on soft metrics like views, follows, and likes. But thanks to the rapid advancement of this technology, analytics have evolved into a powerful science teeming with useful information. Today, marketing departments can determine which types of buyers were most affected by the campaign, what actions people took, how many leads were generated, and how people found the service. These numbers tell a more relevant story, and they mean a lot more to a CFO than views and likes.
Return on Investment (ROI)
What kind of return on investment is your company projected to achieve with its marketing campaign? The latest research suggests that consumers like to feel in control over their consumption of brand information. This means that blogging and social media efforts are more important than ever -- Hubspot's latest report suggests that companies that blog are 13 times more likely to generate a positive marketing ROI. Furthermore, content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing, and is three times as effective at generating leads. Use the current research to determine your company's projections, and then present those to your CFO.
Finding the Top Influencers
Determining the biggest advocates of your brand is incredibly useful because those influencers are the ones doing most of your campaign's heavy lifting. By figuring out your most influential followers on each platform, you can reach out to them for sponsorships, paid features, and other collaborative projects. If you can track your bump in lead generation numbers from these collaborations, you'll have content marketing successes that your CFO won't be able to ignore.
The Competitors' Numbers
Knowing how you stand compared to your competition is crucial, and the latest social analytical tools let you do that automatically and efficiently. With the right tools, you'll be able to track your competitors' marketing campaigns and gauge where you excel and where you need improvement. With this knowledge, you can leverage your strengths to draw customers away from the competition and into your sales department -- a benefit any CFO would be thrilled to see.
Market Research Savings
Market research is certainly useful, but it's expensive and can be an inefficient use of your time. Thanks to the ubiquitous use of social media and data farming today, market research can be executed cheaply and on a grandiose scale. With the right analytical tools, any marketer can pick up on relevant market trends, market sensibilities, customer opinions, and much more. If you can prove that you're getting this kind of market research at a fraction of the cost, your CFO will be appreciative of your financial savviness. It will also be one more metric you can use to justify your content marketing budget this year.
Closing Note:
These metrics are important, but don't forget that emotional connections are the basis of any successful content marketing campaign. The more emotionally engaging your content is, the more your target audience will want to energetically share it. Use your analytical tools wisely and you'll benefit from a campaign that is both incredibly effective and financially efficient.
Originally published on LinkedIn Pulse