ROI on a Young Social Media Program

What Facebook and Twitter are doing for a company’s new Social Media program so far

Janine A. SouthardNovember 12, 2008

FACEBOOK IMPRESSIONSDo you trust your friends’ taste?

Growth of Facebook fans since Community Manager involvement

Is that growth natural or guided?

• Fan growth by ORDER OF 10 with campaign!• Expected fan growth for 10/19-11/19 to make the next order of 10 (at 1000

new fans)

Month ending # of fans Fan growth Event

7/19/08 158 0 Started page

8/19/08 225 67 No action

9/19/08 464 239 Community Mgr begins to post and interact

10/19/08 1023 559 Comm Mgr talks with fans

Monthly Facebook impressions

Month Ending Facebook fans New Facebook fans

Total new impressions of Page*

Total new views of OUR NAME**

Total unique FB Page impressions***

Total free advertising of our name****

7/19/2008 158 0

8/19/2008 225 67 335 3,350 3,373 3,575

9/19/2008 464 239 1,195 11,950 11,996 12,414

10/19/2008 1023 559 2,795 27,950 28,052 28,973

11/19/2008 2000 977 4,885 48,850 49,050 50,850

* Total non-fan views: Assume for every 5 people who see the Facebook page, 1 signs up. Total non-fan views, then = 5*(new fans)

** Total non-fan views of OUR NAME: assume that 1 person views our page for every 10 people who see that a friend has joined us. Then, non-fan views of OUR NAME alone = 10*(total non-fan views of Page)

*** Total FB Page impressions = total non-fan impressions + (0.1)(current fans) <-- chose 10% of current fans because all will get a message to their homepage, but we only get about 100 unique visitors daily

**** total free advertising is all sitings of our name from the page. Includes all non-fan views + all fans (since all fans get a notice of an update, and I make at least two per week)

TWITTER IMPRESSIONSFollowers and their followers

Weekly twitter fan growth

Weekly twitter impressions

• Current data is for weekly – have not had more than one month of data

Week Ending # of fans new fans public "@ replies"# of non-follower impressions of our name*

Saturday, October 04, 2008 10 5 300

Saturday, October 11, 2008 15 5 2 98

Saturday, October 18, 2008 30 15 6 942

Saturday, October 25, 2008 50 20 11 1,742Saturday, November 01,

2008 145 95 29 5,899Saturday, November 08,

2008 170 25 18 2,480

* Calculated from total number of followers for each public reply less the number of fans we have (which simulates crossover audience)

COMBINING MEASUREMENTSHow to compare apples and applesauce

Weighting conventions so that items can be compared against each other

Impressions category relative weightin terms of Facebook name recognition

Twitter follower 3 Facebook fans 90Twitter name recognition (@ replies) 10 Facebook name recognitions 10

Facebook fans 10 Facebook page reviews 30

Facebook page views 3 Facebook name recognitions 3

Facebook name recognition 1 Facebook name recognition 1

Monthly weighted impressions

Month of Twitter followerstwitter name recognitions Facebook fans

Facebook page views

Facebook name recognition

Weighted Impressions (in terms of Facebook name recognitions)*

Weighted Impressions (in terms of Facebook page views)**

7/19/08 0 0 158 4,123 39,806 52,792 17,597

8/19/08 0 0 225 4,193 39,904 55,040 18,347

9/19/08 0 0 464 4,435 40,174 62,964 20,988

10/19/08 170 3378 1023 4,997 40,763 123,727 41,242

11/19/2008 170 3378 2000 49,050 50850 251,230 83,743

* summation of weight of twitter followers: twitter followers x 50weight of twitter name recognition: twitter name recs x 10weight of Facebook fan: Facebook fans x 30weight of Facebook page view: Facebook page views x 3Facebook name recognition (accounting for page views already counted): Facebook name recognition - Facebook page views** prior summation divided by 3

11/19/2008 line: forecasted from 11/12

Monthly Weighted impressions(campaign reflected 8/15 – 11/1)

BENEFITS IN TERMS OF US$

ROI – valuation of impressions

Month of

Weighted Impressions (in terms of Facebook name recognitions)

Value of single ad impression*

Social Media ROI as Ad impression

Minimum value of a Google Click**

Social Media ROI as targeted ad

7/19/08 52791.6 0.005 $263.96 $0.01 $527.92

8/19/08 55039.8 0.005 $275.20 $0.01 $550.40

9/19/08 62964 0.005 $314.82 $0.01 $629.64

10/19/08 123727 0.005 $618.64 $0.01 $1,237.27Forecast:

November 19, 2008 251230 0.005 $1,256.15 $0.01 $2,512.30

* Value of single ad impression taken from what company in question currently pays in Ad Impressions** Social Media impressions are like highly targeted ads, such as Google SEM ads. Minimum value of a Google Click taken from Google's cost-per-click figure 11/12/08

APPENDIXScope and Quotes from Real Analysts

Scope

• This analysis did not include– Static and small social media which may have more

impact in the future: Steam OGG, YouTube

– Stickiness considerations (i.e., value of obsessive page checkers who come back over and over)

– Future projects planned

– Track backs to corporate website itself (not enough data at this point in time)

Social Media Goals

• If the goal of social media is direct ROI, then this is a complete analysis for the data available

• Other goals of social media:– Participation & Engagement

– Reputation

– Name recognition

– Retention

Fan multipliers

• Getting the attention of a big name leads to a lot of publicity

• E.g., company’s twitter jumped from 50 to 150 in three days, thanks to getting a public mention by user “trixie360” who has 1700 fans.– Cultivating relationships with big names, and

seeking out mentions from them, keeps company visibility growing