Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest,
Instagram, Linkedin, and Tumblr are comprise over 88% of U.S. social media market
share (see graph below). Businesses and individuals alike heavily use these sites,
and the more these sites are used, the more important it is to understand how
to use web analytics to leverage information collection from social media
usage. Both Google and Twitter provide their own analytic software, but there
is a wide variety of other companies which provide similar services (some are
free, others require payment).
For commercial use, Google analytics recommends
measuring the impact of social media by quantifying the value of conversions
and by knowing which sources referred visitors. Stephane Hamel, on his online-behavior
web site, argues that social media return on investment is useless, that “social
media ROI can only exist when measured and clearly correlated against clearly
defined business outcomes.” In his article discussing analytics trends he
writes that companies that use social media are often trying to improve soft
metrics, that is, they use social media to give an unplanned boost to web
traffic or to revenue. If companies truly want to measure the impact of social
media they can do so with analytics, but they must do it in a thoughtful way
that focuses on predetermined and well-defined metrics. “Big data,” a new buzzword
has become popular as a new way for companies to increase their bottom lines.
Big data is great for a business, but only when coupled with a company’s
ability to analyze such data and to come to meaningful conclusions; otherwise,
they only have masses of data that they are unable to draw any information
from. In September 2011, Twitter
released Twitter Web Analytics so that users could understand how much of their
site is being shared across Twitter, quantify the traffic that Twitter
facilitates to their site, and measure the impact of a site’s integration of
the Tweet button. All of these features can help a company to move away from soft
metrics and instead quantify the impact that Twitter has on their site so that
they can truly calculate social media return on investment.
Another twitter analytics tool, Twtrland, can be
useful for both individuals and for companies as they navigate through over 500
million registered twitter users. Twtrland allows users to search for names,
locations, or tags and returns a set of twitter accounts that fit the search
criteria. Once a user selects a account, Twtrland quantifies the gender,
country, and type of user (casual, power user, celebrity, etc.) for all of that
account’s followers. For example, followers of the NRA’s twitter account are
68% male, 95% are from the U.S., 8% are power users, 0% are celebrities; those
numbers can be compared with those of Justin Bieber’s followers: 74% women, 34%
from the United States, 64% power users, and 8% celebrities. The social
analytics tool also displays the number of tweets per day, the retweets per 100
tweets, replies per 100 tweets, tweet content distribution (replies, links,
pictures, etc.), and identifies other tags and twitter accounts that the user
might be interested in. This tool is not only useful for the average twitter user who subscribes for personal use,
but could also help companies to identify target audiences, view key metrics,
and track progress as they refine their social media presence.
In the end, social media analytics can be used by any
type of user. Whether it’s to find new accounts to follow or to monitor the
effect that a company’s social media strategy has on profits, using sites like
Google Analytics, Twitter Web Analytics, and Twtrland can provide meaningful
information, so long as it is implemented diligently and with the right focus
and metrics.
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Thank you for sharing. This is excellent info for companies wanting to know more about their own social media presence.
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