The Facebook Page: The Good, The Bad, The UGLY

Facebook. Everyone knows what it is and I’m pretty sure mostly everyone has an account.  You can post an update, message a friend, create an event, post photos, and read the news of everything posted.  Another part to it is where you can create a Facebook Page of whatever is of interest to you.  There are many different kinds of fan pages where mainly your goal is to get as many likes as you can.  Once they like it, they can read about it and see your posts on their news feed.  This allows you to get yourself out there and recognized by more people which in turn could help improve your business.  It’s one of the methods to advertising.  

Facebook Page Metrics and Insights

To utilize the Facebook Page to your advantage, Facebook provides you with aggregated anonymous insights about people’s activity on your page.  This is where you can view the different Facebook metrics like how many people your post reached, how many people clicked it, how many people liked it, how many people commented on it or shared it.  If you don’t know how to utilize this Facebook fan page to your advantage, don’t worry there’s a breakdown on “6 Facebook Metrics Marketers Should Be Measuring”. [1]  This might be a little outdated so you can always go to the Facebook help option as well to get more up to date information on your fan page. [2]  With these metrics you can learn which posts are good, which posts aren’t as good, and how to improve your page based on what you see. 

Optimize Your Page Post Metrics

Once you know how to navigate throughout the page, you’ll find that there are many metrics for you to work with.  By knowing how each of these key metrics work, you should be able to analyze how effective your web page is and what needs to be done to boost the company sales. [3]  From the perspective of Facebook, there are also specific ways to promote your page and increase your likes.  Some methods - such as contests, promotional offers and promoting through other social media – won’t cost as much as others. [4] 

How NOT To Optimize Your Page

Now there are genuine ways to boost these Facebook metrics and then there are fictitious ways.  You want to be careful and make sure that your metrics are accurate because with all metrics, there’s always the possibility that they could be unreliable.  For instance, the Facebook Page Likes metric could be helpful or could not.  As I stated above, the more likes you have, the more detailed your metrics will be on your Facebook dashboard, but that’s if those people that have liked your page are actively participating in your posts.  On your Facebook page, there is an option to promote your page and get more likes.  The problem with paying to promote an ad is that there are businesses in other countries that get paid to like your page.  This technique, known as “click farming”, will definitely increase your likes, but it could even lessen your engagement metric. [5]  There’s more to this and I would love to discuss it, but since there are great links that describe it better and an even better video linked below about it all I’m pretty sure you’d rather read about the fraud and all those fake Facebook profiles there.[6] [7]  This video is a really good one about Facebook Fraud. 

Know Your Metrics

Overall, if you’re trying to increase your engagement and utilize the Facebook metrics to your advantage, you need to know how each one works and if they’re truly a good metric.  This also applies to all other metrics and how you analyze them.  Knowing how each one works and which ones are needed will allow you to use them to your advantage and analyze the data based on your company requirements as well as compare them to competitors and the industry.  Particularly, you would also want to make sure what you’re paying for is authentic and that you’re not getting ripped off.  If this is occurring on Facebook what happens to other social media that you pay for?  Are those authentic metrics that you're looking at?


References:

[1] Ernoult, E. (2013, March 18). 6 Facebook Metrics Marketers Should Be Measuring. Retrieved February 18, 2014, from Social Media Examiner: www.socialmediaexaminer.com/facebook-page-metrics/

[2] What's new in Page Insights? (2013, November 18). Retrieved February 18, 2014, from Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/help/247808452010769

[3] Tabita, J. (2014, February 11). Beyond Tracking: How to Improve Your Web Metrics. Retrieved February 18, 2014, from SitePoint: http://www.sitepoint.com/beyond-tracking-improve-web-metrics/

[4] Steeves, N. (n.d.). 7 Ways to Increase your Facebook Likes [Guide]. Retrieved February 18, 2014, from Wishpond: http://blog.wishpond.com/post/52815764009/7-ways-to-increase-your-facebook-likes-guide

[5] Schneider, J. (2014, January 23). Likes or lies? How perfectly honest businesses can be overrun by Facebook spammers . Retrieved February 18, 2014, from TNW: http://thenextweb.com/facebook/2014/01/23/likes-lies-perfectly-honest-businesses-can-overrun-facebook-spammers/#!wgii9

[6] Cellan-Jones, R. (2012, July 12). Who 'likes' my Virtual Bagels? Retrieved February 18, 2014, from BBC News Technology: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18819338

[7] Hicks, J. (2013, July 3). IG report: State Department spent $630,000 to increase Facebook ‘likes’. Retrieved February 18, 2014, from The Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/wp/2013/07/03/ig-report-state-department-spent-630000-to-increase-facebook-likes/

[8] Facebook Fraud . (2014, February 10). Retrieved February 18, 2014, from Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVfHeWTKjag

Facebook advertising and the value of a ‘like’

You might be wasting your social marketing budget.

In a recent upload by YouTube educational science channel Veritasium[1], Derek Muller exposes what he believes to be a major problem and conflict of interest with Facebook’s page promotion services.

Muller describes his recent page promotion results and finds that the massive amount of ‘likers’ he gained engage far less often and less deeply than his initial fan base.

The reason, he thinks, is simple:  they’re fake. Click farms generate the likes.

His hypothesis is supported by the fact that the likes are almost exclusively generated in parts of the world notorious for the forbidden practice: India, Egypt and the Philippines.

Although Facebook does employ algorithms to detect fake accounts, he says these likers avoid detection by indiscriminately ‘liking’ just about everything, regardless if they’ve been paid by that particular client to do so. The real ah-ha moment comes when Muller explains that even if Facebook were to detect these likes, it has a vested interest in perpetuating the status quo.

Facebook makes a profit with the initial advertising fee and once the client has their new ‘likes’, the engagement level is so low that they have no choice but to invest further with Facebook’s page promotion services.

The problem is that once these fake likes have been added to your page, they don’t go away. Any subsequent marketing campaign is then distributed to a subset of your likers and the truly engaged fans never get a chance to see the content. Your campaign is lost in a sea of fake accounts and the vicious cycle continues.

In my research, I found some very interesting mobile metrics, reported by the Search Engine Journal [2] in which they compare iOS and Android Click-Through rates (CTR) with marketing spend ROI.

The study shows that iOS devices have the lower CTR of 1.25% with an astonishingly high 162% return. Conversely, Android operating systems show a CTR of 2.73% with a ROI of -10%.

This information was puzzling at first. Why would iOS users convert at such a high rate in comparison with Android users?

I realized this too can be attributed to click farmers. Android phones are particularly dominant in the emerging markets and in developing nations. It is certainly possible, if not likely, that click farmers are performing their duties on Android devices!

Although this seems like an insurmountable obstacle, the problem of social advertising cannot be ignored; there is simply too much opportunity.

In the April 2013 Syncapse research paper, “The Value of a Facebook Fan 2013: Revisiting Consumer Brand Currency in Social Media[3],“ they report the average value of consumer brand fans has increased 28% since 2010 to $174.17.

One of the most valuable fan bases appears to be BMW, with a fan value of $1613.11. This makes sense considering the price of an average BMW is much greater than say an average cart of goods at Wal-Mart. The value of a Facebook fan then, increases at a rate in proportion to the average retail purchase price.

Another key finding in the Syncapse research points to the actual revenue these companies are deriving from engaged Facebook users. Fans spend upwards of $257 more, on an annual basis, than non-fans.

So, for the brands in the Syncapse study, it appears to be paying off, but how? There is one major distinction with the Syncapse data.

Most brands in the study have reached an established, mature presence in their respective markets and some have attained the coveted lifestyle status. In addition, their marketing budgets and count of Facebook likes far exceed that of a start-up or a fledgling blogger.

They can afford to bear the burden of fake likes. Their ubiquitous brand can reach enough fans that the impact of fake likes is far less burdensome.

This really is an issue of conflicts of interest. If Mark Zuckerberg wants to create his own mini version of the Internet, he has an obligation to users and advertisers to maintain objectivity. At the very least, Facebook should be providing some level of transparency with its paid promotion practices.

Most importantly, Facebook must find a way to identify and delete fake likes and associated accounts. Until then, small to mid-size companies and their marketing teams will continue to suffer on an uneven playing field.

Small scale marketing teams would be wise to use Facebook's promotion services sparingly and keep a close eye on the results. At this point, once the damage has been done, it is difficult to overcome. 

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[1] : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVfHeWTKjag

[2] : http://www.searchenginejournal.com/retail-advertisers-facebook-average-152-roi-162-roi-ios/73911/

[3] : http://www.syncapse.com/value-of-a-facebook-fan-2013/#.UW6uQrVJNQU

Social Analytics: Measuring How Much We Rock (or fail) at Social

       Everyone knows that social is here to stay. Sites like Facebook.com, Twitter.com, Google + and YouTube allow for communities of people to connect to one another at the click of a button. As these sites gather subscriber bases in the hundreds of millions, businesses are looking at ways in which they can leverage social to impact the bottom line. Marketers are diving head first in the race to obtain the most likes, +1’s, and re-tweets in order to provide stronger positions for their brands. An unfortunate reality of this strong push towards social media marketing is that marketers are ignorant of the means in which to quantify how every Facebook “like” or Google “+1” impacts their business. Instead of looking at how optimal their involvement in social media is, the organization focuses on insightful metrics that common place tells them are important.

What can we track?

      Marketing efforts on social media can be more than content saturation and posting pandemonium. According to Avanish [1], social media metrics can be reduced to four aspects that provide practitioners insight into the effectiveness of their social media brand promotion campaigns. These metrics provide analytical insights that allow you to understand who your audience is and how to effectively engage them.

1. Conversion Rate: # of Comments Per Post

    Where e-commerce conversions generally describe a completed sale, social conversions occur when subscribers to your social asset connect with you through comments or replies to the content that you have posted. Conversion rates are calculated by finding the amount of audience comments per posting. Achieving higher conversion rates can mean that content is engaging your audience and driving return visits and additional brand interaction. Beware posting content that artificially stimulates audience interaction and focus on obtaining genuine engagement with a message that is in line with your brand and organization.

2. Amplification Rate: # of Shares Per Post

   Many channels of advertisement provide only a limited amount of impressions per add. Social media has the added benefit of enabling audience members in your own network to provide additional exposure to audience members within their own networks. Amplification rate describes the rate at which people take your original content and distribute it through their own social networks. Amplification actions may go by different terms based on the social site (re-tweet on twitter, share on YouTube Facebook and Google +), but each action amplifies the reach of the original posting. Analysis begins by categorizing content which obtained the highest amplification rates and finding similarities in order to influence future postings.





3. Applause Rate: # of Likes/+1 Per Post

    All of today’s social media sites provide users a means to provide immediate feedback to content and comments from other user. Applause rate is the number of “kudos” (favorites, likes, +1s) per post. This metric allows marketers an insight into what content audience members like and dislike, while simultaneously notifying others in their social graph that they endorse your content. These endorsements follow your content and provide credibility to users who might have discovered it through search. 





4. Economic Value: Value Per Visitor

   Even though the previous metrics are an important way of quantifying how effectively your organization participates in social media, most high level managers need to be educated on the value that is derived from social efforts before allocating any additional resources. Social economic value is a combination of revenue generated and reduced costs that social media campaign’s produce. Before we are able to discover how social drives economic value, organizations need to define what their micro conversions are.

Micro Conversions

   Micro conversions are web site engagement actions taken by users that are not overall conversion goals for the entire site. For example, when a user comes to your site to research what comments people are leaving for your products, but fails to make a purchase (a macro conversion goal), that individual has participated in a micro conversion. Organizations who define and track these micro conversions are able to gain insight on how aggregated micro conversions influence macro conversions. (2)

   Micro conversions relate to social economic value in that once defined, our analytics tools are able to track how and quantify exactly how our micro conversions are influencing the money making conversions that mangers love. A micro conversions may look like any customer who looks at a support page, blog, or product info on our site. We then take that data and compare it to the amount of referrals from the social sites we participate in and the amount of macro conversions, we are able to prove that social participation can generate value to an organization.(3)




Take Away

   Social media analytics can and must be used as a means of objectively measuring how effectively organizations are able to leverage social media to add economic value. However, social media’s most effective role in any organization is how it allows us to define our marketing message, while providing a communication tool that allows us to build relationships with our customers. Social marketers usually don’t work for free. By correlating social media efforts to profits, social efforts can be seen as a revenue generator.

Some Social Analytics Tools

These tools can help keep track of social media efforts through the gathering and reporting of every interaction that occurs on an organizations social media assets. 

Hootsuite: 
http://hootsuite.com/features/social-networks

Tool Demo

Google Social Reporting
http://www.google.com/analytics/features/social.html

Tool Demo

References:
1) http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/best-social-media-metrics-conversation-amplification-applause-economic-value/

2) http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/excellent-analytics-tip-13-measure-macro-and-micro-conversions/

3) http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article/how-to/5-tactics12

Facebook Analytics: MAUs and DAUs

With all this hype about the expected continued growth in the social media industry and the dominance of Facebook in this industry, are these growth trends as likely to increase as so many people say or how much of this is just advertising fluff?

If advertising through Facebook is as important as some people claim then how much of my advertising budget should I allocate to Facebook advertising? Or is Facebook just another fad that will pass like MySpace even though it is very different?

   

The answer to the question about Facebook trends is that while the Facebook user base IS growing, most of this expected growth is expected to come from countries such as China, India and Brazil (1). Facebook has even stated that they forecast stagnant to diminishing growth of their user base in the United States, Canada and Europe. From what I have read in Facebook’s last quarterly report on social media market outlook conditions, these changes and trends in social media technology are due to IT improvements. This is because smartphone technology has been getting cheaper and cheaper. All these millions of “would be” social media users in developing markets who historically have never had internet access because they cannot afford to purchase personal computers will begin to have internet access though their smartphones as smartphones are expected to enter these markets. 

So what do these market trends mean to my business and my marketing dollars on Facebook analytics?

This means that most of this hype about the explosive future growth of the Facebook user base is not only going to NOT involve users in the United States or Europe, but it will also NOT even involve the English language. The question then becomes, if this is the case, then do I want to increase my investment in targeting this growing segment of users in these countries and are my products or services relevant to these users?

This can be helpful to keep in perspective before you decide to triple your budget on Facebook advertising based on “dramatic growth” forecasts or purchase more extensive services from any of the companies allowing you to outsource your social media analytic needs.

Facebook social media market analysts have further stated that along with this trend of an increasingly foreign Facebook user base using smartphones as their only method of internet access, advertising revenue will have to be increasingly based on mobile advertising. Traditional PC users are expected to stagnate and decline. Will the same Facebook advertising strategies that were once successful on a PC screen still work on a tiny smartphone?

These changes can dramatically impact the quality and the breadth of data that can come from Facebook targeted advertising. The level of involvement with many websites is very different on a PC from a smartphone. How many people comment on posts from a smartphone? Will the future of Facebook analytics become even more limited by this trend to only measure “likes”?

·       

 

How big is their user base?
How

Facebook uses 2 metrics they call “Monthly Active Users” or “MAUs” (logged in within the last month via any method (computer, tablet, mobile… etc.) and “Daily Active Users” or “DAUs”. Here are some handpicked metrics I pulled from their most recent report filed with the SEC.

Current MAUs by region

Worldwide users 1,007,000,000 –increasing about 52 million per quarter

USA & Canada =189,000,000 –increasing steadily at a rate about 3 million per quarter

Europe =253,000,000 – increasing at about 9 million per quarter

Asia=277,000,000 –increasing at about 20 million per quarter

Rest of the World =288,000,000 –also increasing about 20 million per quarter

            Note that the USA is the slowest MAU growing market for Facebook

Current DAUs by region

Worldwide users 584,000,000 –increasing about 33 million per quarter

USA & Canada =132,000,000 –increasing steadily at a rate about 3 million per quarter

Europe =160,000,000 – increasing at about 7 million per quarter

Asia=141,000,000 –increasing at about 11 million per quarter

Rest of the World =152,000,000 –increasing about 12 million per quarter

            Note again that the USA is the slowest DAU growing market for Facebook

Segmented for Mobile users only

Worldwide users of mobile =604,000,000

Sources:

(1)  http://investor.fb.com/secfiling.cfm?filingID=1326801-13-3

https://www.facebook.com/marketing

http://www.facebook.com/business