I came across this interesting article on searchenginewatch.com and it brought up some great points about how to measure social media.  Once these tools become more mainstream, companies will be confident deploying social media strategies that can produce measurable results.  Below is an excerpt from their article:

“ As with most social media activity, the majority of interactions occur off your site, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t analyze your site’s social media referred visitor segment. To get the most value out of your analysis, you should break the segment into two sub-segments:

1. Social media referred visits that are attributed to your efforts.
2. Social media referred visits that are attributed to individuals outside your company.”

Once you have identified both segments, compile a list and identify which social media networks send the most traffic to your site. A second step would be to research other sites that might be just as beneficial and add them to the list.

You have completed your lists and you are ready to jump in. Fan pages and profiles are created, links pointing to a landing page or your website are set, but how do we measure? There are a number of social media monitoring tools out on the web that are free and on a paid subscription base that you can use:

FREE:
http://www.monitter.com
http://www.search.twitter.com
http://www.twendz.com
http://www.technorati.com

Google analytics – You can now use google analytics for your Facebook pages. (It’s not realtime as it takes a day to take off but its worth it)

FEE BASED:
http://www.radian6.com
http://www.collectiveintellect.com
http://www.techrigy.com

You can pick and chose which tool fits your needs best and apply them to your strategy. Not sure about where to start? Drop us a line and we can help you get your social media strategy started without breaking the bank.

If you would like to read the article in its entirety, click here.

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