Social media reach ROI: Communicate correctly & measure success

For many Companys and marketing people, this is the key issue: measuring success and reach in social. Measuring these correctly is not that easy.

Twitter - the discovery of simplicity?

My favorite information, communication and filter tool is and will remain Twitter. The Idea behind it is simple, but that's exactly where the attraction lies: More than 140 characters, the so-called tweets, are not allowed to create a Information to get rid of. This forces the sender to keep it short and concise to the core of a statement - probably one of the main reasons for the Success of the microblogging tool Twitter. The other might be that the short messages often come with a pinch Humour, irony and sarcasm are flavored. According to an evaluation by Google Trends, Twitter is in fourth place in global statistics – behind Facebook and two networks, which have no meaning in Germany.

The tweets are public and can also be found on Google. Above all, they are displayed in the so-called timeline of all those users who have subscribed to my messages - my so-called followers. If I want to answer someone, I write an @ in front of their Twitter name (e.g. @simonejanson). If I find a message particularly good, I can repeat it (retweet) or remember it (faven). There are also so-called direct messages, or DMs for short, that are only intended for certain users. Words within the tweet that I want to emphasize in particular are marked with a # as #hashtag, which can be specifically searched for. Because that is another special feature of Twitter: unlike Google and many other search engines, which index search results and therefore only display them with a time delay, tweets appear immediately in the search. Thanks to this real-time search, Twitter owes its reputation as the fastest news medium.

And Twitter can really save time. For example, I recently received a 140-character message that my gas supplier had filed for bankruptcy. No reason to be happy per se, but I had already spent time on hold at the hotline to inquire about the refund and had actually intended to call again. I was able to save that entirely. Of course, it's even better if companies let their customer service run entirely via Twitter. The most recent example is Deutsche Bahn, which, with eight employees at @DB_Bahn, is committed to answering customer inquiries with humor. When asked if you could take your French mastiff with you in a travel bag, the following dialogue broke out on Twitter: “@DB_Bahn: @Bertimaus Dogs up to the size of a house cat are transported free of charge... Is your bulldog bigger than a house cat? @Bertimaus: @DB_Bahn no, but clear more muscular and therefore the travel bag. that's the only thing that holds 12kg... @DB_Bahn: @Bertimaus If your dog is clearly more muscular, it's bigger than a domestic cat. Therefore, the child price must be paid.”

Long since more than banal

Even if I'm serious about saving time, you can laugh at the example! It's quite serious though System with the 140-character short messages is so successful that it has now also been transferred to other systems that are used in companies, for example. There are currently around 30 providers of enterprise microblogging worldwide. The best known is Yammer, the only German provider is Communote. Like Twitter, these tools allow employees to fast and exchange links and information in real time and thus work together on projects. with which not only public and private messages but also file attachments can be sent in a company-internal network. In addition, unlike Twitter, there are sophisticated group functions and discussion threads that can be tagged and found again later. While company wikis, for example, always claim that the information is complete, the Communication with microblogging completely spontaneously and intuitively. And like Twitter, they can Employees also communicate informal things in this way - the classic corridor radio sends its greetings. Nevertheless, there are some serious differences to Twitter, which are due to the special needs of companies: With Communote, for example, file attachments can be sent, which eMail-Traffic replaced. More than 140 characters are allowed and the discussion threads can be tagged, which makes it much easier to understand. The software can be integrated into existing ITIntegrate systems, also works behind a firewall and takes German data protection regulations into account.

So Twitter has long been more than a medium for banal short messages, but a real productivity tool. Nevertheless, the reservations are still large. My answer: just try it yourself. Like all social networks, Twitter is not just a pure tool, it stands and falls with them Peoplewho you meet and get to know there. It is up to them whether we perceive the mutual exchange as fruitful, productive and innovative or as a senseless waste of time. If I follow the right people who say smart things, I also get useful and important information through my timeline. But I still remember that at first I asked myself what Twitter is actually supposed to be good for. At that time I was from Facebook still very enthusiastic. However, that has now fundamentally changed.

uniebook: A wacky bar host from California?

My Problem with faxebook: It becomes more and more confusing with growing size - there are now a good 750 million users. Although you can at Facebook In fact, you can turn on or turn off every function such as notifications, hiding messages you don't want to read, making your profile and data public, etc. However, the constant changes mean that even the most experienced user quickly misses out on important setting options Eyes verlieren. Precarious: If you are not careful, you involuntarily give out data out of sheer ignorance. Because making everything open to everyone is the default setting at Facebook. If you don't want that, you first have to click through several pages, which is time-consuming, and then laboriously open all the settings Private to put.

But that's not all that Fac doesebook so nerve-wracking: The constant big and small mistakes that occur every now and then are added. One might argue that it is completely normal that an application does not work here and there on a page with this range of functions. The many apps that external developers have created for Facebook programmed, do not always work one hundred percent, one can hardly blame the "blue giant" himself. However, it becomes critical if, for example, entire company pages in Facebook disappear. That happened to the Hamburg personnel consultancy Atenta. After numerous messages to Facebook the page reappeared after exactly 30 days - without explanation. Anyone who uses Google to search for “facebook page disappeared ”will determine that the problem is not an unknown bug. For a company this can mean economic ruin if it is too much of a facebook makes you dependent.

From the website in social media? Is that wise?

The men's magazine FHM once caused heated discussions in the social media and marketing industry, which closed its regular website and opened its online presence on Facebook relocated. This step was justified by saying that you want to be where your own readers are. For some it is a good, logical idea because you can reach more readers with less effort, for others it is sheer madness. Presumably, however, the operation of the website had become too time-consuming for the publisher, because the magazine was discontinued only six months later. Another publisher is now issuing the magazine. The irony of the story is that the new creators don't seem to have heard of the Facebook-Only strategy: In any case, we are now working on a new website.

Costs and reduce workload – who wouldn’t want that? But even if the step away from your own site towards Facebook seems tempting: let it be better. Not only does Facebook unnecessarily dependent, you also have to come to terms with the extremely limited options for page design and other restrictions. Martin Oetting, partner and research manager at the word-of-mouth marketing platform trnd, commented very aptly:

"Facebook is a.. extremely successful pub. The biggest of the Welt. 500 million people go in and out. Of course, if I want to make my drinks known and sell them, I can now decorate a table with my pennants in the giant bar and have my drinks served there. Good idea. But why should I close my own pub? What if the landlord at Facebook at some point you don't feel like me anymore? What if, overnight, he dies Regulate changes, and I'm no longer allowed in? What if he directs me to a table right next to the toilet that my customers can hardly bear to sit at? The idea seems very risky to me, relying solely on a slightly crazy pub owner from California for your own brand communication in the Internet to put."

Internet trap

uniebook can not only be a terrific time waster. It can also be dangerous for companies that only rely on it. The company promises its users the exact opposite: the clear application of all necessary communication options at a glance. eMails, SMS, chat and wall messages in one. A comfortable photo album, the possibility to watch and play videos ... and and and. And all of this on just one platform, where users would otherwise have to use a different offer for each function. Sounds tempting to save time - doesn't it? So it's no wonder that Facebook now asks its users to set it up as a start page: Facebook would like to become our very first point of contact on the Internet. Because it's so nice and easy.

This works for many Method also very good, as an experiment by the Swiss agency Rod shows. 50 test persons gave up Fac for 300 days in return for an expense allowance of CHF 30ebook. Other social networks were allowed. The FacebookLosers felt socially excluded on the one hand, but on the other hand admitted to working more concentrated and communicating more purposefully with good friends. Particularly striking: Most of them only had all of their contacts in Facebook organized. The constantly updated phone and address book seems so convenient. Data such as birthdays, phone numbers and eMail-addresses of friends, Family and acquaintances were simply not noted anywhere else. And: Many left, since they were Facebook couldn't use the computer right away. That shows how much Facebook meanwhile the computer use dominates.

More is better: alternatives to Facebook

One tool for everyone Tasks? Out Time management-Sight that sounds for sure tempting: enter your password once, that's it. And the myth persists - for example when it comes to Google's new network, Google+, which is just getting ready, Facebook to compete seriously. Thomas Mauch, for example, presents various professional uses of Google+ at imgriff.com - such as the possibility of saving one's bookmarks here, Online-Organize study groups or have live group discussions in the Hangouts video chat program. And he asks whether Google+ might not make an excellent all-in-one work device:

“Of course, all of this Features can already be solved quite splendidly with various tools - sometimes better because these tools concentrate on one task. The question is will people start using Google+ in the spirit of an all in oneSolution to use. Google+'s features certainly open up the potential for the network to be more than just a facebook-Clone. Playing around on Google+ up to now I had the strong impression that the platform is used for some tasks in the Businessenvironment would be very suitable - something like video conferencing or the simple ways of organizing teams in circles. The exciting question for the coming weeks and months is how users will use Google+ and how the platform will develop.”

There is always something better

Well, I'm different Opinions: Apart from the fact that many users for privacy reasons Anxiety have to concentrate all of their data on one service, and this concern may actually be justified, there are also tangible practical reasons for this: for many tasks there are actually better tools that offer more functionality. Because at the latest when you think of apparent “all-rounders” like Facebook or Google+ wants more than just the standard functions, you have reached your limits. If I just think of the countless hours I've spent trying to get to Facebook special functions that didn't work after all, so that I finally gave up in exasperation, then, looking back, I think it would have been much more time-saving to go straight to a special service provider. For example, I never focus on just Facebook leave as an address book: I was simply bothered by the lack of import and export options. And meanwhile a large part of my Facebook-Friends started not to enter their data at all or, out of joke, to give wrong data. Sure, lots of butchers too merchandise Bun. But the bakery next door offers more variety and better quality - and that is also important to me.

For Facebook the all-in-one strategy could become a problem - precisely because users are annoyed by the size and confusion. As Business-Insider magazine reports, Facebook lost users for the first time. 6 million in one month in the US alone. And there is also a decline in Canada, Great Britain and Russia. Google+, on the other hand, is praised by many users for its clarity - but that too could change at some point, as Gunther Dueck says: "Hopefully Google has the smart one Handto leave everything so spartanly functional. Perhaps they manage to leave the touristy, the intrusive and the loud outside. Oh, then we don't always have to move every two years."

Distributing your work tasks to different special tools that do this job much better is sometimes not so wrong. You don't deliver yourself completely to this one provider for better or for worse and are then dependent on each changewho have favourited google or facebook stipulate to contribute. Or in a nutshell: more is sometimes less! Which brings us to the next point: What's the point of all that social mediaa-Zirkus at all?

Tail comparisons and statistical neuroses

One day the journalist Silke Burmester made a terrible discovery: namely that her colleague Cherno Jobatey, the German journalist with the great fans on Facebook is. Well over 5.000 people like his site. “I can't leave that behind in our profession,” said Burmester and launched the “Beat Jobatey” campaign: she called for it, at her own Facebook-Like the “The War Reporter” page. Still effective: Even if you haven't beaten Jobaty yet, she did with this funny one SALE but within a week the number of their original 160 fans increased tenfold. And the action shows even more: Namely how absurd number games at Facebook and twitter are. And yet for many social media beginners the first question is: How do I get as many friends and followers as possible?

Like the Hamburg career advisor Svenja Hofert, who on her blog about her entry and her Set reported on Twitter: “It could be that I make the jump to 500 followers this weekend or early next week. I've resolved to get to 5.000 by spring. When I put this to my TwitterCoach told me about it, she looked at me with big eyes. “It always has to be the big goals, right?” I admit: goals are like guard rails for me. How do you achieve “big” when you think small? I like to have my guard rails, but I also deviate from them when things develop differently. Until the end of October I would not have dreamed of it, once so much Energy into a weird portal that you use to send text messages to each other.”

Numbers game in the reality check

That on Twitter and also on Facebook primarily looking at the numbers is nothing unusual. At self-proclaimed Marketing- Not strategists anyway. Even in the time before social media, the media was all about numbers such as the number of copies sold, the number of viewers, visits or unusual visitors. Because this is how marketers calculate their so-called return on investment, or ROI for short. Or to put it in plain English: the decision-makers in the company want to know what comes out at the back for what they put in at the front. And numbers always sound good. How useful but who are, is rarely questioned. But private users also look at the numbers - and let themselves be put under pressure by the constant cock comparisons in social networks. It's like that My House, My Car, My BoatAdvertising: Who celebrates the craziest parties, has the coolest friends or makes the most adventurous trips? In the USA, this has already resulted in a new clinical picture, the Facebook-Depression. People are treated who have fewer friends in social networks than others and therefore feel inferior feel.

This is of course a stupid self-deception, but through social networks, the short status messages and posted pictures, we get to know what our “friends” are up to at any time and much faster. For example, we see when someone is successful in their job, has great trips or has had a child. And we want that too or believe we have to do it too. Because people are social beings who tend to constantly compare themselves to others. This can be positive if we are encouraged by others' example to do the same. But it can also become a problem if we do so badly in the comparison that we prefer to leave one thing the same. This is exactly what happens with the Facebook-Depression: Above all, people who have little social contact or activities in “real” life feel neglected when they see the goings-on of their fellow human beings so closely. Especially since they don't like it in personal Conversation, can check their truthfulness based on gestures or facial expressions. And unfortunately, exciting and funny status reports or photos quickly suggest that this person must be particularly interesting and exciting - even if that is not true at all. What helps? Just think logically: Isn't it pretty absurd, from a few photos and snippets of text all over the place Character close? And isn't it just as absurd that this idealized person generally performs better in our comparison?

Who has the longer one?

It is similar with comparing numbers online. For example, on Twitter, the pure number of followers is a quality criterion. If you have a lot of followers, you have to be particularly interesting, funny or informative. From a certain size onwards, Twitter accounts become a sure-fire success, which more and more people follow - according to the unreflective motto: 15.000 followers cannot be wrong. Celebrities like Sascha Lobo or Dieter Nuhr have achieved tens of thousands of followers thanks to this mechanism. But is mass really a quality criterion? Let's just do the reality check.

Media educator and social media analyst Thomas Pfeiffer regularly publishes a special kind of Twitter ranking. It does not count the pure number of followers, but only those followers who are also active on Twitter. With surprising results: Apparently, on average, only a third of the people who follow the top Twitterers are even active on Twitter. All the rest are file parts who might drop by on Twitter every now and then to read something or who have signed up at some point but have since lost their interest. They are all still included in the official follower statistics. This can significantly skew the statistics: A successful Twitterer may have 10.000 followers, but is actually read by far fewer people than a newer account with only 1.000 followers. Also at Facebook There are such data files, if, for example, people “like” a page but then hide it in their personal news feed: In real life, the news is then read less, even if the statistics still look good. A comparison with other media shows how absurd this is: It would be as if a newspaper published the number of people who have ever read an issue of this newspaper instead of the current circulation figures. How many friends or followers a person or company on Twitter, Facebook and Co. is not a quality criterion. But what then?

File corpses and future oracles

There are tools and numbers that allow a little more meaningfulness than the pure follower or friends numbers. For example, how often tweets are retweeted or posts shared on Facebook, how often a post is marked as a favorite or how influential the friends and followers of an account are. If you are looking for such up-to-date tools: simply search the web for “Social Media Monitoring Tool”. Probably the best overview tool, at least for blog posts, is the aggregator Rivva, which searches the social web for the most recommended articles and debated topics and bundles them clearly on one page. So Rivva-Founders Westphal announced the end of his site a few years ago due to lack of money, which caused great grief on the internet. Accordingly, the Rivva return was celebrated in June 2011 – in over 20 blog entries and more than 300 tweets.

The researchers at the Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology went one step further. They are not limited to simply tracing the path of certain topics on Twitter, but have, as the magazine Technical Review reports in its online edition, developed the key to predicting future trends. This is done using algorithms that can be used to find out which users of the short message service have what it takes to disseminate information particularly quickly and widely. To do this, the researchers tested various variables such as the number of connections a user maintained or the proximity between individual members in the network. In doing so, a value emerged that the Team “Rumor Centrality”. In other words: There are Twitterati on every topic, whose influence is significantly greater than that of other members of your network. From these results, the researchers developed the experimental search engine Trumor. Users first enter a topic and are then directed to tweets that could become popular in the near future. The system can also identify significant users for specific subject areas.

Especially for many companies that are still afraid of the effects of social media, this forecast may sound like heaven on earth - or at least like a glimmer of hope. Can the unpredictable social media finally be tamed, calculated in advance and pressed into a marketing strategy corset? Perhaps in the end such things will no longer happen: In October 2010, Deutsche Bahn, which had previously only had an account for the human resources department at Facebook was represented, the Facebook-Page for the boss ticket, which is no longer available. Anyone who became a fan there could do one Executive-Ticket purchase, with which he could travel a single journey in the whole of Germany in the second class for 25 euros.

Like the rabbit with the carrot

Condition: You had to book between October 25th and November 7th and between November 1st and December 15th travel. At first glance a well thought-out marketing strategy, at second glance Deutsche Bahn had it on account made without the dynamics of the web - like so many other companies before and after her. The fans registered in their thousands and also bought the advertised boss ticket. However, they did customers also something that Deutsche Bahn apparently did not expect: they massively vented their anger at the company via the comment function. And the train stood helplessly next to it and simply reacted... not at all!

The question is: Can such errors really be foreseen? People forget that - real quick. Forecasts go wrong – always! Except perhaps in the case of Octupus Paul at the 2010 World Cup. No algorithm, no matter how good, can do that Future calculate, because he cannot foresee human imponderables and coincidences, but always calculates the future from existing data material. People and companies that hope for predictability are in fact suffering from a control craze. And they still believe in the classic carrot theory: You only have to hold the message in front of people for long enough and they will do what you want – eg buy the product. Which brings us back to the initial problem: quantity is not quality. Anyone who only uses social networks to gain as many friends or followers as possible will end up being pretty much alone in the end. Because using social media efficiently does not mean indiscriminately spamming as wide a mass of friends or followers as possible. It's much more about reaching people who also share your own interests in a targeted manner. This requires listening and sharing information. dialogue instead of monologue. Talk round instead of casting show. Or, as Peter Kruse said: Intuitively swim with the waves instead of staring at them Strategies to hold on. Real entrepreneurial thinking. Only then will you be noticed in the long term. Deutsche Bahn has now apparently understood this, as their Twitter activities show.

If you prefer to stick with the carrot, you should actually focus your collected energies on getting as many friends and followers together as possible. He is in good company. Because for many users the only thing that matters is to collect a lot of followers. Therefore, for example, they retweet anything that somehow sounds like an interesting headline - often without even having read the relevant content. Because quality and whether people read along and think along are not important at all! But: don't complain if nobody is listening to you afterwards and nobody takes you seriously.