Morgan McLintic on PR and Performance

Social media measurement - basic metrics

Social media is easy to measure. That’s one of the most compelling factorsof online behavior – it’s trackable and comparable. And for marketers that means we can combine the creative right-brained activities with the logical left. We can fly by instruments, not just gut reaction. And we can demonstrate progress. That’s not the same as Return on Investment, but for many companies, it's more feedback than they have on other areas of the business. Measurement helps us learn what’s working, do more of it and do it better.

So what should you be tracking as a minimum? Here are five dials you should have on your social media flightdeck:

• Blog – traffic over time, comment numbers over time, posts, comments per post, inbound links, RSS subscribers
  The goal here is to track your reach and basic level of engagement. You can get the traffic and comment numbers from your blog platform. Feedburner will enable you to get the number of RSS subscribers. Technorati's Authority index tracks the number of inbound links (although they've removed Watchlists as a service it seems).

• Commenting – number of comments you make, number of different blogs commented on
  The goal here is to track your level of interaction with the community and its reach. You can do this easily manually, although commenting systems like Disqus and Typepad Profile do keep track of them. It's just that different blogs use different systems.
  

• Twitter – Followers, tweets, RTs, @replies, link clicks
  The goal here is to track your level of interaction, how your audience is expanding and the reaction of that audience. Twitter gives you all this info, so it's simple to measure. The URL shorteners will show you the number of clicks on the links you share.
  

• Facebook Fan Page – views, number of Fans, posts, total interactions
  The goal here is to see how your Page is being received. Facebook gives you a good dashboard which will show you this info. The Insights section will tell you about your Fan base and traction. There is a lot of good stuff in there.
  

• Podcast – subscribers over time, episodes, comments, comments per episode
  The goal here is to assess the take up and enagement of your podcast. If you set up a dedicated feed, then Feedburner can tell you the number of subscribers. Comments (written/audio) tend to be lower for podcasts than text-based blogs.
  

• Video – views over time, number of videos, comments, subscribers, embeds
  The goal here is to see which videos work best, and what the viewership/reaction is. YouTube has a good Insights tool which will show the views per video, comments and the embeds. Again there are some good demographics in here too.
  

Obviously, you can track a lot more data than this, but this should give you a good overview. Most blogging, podcasting and video services have their own free analytics behind them. The aim is to set some benchmarks and to move forward from there. Which channels does your audience use the most? What types of content do they respond to and share the most? What’s the best time to post the content? By looking at the data, these trends will start to emerge.

There are many methodologies for social media measurement. No two companies evaluate in the same way since they all have different channels, audiences, resources and levels of engagement. The trick is to get a system which fits with the communications culture of the business and gives the right instrument data to make decisions and to prove progress. Once you have that, you can link it to commercial impact and then compare it to investment.

In the first instance, the metrics above should be quick to set up and quick to manage.

Poll: Which social media monitoring service do you use?

Beyond the free alert systems, if you want context you'll need to sign up for a subscription-based monitoring service. They all have different strengths - it's a competitive and innovative space. But which do you prefer?

Creating a monitoring system with free tools [video]

You can set up an alert system to monitor blogs, comments, Twitter, the Web, video and tags for free. Here's how in two minutes. More details here.

Monitoring - alerts are free, but context costs

Listening is the first step towards social media engagement - and thankfully it's generally free. If you haven't already, you should set up Google Alerts for not just your company, but your products, your key spokespeople, your competitors and the main trends you want to be associated with. By adjusting the frequency of these Alerts you won't get deluged, and can save them for analysis later.

You should also create an RSS feed for your favorite searches in Google BlogSearch. IceRocket is another good source for blog monitoring.

You can monitor Twitter for the same keywords (company, product, competitor, spokespeople, trends) either by saving a search term on the Web version, or by creating an RSS feed of the results at Search Twitter (formerly Summize) and putting it into your reader. Personally, for my main persistent searches, I create columns for them in Tweetdeck so I can review them at a glance. This doesn't scale if you have multiple terms, but it's great for a rapid scan.

You can also monitor what is being said about your company in blog comments using BackType.

So now you've covered the Web, blogs, Twitter and blog comments. You could add tag searches to that in  Delicious if you wanted, and a search on YouTube to cover the descriptions/titles of videos. With the exception of forums or subscription sites, you're in pretty good shape at this point in terms of knowing what's being said.

The next challenge is getting some context to this wealth of information, and then turning it into something actionable. For many companies, if the volume of alerts is low enough, you can do that manually. For larger brands, there are several services which can help here - but context costs. Take a look at Radian 6 or ScoutLabs (or Biz360, BuzzLogic, MeltWater Buzz, Factiva, Lexis-Nexis, Vocus even). They all operate on a monthly subscription basis. Have in mind about $500 per month for an entry level service.

If you sign up for a paid service, you'll start to get some historic trend analysis, competitive benchmarks, drill down info about the source of comments, rate of proliferation, associated trends, tag clouds and various other graphing tools. Most will also pull all that alerting information into a central flightdeck for ease of use. If you are serious about monitoring and response, you'll probably find one of these services saves you time and gives insight which you couldn't otherwise get.

The social media monitoring space is rapidly evolving, and no service covers all the channels for all geographies. The good news is that costs are falling and the free services are becoming increasingly rich. Regardless of the tools you use, the most important thing is to set up your system, refine it and then determine your engagement plan.

Choosing the best approach to media embargoes [video]

So what's the best approach to take towards media embargoes? Here are a few thoughts (in 90 seconds).

PR is dead. Long live PR.

[I'm PRWEEK's guest blogger on the Insider this week. This is the third post in a series which is kindly being edited by Rose Gordon, News Editor. I'm cross posting it here, but if you have thoughts, please comment on the original post here. First post is here and the second is here.]

Despite the reputation and changing skillset, there’s never been a better time to be in PR, and here’s why:

• Our consumption of news has not diminished. It has increased. We just get it in different ways and from new places.

• PR builds relationships. In an age where markets are conversations, and against growing frustration with interruption advertising, PR can step into the light.

• PR is about sharpening messages and creating content. If content is king and marketing queen, then PR is the crown.

There is a window of opportunity for PR to take the marketing lead.

If social media channels provide the inflection point, there will be competition - creative, credible, motivated competition. The social web isn’t just disrupting PR. Other elements – advertising, direct marketing – are also feeling the pain. Each has its own take and brings specific skills to the party. Skills we must integrate and adopt.

But how? The first step is recognizing the need for change. The second is knowing the destination. It’s distant still, but PR’s role might comprise:

• Communications strategy and messaging – knowing what to say and where to say it (and why)

• Content creation and optimization – capturing those messages in compelling stories, videos, applications, and experiences

• Channel integration – selecting the right channels and harmonizing them

• Global coordination – doing this on an international stage

• Crisis communications – responsive when events go badly or misinformation spreads.

• Evaluation/measurement – are we doing the right things in the right way at the right time with the right results?

This involves many skills and disciplines from global strategy to tactical implementation. It embraces traditional media, analyst and IR but integrates social media, advertising, direct marketing, word-of-mouth, events, and SEO. It’s technical. It’s creative. It’s the written word and the virtual world. All of it aligned, and all creating and building relationships with the public. I call that PR.

Public Relations Glue Factory >> This Way

[I'm PRWEEK's guest blogger on the Insider this week. This is the second post in a series which is kindly being edited by Rose Gordon, News Editor. I'm cross posting it here, but if you have thoughts, please comment on the original post here. First post is here.]

Consider the following:

• So far this year there were 13,434+ layoffs in US newspapers.

• For most organizations, public relations means media relations. This is the service that accounts for the majority of the time, fees and skills.

• Fewer media = less media relations = lower fees/budgets.

Companies don’t need to spend so much time on media relations if there are fewer media to relate to, but fear not, social media to the rescue! It’s ok if we spend less effort on media relations because we’ll spend more on social media.

Perhaps, but it’s not a given, nor is it an equal because of the following:

• Some companies might not embrace social media

• Many organizations will implement social media in-house with a small team rather than outsource it

• Agencies beyond the PR realm are claiming a valid stake in social media

• It requires different skills that the current PR departments and firms might not have.

This last point is the kicker. Regardless of the speed of transition away from media relations, the skills required for social media are more visual and technical than traditional PR. The tools we use today might not be those we use in five years. Already they are different to five years ago (WordPress, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn etc).

Media relations won’t go away, and those skills are transferable and desirable. Yet, the skills and knowledge we will all need in the future are not the ones we have today. For veterans, this means working out how to translate those talents to a disintermediated world. For newbies, it’s an opportunity to carve out a valuable niche.

We’ve seen the pain of transition in the agricultural and manufacturing sectors as new technologies come along. We’ve witnessed firsthand the impact the social web is having on the media. The Internet changes the economics of every industry it touches. Now it’s happening to you.

It’s terrifying, but also exciting. Good luck.