Social Media Goals

Tagged with: Analytics

Coming up with quantifiable goals for your social media efforts can be difficult. The terms we throw around all of the time – like brand-building and engagement – lose their meaning when no quantifiable goals are associated with the phrases. Increasing the number of followers or getting more likes is trivial if it doesn’t drive a key business goal. While engaging with your customers and building your brand are great ideas, it is important to set measurable business goals and determine if your social media efforts are working towards meeting those goals.

What are some examples of measurable social media goals?

• Respond quickly to customer feedback. Choose what works best for you based on your business model and time/staffing constraints, and set a goal – will all responses occur within an hour? In less than three hours? Remember that timeliness is critical on social, so your goal should definitely be somewhere within 24 hours.
• Monitor your online reputation. Decide who will be doing the monitoring, how often, and how many people will be involved, then stick to a schedule. Investing in a good social media listening tool is essential if this is your objective.
• Drive sales and lead generation. Set a realistic, specific goal – a 10% increase in leads in the next three months. Use analytics tools to measure direct conversions (where social media is the last click before a sale) and assisted conversions (where social media is part of the user journey but is not the last click before a sale). 
• Drive traffic to your website. Again, set a realistic goal. For example, over the next three months, aim to increase traffic from social referrals to your website by 20%. Monitor your progress through tools like Google Analytics.
• Measure website engagement metrics. It’s not enough to drive traffic to your website from your social channels. You need to measure what users do once they are on your website – how long do visitors from social networks remain on your site? Do they convert? Set a goal to increase website engagement through referring high-quality visitors from social media channels.
• Increase brand awareness on social channels. Although I mentioned “brand-building” as a buzzword above, it can be measured with the right social listening tool. You can utilize your social media to address the specific needs of your audiences. 
• Increase social media engagement. Set quantifiable metrics – social shares, email links, whitepaper downloads, contest entries – and tailor your content to support each objective. Putting a timeframe on goals and working toward short-term and long-term gains can help keep your strategy realistic.

While there are benefits to social media that cannot be easily quantified, your goals should be driven by data on and off social channels.