Social Media Metrics: How to Measure and Optimize Your Marketing Investment (New Rules Social Media Series) [Hardcover]

Jim Sterne (Author), David Meerman Scott (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 5, 2010 | Series: New Rules Social Media Series (Book 3)

The only guide devoted exclusively to social media metrics

Whether you are selling online, through a direct sales force, or via distribution channels, what customers are saying about you online is now more important than your advertising. Social media is no longer a curiosity on the horizon but a significant part of your marketing mix.

While other books explain why social media is critical and how to go about participating, Social Media Metrics focuses on measuring the success of your social media marketing efforts. Success metrics in business are based on business goals where fame does not always equate to fortune. Read this book to determine:

• Why striving for more Twitter followers or Facebook friends than the competition is a failing strategy
• How to leverage the time and effort you invest in social media
• How to convince those who are afraid of new things that social media is a valuable business tool and not just a toy for the overly-wired

Knowing what works and what doesn't is terrific, but only in a constant and unchanging world. Social Media Metrics is loaded with specific examples of specific metrics you can use to guide your social media marketing efforts as new means of communication.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Measure the success of your social media business strategy

Filling a key need for serious online marketers, Social Media Metrics gives you an A–Z guide to using data to drive your social media marketing efforts. Inside you'll find how best to assess your Twitter and Facebook followings (hint: more is not always better), how to maximize your social media ROI, how to use social media metrics to effectively make your case to skeptics, and much more. Filled with the numbers that matter and specific examples of how to use them, Social Media Metrics equips you to successfully market on the social Web.

"Jim Sterne has been at the cutting edge of this industry since before there even was an industry. If you're focused on measurement, you need his take on it."
—Seth Godin, author, Linchpin

"Companies know they must have a social strategy, yet when approaching emerging technologies, measuring ROI is a challenge. Thankfully, we've got Social Media Metrics, in which Jim provides actionable frameworks and how-tos. This is a desktop reference that professionals should keep in close reach."
—Jeremiah Owyang, Web strategist

"Jim Sterne has been in the business of teaching us how to measure the immeasurable for fifteen years. With this wonderful book, he brings his wisdom to the problem du jour: social media. In a faith-based medium, you'll learn how to be data driven!"
—Avinash Kaushik, author, Web Analytics 2.0

About the Author

Jim Sterne produced the world's first "Marketing on the Internet" seminar series in 1994. Today, Sterne is an internationally known speaker on digital marketing and customer interaction and aconsultant to Fortune 500 companies and Internet entrepreneurs. He is founder of the eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit and cofounder of the Web Analytics Association.
For more information, please visit JimSterne.com.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (April 5, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470583789
• ISBN-13: 978-0470583784
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 0.9 x 9.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #249,708 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #71 in Books > Computers & Technology > Business & Management > Social Media for Business

More About the Author

Jim Sterne is an international speaker on electronic marketing and customer interaction. A consultant to Fortune 500 companies and entrepreneurs, Sterne focuses his twenty five years in sales and marketing on measuring the value of the Internet as a medium for creating and strengthening customer relationships.

Jim is the producer of the international eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summits www.emetrics.org and is the co-founder and current Chairman of the Digital Analytics Association www.DigitalAnalyticsAssociation.org

Named one of the 50 most influential people in digital marketing by Revolution, the United Kingdom's premier interactive marketing magazine at the time, Jim was more recently was named one of the top 25 Hot Speakers by the National Speakers Association.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 36 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Fails to deliver on the promises of the back-cover synposis October 25, 2010

By ICUH8N

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is an entirely worthless text written by a rambling cynic that's mostly filled with "No s*** Sherlock" tips and tricks. Sadly, it fails to deliver on its promises and is utterly and completely bereft of real scientific methodologies, data tracking tools, or insight into translating social media phenomenon into actionable solutions for your organization, blog, podcast, etc.

Instead of these helpful ideas you'll receive asinine anecdotes and amazing self-serving statements like, "I've spent the last 30 years explaining why computers are so incredible." Even more frustrating is that on occasion the book lands on a great idea, such as "Lots of tools are out there to help you monitor what pearls your wisdom others deem worth of retweeting" but then just leaves it as a passing statement without actually going into any depth on what tools are, how to actually scrub for things like BOTS vs real people, how to use them or which one is more advantageous, etc.

In short, Social Media Metrics is easily the worst business text in my library.

19 of 21 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Make a difference and succeed in the online world April 1, 2010

By Daniel Waisberg VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

Jim Sterne describes in this book techniques and strategies that are essential in order to optimize companies' efforts when it comes to Social Media efforts. This is the first book in this arena and it is a game changer for companies looking to increase their social presence and profitability in any social media: forums, review sites, social networks, blogs, microblogs, and others.

The book will help readers to manage Social Media as a serious business tool, a corporate asset in a world where companies become more aware / vulnerable to customers' opinions and needs. It will help them convince upper management to invest resources in social media and understand how profitable Social Media is for the organization.

As the author writes:

"Success in social media is not found in how many people got your message; it's found in how many people thought your message was remarkable - literally. How many people were intrigued enough by the point you were making to comment on it and pass it along to their friends?"

If your company (large or small) is trying to make a difference and succeed in the online world, I warmly recommend this book.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Social Media for businesses: an end-to-end metrics-driven process April 25, 2010

By Marylene Delbourg-Delphis

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

The purpose of Social Media Metrics is not to convince companies about the importance of social media: "If you're still not sure whether social media is important or is important to your company, save this book for later." I'd love every company to read this statement as a litotes of sorts and realize that understanding what social media metrics is about is precisely an excellent pathway to understanding how important social media is. Ergo: I highly recommend this book to any business owner or marketer.

The book starts with the 100 ways to measure social media in November 2009 by David Berkowitz, and once you know that, you must identify your goals and define the KPIs that indicate how efficiently such goals are met - and get inspired by Katie Delahaye Paine's measurement standards. When your goals are clear, you want to get attention and know if your message is reaching the right people, and the nature and the scope of their influence (that Jim Sterne designates through a neologism "influencity". Ultimately you want to identify your actual amplifiers, i.e. the people who expand the impact of your message, making sure they stay engaged - and sit high on the "engagement food chain." However, winning people's hearts and minds also requires a real and continuous commitment from marketers to listen methodically, as recommended by Jeremiah Owyang in his Eight Stages of Listening, participating in the conversation and eventually anticipating followers' expectations, and by doing so, driving and accelerating favorable business outcomes. Now convince your boss or your colleagues, and do so by showing to them that social media is not a touchy-feely story, but an end-to-end metrics-driven process!

What I like about the book:
- It's an action-oriented framework with minimal blah blah.
- Jim Sterne doesn't try to reinvent it all, and refers oecumenically (and relevantly) to a variety of authors, consultants, and practitioners.
Although the book offers an appendix of important resources, marketers who are new to social media metrics would benefit from a summary bibliography and linkography.