After starting out as a "move now or be left behind" reactive strategy, corporate involvement in social media has matured to the point where companies are starting to see the real cost of participating in the social space, and want to see a return on that investment.
Determining the real value of marketing involvement in Twitter, Facebook and other social networks will be a priority in 2013. It was telling that, even as many companies are drastically increasing the percentage of their marketing spend they intend to assign to social strategies, GM decided to cut its Facebook ad spend because it didn't seem to be influencing consumers. But GM retained its free presence – it was like saying, we'll take all the free soda we can drink but you can keep those overpriced burgers.
The companies planning to increase their spend in the social space will want to be able to track it with pinpoint accuracy, and play to the medium's strengths while avoiding its weaknesses.
How Can Firms Calculate their Social ROI?
By investing in real-time analytic tools that help to measure intent as much as enthusiasm. It's not enough to note that someone who follows a brand on Twitter is more likely to buy its products: that's pretty self-evident.
You need to be able to find out which social strategies make believers out of skeptics, and measure how well they work. Conversion is the key.
