Social Media Analytics: Purpose, Process and Pitfalls

Editor's Notes

• #3: First let’s look at what the Social Media looks like in the Middle East.
• #4: So generally with brands who have little money, the best bet to get to your target audience is Facebook. But take this with a pinch of salt, it depends on who you are targeting as well as the prevalence and dominance of each social media platform in your particular country in the Middle East. Wherever you can, be specific and don’t generalise.
• #5: Obviously most users of new media tend to be younger, and the male/female split is a market wide phenomenon. Therei s an opportunity to get more women involved in using these media platforms. The topics give you an idea of where the mindspace of the target market online is generally focused.
• #6: The need for a goal/objective.
• #7: If you can’t break your objective down into numbers, you probably won’t be able to sell anything effectively.
• #8: Apart from “Reach”… Your objectives will generally revolve around three things: Getting your consumer to buy your product – Give you money. Increasing the trust of the consumer in your brand. Improving the perception of your consumer around your brand – getting them to “love” your brand.
• #9: See = Reach Say/Feel = Engagement Do = Actions / Direct contact between Consumer and the Brand.
• #10: Because this is about analytics, I’d like to share a simple process I use and keep in mind when it comes to getting the best out of my social media activity. Objectives and KPI’s are the MOST IMPORTANT.
• #11: Let’s start with Objectives.
• #12: SMART objectives are not just for Performance Appraisals, they’re for anything that has a goal attached to it. It needs to be concrete, an simple, understandable purpose behind what you are doing. It needs to have a specific number attached to it, so you know EXACTLY what it is you’re aiming for. It must be realistic and achievable with your current resources. It must tie in with your overall strategy for the business. You must know in what time frame and what deadlines and milestones are in plce for you to achieve the goal.
• #13: The metrics – These break down how, in social media terms, your progress on achieving your objectives will be measured.
• #14: Quant: The hard numbers – easily tracked and found out. – Sales.Attribution is important here – following user journeys – Google does this, and some specialised agencies. Qual:Softer Measures are much harder to find out. Need surveys and qualitative research to find out what the audience is thinking/feeling about your brand – expensive.
• #15: A few metrics you can use for Facebook.
• #16: A few metrics you can use for Twitter.
• #17: A few metrics you can use for Facebook. Google is far more integrated in how they work. Google Ads, Attribution, Play around with it…
• #18: A few metrics you can use for Instagram.
• #19: Basically the actual tools you use to measure the KPI’s and metrics.
• #20: Too many to count – Google and ask around and find the best one which works for you. Ask the questions above to keep you on the right track so that what you use is the best tool to measure your specific metrics.
• #21: Finally getting down the data itself.
• #22: Basic Tracking – Keeping an eye on what’s going on. This is the “What.” you do when it finally comes down to the day-to-day work. Motoring all the data points for your metrics.
• #23: Here’s a nice complicated table that will make you look like you know what you are doing. The point is, with the day-to-day monitoring of data, make it a routine, have templates and tables and anything that works for you Which will make it easier for you to capture and interpret the data you get. Alter it, play with it and use what works best for you.
• #24: The final stretch…
• #25: Takes dedication and insight and you must be very quick. Know and decide what’s working and what’s not – this is dependent on your strategy and objectives.
• #26: Some examples of questions you can ask when looking at the data you receive… Why are more 18-24 year olds interacting with that post and not the other one? Why is this content getting so much engagement in the UAE and not Saudi Arabia? Why did our Tweet generate more engagement than our Facebook post in Egypt? What does this mean? How can we change the content, post, video, audio to amplify this or change direction?
• #27: Ask Yourself What the data is telling you: “Okay so this means… if we do this then we can hit this target market, we could increase engagement here, we could… etc., etc.
• #29: The more social media we use and the more our audiences use it, the more interactions we have with them. The more tracking there is  the more data there is. Which means our expectations rise about the outcomes of this data. Basically, your stakeholders and clients are going to expect more and more as this becomes the norm. You need to know your specific audience, internally and externally, what works when it comes to measurement, which platforms work better. You need to become the experts, all expectations will be on you, the more data there is and the more you measure.
• #30: People Die: US has a 317m population, 2.5m die a year, Facebook has 1bn users – do the math. Popular Culture: you need to know your audience and what they’re doing. Lady Gaga fans once started calling her “Lady Dada” as a nickname, if you’re measuring the prevalence and impact on social media of Lady Gaga and you don’t take this into account… you’ve lost a large chunk of very relevant data. Promotion-Driven Behaviour: People are fickle, they only “like” you when they can get something, so approach the data with skepticism and realism where you can. Public Information only: Twitter is all public, but other social media platforms have major privacy settings which do block out a lot of data, you need to be aware of this. Generic Keywords: If your brand name can be mistaken for anything else, it will make your job much harder to sort through relevant data. An example is when the movie “Salt” had come out, social media analysts had seen spike in mentions online and attributed it to marketing… meanwhile, it was merely Justin Bieber mentioning his new tour in “Salt Lake City” which skewed all of the results. Other things to be aware of: Cultural elements in the middle east – senior stakeholders not being aware of the time it takes to create social media assets, the money involved in creating them and, last but not least, taking into account the bureaucracy in place to get things done.