The problem a lot of advertisers have is that they’re spread out over such an expanse of business real estate—multiple websites, multiple ad campaigns, on-location offices, employees, outsourcing, etc—that they cannot accurately gauge just how well their social media campaign is doing versus the other marketing they’re doing. Thus they need a better way to look at Facebook-specific numbers.
How to Gauge Social Media ROI
The first step here is to actually break your business down and to judge Facebook and the campaign you’re running on its own. You want to judge it independent of all other aspects of your business; in fact, you always want to judge these aspects separately. You could be profiting overall but still losing money on Facebook, or you could be doing incredibly well on Facebook but still losing money in other areas.
After you break your business down and begin to look at only Facebook, you want to focus entirely on your ROI – first making sure to realize what you’re investing and where you’re investing it.
Although your social media marketing should in no way stand alone as a campaign, it needs to be measured that way in order to ensure you’re actually receiving a return on your investment. A lot of companies invest a lot of money, so judging how well it’s paying off is incredibly important.
You’re looking for: Overall increased sales directly attributable to Facebook; New business leads stemming from your campaign; An overall increase in business efficiency; An improvement in customer feedback and in customer engagement; Increased brand recognition amongst Facebook and better brand awareness; An increase in the traffic you specifically target; and an overall farther reach.
In other words, you are not looking to target a dollar amount per se. While a successful Facebook campaign will most certainly give you a return on your investment, your campaign is going to be about more than an immediate return. You’re looking for an increase in your brand and an increase in the size and scope of your business.
A successful Facebook campaign will allow your business to grow. This growth is obviously measured by more than what your initial return is.
