Dont Be a Like Counter Social Media Analytics & ROI

Presented by Derek Belt Social Media Specialist, King County

Follow me: @derekbelt Follow us: @kcnews

Social media at King County

My role is centrally-located in King County IT.

Bottom-up approach to social media.

Smart, data-informed strategy.

170+ social media pages w/ 220,000 fans and followers.

500+ different email and newsletter topics

320,000 subscribers reaching 1 in 9 county residents

Sent 9.6 million emails and 3.8 million texts in 2014

Counting likes is the easy part

Anyone can count fans and followers.

But how is this relevant to your work? How do you connect social media to a bigger picture? Analysis, after all, is what analytics are all about.

Page Growth

Channel Name Fans Sept. New Fans Growth

Twitter @kcnews 37,010 742 2%

Heres the risk: Motrin Moms

Hooray, attention! (website traffic)

Heres the risk: Motrin Moms

Hooray, attention! (website traffic)

Example: King County Metro

For months, people had shown tremendous support for Metro in the face of potential budget cuts.

But the ballot initiative wasnt popular.

Press conference report:

100+ comments on Twitter

#kcmetrocuts was Seattles top trending term that day

Awesome, right?

Wrongsentiment was 80/20 against. Biggest issue > people who dont ride the bus dont want to pay for it.

Takeaway We need to connect with non-riders.

What is social media ROI?

Social media ROI is tied to your goals

This can take many forms:

Reach (people that see your Twitter hashtag)

Engagement (likes and shares of your Facebook posts)

Traffic (clicks to your website)

Growth (new subscribers to your YouTube channel)

Time/money saved (equivalent to FTEs)

Google search for social media ROI yields 36 million results, and all of these sites claim to be experts! ROI is different for every project, and thats OK.

Metric Example Project Calculating ROI

Reach Hashtag views Metro hearing on Twitter

Single day 634 mentions of #kcmetrocuts 271K people reached #1 trending topic in Seattle

Engagement Likes and shares Earth Week on Facebook

Campaign specific 12 total posts 255 interactions 22 interactions-per-post

Traffic Clicks to website

Archive images on Pinterest

Monthly metrics 16 total pins 126 clicks to Archives website 8 clicks-per-pin

Growth New subscribers Sheriffs videos on YouTube

Event specific 8 videos posted 5K video views 50 new subscribers

Time/money saved

Equivalent to FTEs

Assessors Office iPad app

Program wide Bulky PCs cost time and efficiency New iPads and customized app

save enough time = 8 FTEs $6.1 million savings over 5 years

Where to find your numbers

Facebook

Facebook Insights

Twitter

Twitter Analytics Recently opened up to general users.

Hashtracking Free analytics for Twitter hashtags.

Followerwonk Find the best times to tweet based on your followers.

Instagram

Iconosquare Solid metrics and search tools for Instagram.

800-pound gorillas (paid @ $500/mo.)

Radian6 Powerful listening tool, part of Salesforce Marketing Cloud.

Simply Measured Ready-made reporting tools and graphics.

Use the free tools: Public Health

Negative KIRO 7 story airing about food inspections.

We put out messaging to educate people about the inspection process.

Home page graphic on King County website viewed 26,000 times in just a few days.

Reached 140,000 people on Facebook and Twitter, driving 73 clicks to the food inspection site.

Site visits increased by 60% over the previous week.

Start with simple benchmarks

38 clicks

Start with simple benchmarks

38 clicks

44 clicks

First surplus stories

8 interactions, 77 clicks

Both were top 10 performers on Facebook and Twitter for the month add to monthly content calendar.

Second surplus stories were just as good

2 interactions, 95 clicks

2 posts that drive roughly 100 clicks to our website each month Ill take it every time!

My ROI: Engagement per post

Page Performance

Channel Name Posts Interactions* Clicks Total

Engaged

Engagement

Per Post

Twitter @kcnews 120 1,832 629 2,461 20.1

Facebook King County, WA 22 660 220 880 40.0

Instagram kingcountywa 15 362 N/A 362 24.1

Totals 157 2,854 849 3,703 23.6

* Interactions include retweets, mentions, favorites, likes, comments, shares, and repins.

Dont worry about the hundreds of metrics available to you in Facebook Insights. Know what you want to measure.

King Countys social media ROI is measured by engagement per post and reach/impressions.

My ROI: Reach/impressions

Reach = the number of people our posts are delivered to. Does it show up in their Facebook news feed?

Engagement is great, but first we need to reach people.

Page Posts

in 2014 Page Fans

Potential Reach

Actual Reach

Reach Per Post

% Reached

% Engaged

Pets 281 2,247 631K 198K 704 31% 6%

Public Health

579 1,935 1.1M 202K 348 18% 4%

Parks 279 2,582 720K 104K 374 14% 4%

Average 374 2,619 974K 308K 425 16% 6%

A lot of work for not a lot of ROI.

Why Facebook posts dont work

200 friends

20-30 friends

15%

We dont see posts from all of our Facebook friends.

f

WHY NOT?!!

Facebook decides for us what we get to see.

Roughly 15% of our friends see content we share.

Metric Regular Posts

Facebook Ads

Posts 16 1

People reached

3,791 15,709

Clicks to slideshow

53 313

Spent Free $100

Cost per click

Free $0.32

Facebook ads vs. Regular posts

Five times as many people clicked on this Facebook ad, compared to the 16 regular posts we made.

Case Study: Strategic Plan update

SeattleTimes.com Ads Impressions: 1.8 million

Clicks to website: 2,232

Total spent: $12,000

KIROTV.com Ads Impressions: 5.3 million

Clicks to website: 2,740

Total spent: $12,000

Facebook Ads Impressions: 1.9 million

Clicks to website: 2,658

Total spent: $1,500

Same number of clicks to our survey page for 10th of the cost.

Summary

Dont be a like counter.

Go beyond simple benchmarks.

Connect the dots How does social media help achieve your goals?

Dont worry about the clinical definition of ROI, its different for every project.

Analytics and ROI are not just about numbers Its about telling good stories and showing real value.

Be creative, and remember, presentation is everything. Keep it simple, keep it short.

Derek Belt Social Media Specialist, King County Email: derek.belt@kingcounty.gov Phone: 206-263-2398

See all our social media pages @ kingcounty.gov/socialmedia

Thank you!