Tag: klout

Six Free Tools to Help Measure Your Social Media Activities
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Some of my clients are small businesses. Does this mean they should not participate in social media?  Does it mean that return on investment (ROI) doesn’t matter? Of course not. I hear it all the time… “It’s not in my budget. My budget won’t allow that expenditure.”  If you want to measure your social media ROI, there are many tools you can use.

Some typical products used for Facebook, Twitter, blogs and websites are:

  • BackTweets.com: BackTweets is a Twitter time machine which enables you to search through a tweet history for tweets that link back to your site. It doesn’t matter if the sharer tweeted your domain name or it was hidden in a tiny URL, BackTweets will be able to find it. This can come in handy when searching for people who love your product/service or who are out there complaining about it – you can immediately address those issues.
  • Facebook Insights: Facebook Insights provides Facebook Page owners with metrics around their content. By understanding and analyzing trends within user growth and demographics, content consumption, and content creation, page owners are better equipped to improve their business and create better Facebook experiences. Only page administrators can view Insights data for the business pages they own or administer.
  • Icerocket.com: Icerocket works like a typical search engine – except it searches on Facebook, Twitter and blogging systems.
  • Klout.com: Klout for Business is a set of tools designed to help you unlock the reach and power of your most influential audience members. By joining Klout, you will have access to free cross-network statistics, tracking and measuring your audience’s influence, and discovering moments and topics that matter most to your social media audience.
  • Pinpuff.com : On Pinpuff you can measure “Pinfluence,” your popularity, influence and reach on Pinterest. It also decides monetary value of your pins and the traffic your pins generate.  It’s similar to Klout and offers perks for popularity.
  • Pinterest Web Analytics:  Pinterest helps people collect and organize the things they love. It allows you to see what people are pinning from your website.

I haven’t used Pinterest yet, but I hear a lot of great stories about it. I think I will make that one of my work-weekend activities – to think of things I may want to “pin,” join Pinterest and start pinning.

What about you? Are you on Pinterest? Let me know so I can see what you’re pinning!

Too Busy? Outsource Your Social Media
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Social media in today’s business world has become a vital part of branding and in building new business relationships. Some businesses have found that they are unable to commit the time, personnel and resources in maintaining a successful social media campaign. Instead of pulling your hair out, you can outsource this function to an outside consultant who is an expert in your business field.

Social Media

Although this is an important function, you need to make sure that the consultant you choose has a successful track record in social media. What they write on you or your businesses behalf could potentially harm your business and brand.  You must ensure that they write and/or share information that represents your business’ vision, ideals and overall brand.

To begin searching for the right consultant, ask a few key questions on the role of the social media consultant:

  • Will the consultant merely look for information and share it on your behalf?
  • Will they be a part of your team helping to develop a campaign, marketing new business initiatives, or launching new products or services?
  • Will they voice “an opinion” on your behalf?
  • Will they provide content via your blog?

Defining the role is going to be very critical in the beginning to eliminate any misunderstandings and errors.

The next step is selecting a consultant. Visit their website. Read their blog and look for comments. Review their writing style. Does it fit with your business or brand? How often do they blog and how many “shares” are they averaging? Look for testimonials from their clients. Visit their Facebook and Twitter accounts to review the information they have written and shared. Look at the number of shares and “retweets.” Check their Klout* scores. These are just a few of the many strategies that will help you make a clear decision.

Develop guidelines and identify tasks for the consultant:

  • If they are writing blogs on your behalf, create a list of topics that should not be included, such as religion, political views, negative comments about competitors, etc.
  • Develop a list of topics that require your approval before publishing.
  • Create a schedule for performing these tasks. And lastly,
  • Delegate a member of your team to oversee the consultant’s progress. Someone who will follow up and keep track of what is being shared and also any feedback that might come back to the company.

Social media is evolving daily. For you business to reach new clients, it should be someone’s daily responsibility.  If you are unable to do it – think about outsourcing it.

*FAQs about Klout.. “Klout digs deep into social media to understand how people influence each other, so that everyone can discover and be recognized for how they influence the world. You can use the Klout Score to understand how influential you are; you can use your topics to shape what you are influential about; and you can be recognized for your influence by receiving +K from friends or Perks from brands.”