Social Media – Effective But Difficult to Track?

Which social media tactic do you think is most effective? According to a new report at MarketingSherpa.com, user reviews or ratings, and blogger or online journalist relationships are the two most effective social media tactics–and two of the most difficult to track.

The MarketingSherpa chart compares how effective a tactic is considered with how accurately it is measured. Obviously many of the latest and greatest social media tactics are so new that the tracking systems haven’t yet caught up with the technology.

The other side of the issue is that connecting with your prospects and buyers “socially” is much less scientific than tracking how many click-thrus you get on your Google ad.

Reputation, word of mouth and recommendations can be difficult to measure. However, here are a few tools to keep tabs on how you are doing:

• Google Alerts.  Make sure you know when and where your name, products and websites are mentioned online with this free tool from Google that emails you.
• TwitBeep.  This site helps you keep track of who is tweeting about your products, websites or name on Twitter.

You can also find some less direct numbers to track, for example,

• Are your Facebook friends increasing naturally?
• Do you get more comments on your blog this month than last month?
• How many Twitter followers do you have?

While these numbers won’t tell you exactly about your ROI, it does give you a good idea if your reach is spreading.

And if you were wondering what was the least effective social media tactic? Advertising. Imagine that.

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