By Erin Lynch-Klarup
Measuring social media campaign effectiveness is a topic near and dear to the marketers we speak with – and justifiably so. Experimentation is a key element of social media strategies, and evaluating the impact of experimental campaigns helps marketers maximize future investments.
For marketers who target viral campaigns to the blogosphere or use online PR as a marketing channel, measurement can be especially challenging. Mentions of a brand can be monitored, but if they don’t link to the brand’s website, it’s hard to tell which mentions are leading to web visits, online purchases, or other objectives. Certain third party sites might be especially influential in directing traffic to a brand’s website – but without the direct link, how do you know?
An emerging technology that we refer to as “view-through technology” can help. This java script embedded in a company’s web page tracks visitors’ exposure to a set of third party sites that reference the brand. While it doesn’t capture everything, in conjunction with a listening platform, leading marketers are using this technology to target online campaigns and fine-tune messaging.
View-through technology is worth considering if:
- Your online campaigns are viral or otherwise often don’t include links to your site
- You engage in social media and viral marketing campaigns
- Your brand is mentioned regularly across the blogosphere
- You use online PR as a marketing channel
For more on the MLC’s approach to social media metrics, take a look at our post on Return on Objectives. If you’re interested in exploring view-through technology a bit more, you might check out Tealium, one of the few vendors in this space.
MLC Members, Check out an example and vendor profile in our use case Using View-Through Technology to Understand Social Media Effectiveness. Also, join our May 4th webinar Cutting Edge Uses of Social Media Data to learn more about this and other potential uses of social data.
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on 27 April 10
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[...] Track the effectiveness of social media marketing campaigns – even if clickthru data aren’t available. I introduced this topic a couple weeks ago in my post on Measuring Social Media Effectiveness Without Clickthru Metrics. [...]