Like most people working in Social Media, I believe it is not just a fad and is capable of generating real ROI.   But I am a realist.  I know that Social Media is competing for marketing budget from other more tried and tested ways to “sell stuff” and it needs to prove itself with reliable measurement.  That measurement will depend on the type of activity taking place.

Let’s take a minute to think about the main reasons why measuring social media can been difficult.

There have been a string of high profile social media disasters lately, which is not surprising with more and more businesses embracing social media, but it highlights the issue of how important it is to learn from our mistakes. This got me thinking about my ultimate social media no-nos.

The continued obsession with social media channels like Facebook, Google+ and Twitter makes it easy to overlook the role of content marketing in your brand’s customer engagement activities. Using these channels to start a conversation with customers is an important first step but the novelty can soon wear off if you stop feeding your customers a regular diet of quality content that draws people in and keeps them coming back. A good digital marketer knows how to develop content that serves a human need, solves a problem or inspires passion.
 

Call me old fashioned, but it’s only recently that I ‘Liked’ a brand in Facebook. To be frank, why would I ever want to ‘like’ a brand within my personal social space?

It’s simple; I like them so why not tell them. I’m getting something in return; through Facebook I know can find out when the next season is due in store and when the next sale is. Brilliant.

But I wonder if this brand is really aware of just how powerful my voice can be to them?

Facebook has once again raised the ire of privacy advocates with the wider roll-out of facial recognition software that invites people to tag photos of their friends in the wildly popular social network.