Big Data Archives

Social Shopping on #BlackFriday

November 29, 2013/by Corey Padveen

It’s #BlackFriday and the numbers show that social shopping is bigger than ever.

We hope everyone had a wonderful, relaxing Thanksgiving. It makes sense that the day following one of the biggest feasts of the year we are forced to exercise the whole thing off by running through malls and department stores offering the biggest savings of the year. But this year, something is different; social shopping is a major factor in this year’s Black Friday shopping. Below are five truly impressive stats about social shopping this year.

91% of e-commerce retailers saw a boost in the SEO rankings due to social referral traffic.

It is no longer speculation that social plays a major role in SEO, but these numbers are unprecedented. Social sites like Pinterest and Facebook are driving tremendous traffic to online retailers offering up some big deals this holiday season. So the results of being socially active? Your search rankings get a well-deserved boost as buying season gets into full swing.

There has been a 357% year-over-year increase in sales from social traffic.

No, we did not forget to add a period anywhere – that is three-hundred-and-fifty-seven percent. Social activity is driving more and more buyers to online stores to do their holiday shopping this year. That’s good news for the retailers with the foresight to have been aggressive with the their holiday promotions on social media in 2013.

65% of consumers research gifts using social media.

Using social media for research and recommendations is nothing new. But it is hard to imagine why anyone would not take advantage of such a vast majority of online users looking to social media for advice. Imagine being able to talk directly to a prospective customer without ever having to get them in the store. The sales process is changing, and numbers like this prove it.

Buyers originating on Pinterest average almost $200 per sale.

Simply put, that’s a big number. Of course we expect consumers to be spending more around the holidays, but we would expect the numbers to even out when we aggregate the data. On Pinterest, it is all high purchases. Pinterest’s most prominent demographic is women from high-income households. It is no wonder that smart businesses turned to that network to drive higher social-driven sales.

Social drives as much online traffic as in-store.

For retailers that discount the importance of social media because they are brick-and-mortar only, think again. Statistics show that social media is driving as much traffic to physical stores as it drives to online stores. Remember, social is a research tool. So no matter what your business structure is, a large part of your audience is starting on social.

Good luck with your holiday shopping this year!

If You Ignore Your Social Data, You Ignore Your Business

November 15, 2013/by Corey Padveen

If you are not paying attention to your social data, then you are ignoring one of the most valuable assets you have in your social business.

With every action taken on social channels, social data is being gathered and analyzed behind the scenes. First, let’s dispel one rumour very quickly: activity on social media is measurable. You just need to know what to measure and where to find your social data.

Paying attention to these insights is going to be an integral part of running a successful social business. How will you know if your strategy is generating results and helping your business grow if you are not monitoring your initiatives’ performance?

Below are three types of social data you should keep a close eye on when it comes to your social business’s performance (and a few places to monitor that data).

Demographics Engaged

There are billions of people active on social networks every day. It is nice to think that every one is a potential customer, and a good way to overcome the fear of getting started, but the reality is that your real potential customers are making themselves shown every day – you just need to know where to look for them.

Look at your Facebook Insights to see what groups of people are consistently engaging with your content. The new Facebook Insights provide some great ways to do this. If you are running Twitter ads, pay close attention to those most actively clicking on your promoted tweets. On LinkedIn, look at your company page stats to see what groups of people find your company most interesting.

These are just a few of the easy ways you can monitor your most engaged demographics and understand how you can better align your business to target these markets.

Ad ROI

Social advertising is not being given enough credit (yet) as a legitimate source of advertising. Trust us, it is. But still, entrepreneurs running their own operations are often throwing a few dollars behind a Facebook as hoping that is generates some clicks and brand awareness. Not enough!

Set goals, target specific demographics and, both when it is over and while it is running, pay attention to your results! When looking at this social data, you might find that a user-base you hadn’t anticipated being so attracted to your offer is up there with the most active. Knowing your market’s wants and tailoring your services to provide for those wants is what keeps you ahead of the competition.

And it’s easy to find! In your Twitter Ads Manager, Facebook Ads Manager, LinkedIn Ads Manager and others, you can see all of this data in real-time!

Content Strategy

Once again, simply sharing content is not going to drive the results you hope to get as fast as you hope to get them. Every once in a while, we have a brilliant idea that helps our content go viral. And I don’t know about you, but those blue moons have been coming around less and less since the whole world has started trying to create their own viral video. Focus on how your content is being engaged with, and optimize your strategy accordingly.

Again, Facebook Insights provides you with some great insight into what types of content are generating interest. You can also look at your LinkedIn Page Insights, among other sources. This information is out there ready to help you succeed on social. Use it to your advantage!

Find out how t2 can help you leverage your social data here.

How are you leveraging the power of social data? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

Everything You Need to Know About Privacy and Security on Facebook [INFOGRAPHIC]

November 14, 2013/by Corey Padveen

Privacy and security on Facebook are concerns for both companies and individuals.

In Deloitte and MIT’s social business research report, companies cited that one of the top barriers preventing them from going social is a concern with security on social networks. As the reality about privacy and security on Facebook comes to light, this is a concern shared by individuals as well. When you consider how many people have been rejected from or even lost their jobs because of what was said or found on social channels, it is no wonder that this is such a dominant concern.

That is why Inside Facebook has put together this infographic with every bit of information you are ever going to need (at least until the next major overhaul) when it comes to your privacy and security on Facebook.

Of the information presented below, perhaps most startling is the fact that over six-hundred thousand accounts are compromised on Facebook daily. Sure, that’s only a small fraction of a percent of the active accounts on the network, but that is far from a negligible statistic.

Take a look at the data below and consider if you have properly protected your information.

Have you ever had any major security issues with Facebook or another network? Tell us about it in the comments below or on Twitter!

The Power of Social Media [INFOGRAPHIC]

November 4, 2013/by Corey Padveen

We all know that social media is important, but have you really considered the power of social media for your business?

We’ve said it countless times before, and the evidence can be found all over: the power of social media is great, and leveraging the platform properly can mean big things for your brand.

There are a lot of very interesting statistics in this infographic from Buzzsmith. Every year, new data emerges that supports the adoption of large-scale social media strategies, and this year is no different. If we look at some of the data in the infographic below, we can see that, unsurprisingly, ROI is the major focal point for most marketers and businesses. This has long been the case. In order to justify the very real cost that social media incurs, we need to be able to measure ROI from social media. Considering this, we can see which statistic is most interesting of the data below.

For those brands effectively measuring ROI (and there are a number of ways to measure it tangibly) they are seeing a 153% return on their investment into social media campaigns! This further exemplifies the great power of social media.

What campaigns have you run that evoke the power of social media? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

How to Determine KPIs on Social Media

November 1, 2013/by Corey Padveen

Understanding your brand’s KPIs on social media is going to be crucial to measuring the success of your program.

ROI remains one of the key concerns for marketers and executives alike when it comes to social media marketing. While there exist a number of ways to measure your returns on social campaigns, few marketers know where to look in order to find them. The first place to start is by establishing your KPIs on social media – they are going to be invaluable down the road.

Think about it: how can you know if you are successful, if you do not know what your measurement for success is going to be? For those that do not know what KPI stands for, these are Key Performance Indicators, and they vary from brand to brand.

There are a few steps you are going to need to take in order to determine your KPIs for social media. Below is the set of steps to follow in order to figure out what, exactly, you plan on using as a criteria for success with social media efforts.

Establish Your Goals

Before you can determine how you want to measure your returns, you need to know what you want to accomplish. As it states above, KPIs are going to vary from business to business. Of course there will be some that are fairly general, and observed by almost everyone. But to know what you want to be measuring, you need to know what is going to contribute to achieving your goals.

There are a few goals your brand might have. Maybe you want to increase brand awareness, or drive direct sales. Maybe it is something in between those two. Whatever it is, you need to start by establishing your short and long term goals.

Understand Insights

When it comes to social media, insights are going to come in all shapes and sizes. They can also be assisted by tools and technologies. When looking at KPIs, you are going to need to sift through quite a bit of data. Conventionally, the top-down approach to measuring KPIs started with your goals and simply looked at the processes that led to results as the KPIs. This is not the case with social (well, not entirely the case). While you are going to be looking at processes as KPIs, you are also going to be looking at a number of other resources. Enter insights.

Know where your insights exist both on and off social networks. Look at your activity on Facebook Insights, and compliment that with data collected in Google Analytics. Knowing where all of your data is being collected (and yes, all of your data is being collected) is going to be extremely useful when determining your KPIs and where you can find them.

Simplicity is Not a Bad Thing

Sometimes, the simplest answer is going to be the best. Measuring your return on investment does not have to be some convoluted set of equations that generate a mysterious, variable-filled result. You can look at some of your more simple KPIs and find a whole lot of value.

Something as simple of your number of interactions – a hard, straightforward number – can be an extremely valuable KPI and you shouldn’t go out of your way to complicate things.

Some Helpful Starting Points

When it comes to KPIs on social media, there are going to be some standard ones. No matter what you are trying to achieve, you will ultimately want to keep at least a few of these in mind.

Cost-per-lead/conversion: You have to spend money to make money and social media is no different. Pay attention to how much you are investing in every one of your conversions in order to ensure that you are profitable.
Engagement: Look at how often your fans are interacting with your brand in order to see if your content strategy is successful. If you are talking to no one, how can you expect to drive any business from social media?
Referral traffic: This relates closely to your engagement KPI. How often is your content leading to users visiting your website? What types of content are leading to users visiting your website, or finding landing pages?
Network growth: It might seem trivial, but a lot of people tend to overlook the value of a large network. Whether that is an email database, a group of Twitter followers, or followers on your company’s LinkedIn page, a growing network can have a lot of value if leveraged correctly.

What KPIs are you using to track your work on social media? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

The Best New Features on Facebook Insights

October 17, 2013/by Corey Padveen

There are some great new features on Facebook Insights that should get marketers excited.

Facebook has done a lot in the past few months in order to ramp up their Insights feature. Remember the ‘People Talking About This’ feature on Facebook? No more! Some of the new features on Facebook Insights provide marketers with some real, actionable data, and we have outlined the highlights of these new features below.

Where are people coming from?

The old Facebook Insights gave you a very basic overview of where some of your most recent activity was coming from. Now, one of the great features on Facebook Insights lets you see exactly when people arrived at your Facebook page, and how they got there.

What is working with your content strategy?

Your content strategy is going to be among the most important features of your bigger social marketing strategy. That said, if you can’t measure how your content strategy is performing, it is going to be very hard to know what is working and what is not.

Among the best new features on Facebook Insights is the evaluation of your content by the system. See what types of content reach the largest audience, what drives engagement and even when your audience is online!

What time period are you measuring?

Let’s not sugarcoat it: the old Facebook Insights were very confusing! There was not much clarity with what you were able to measure, and you simply had to hope that you were looking at the right data when making an executive decision.

A great new feature is the ability to pick a timeframe in which you want to see your data. An easy-to-use slider lets you select the dates you want to monitor, and you can simply look at posts, reach and engagement in that period of time. This specificity is much needed to know how campaigns performed and what needs to be nixed or modified in the future.

There is a lot more to love when it comes to the new features on Facebook Insights, and every marketer is strongly encouraged to take a look at them. While Facebook might not be your primary network for traffic or business, a billion people can’t be wrong. Now, it is nice to know that there are Insights available to businesses to match the power that the network has on its surface.

What is/are your favorite feature/features with the new Facebook Insights? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

4 Ways to Leverage Big Data

October 14, 2013/by Corey Padveen

Data derived from social platforms can be highly valuable if you know how to leverage big data for the right campaigns.

Big data is one of the most talked about concepts of the era, and for good reason. If your brand knows how to effectively leverage big data to optimize campaigns and generate results, you could be looking at unprecedented growth.

Below are four great ways to leverage big data and some examples of campaigns you can execute taking these data into account.

Implement Responsive Branding

Social platforms offer brands a unique insight that no other marketing channel has ever offered. For the first time, your audience is coming to you and telling you what they want and how they want it delivered. If you are properly monitoring your audience’s tastes and preferences, you can implement Responsive Branding initiatives that leverage big data in order to target a specific group according to what they like and when they are online.

Say, for example, that you sell jewelry. After you mine for data, you find out that your target audience is most active early in the morning. Imagine taking this information, and targeting this audience when you know they are most engaged – wouldn’t that make the most sense?

Optimize Search Campaigns

When it comes to search-driven traffic, the majority of our audience is going to come from organic results. That’s a well-known fact. That said, there is still a strong part of our audience that can be influenced by ads online. Imagine if you had more insights into what that audience was.

For SEM (search engine marketing) campaigns, you can easily leverage big data in order to narrow your scope and drive a higher click-through rate (CTR). On Google, anything above 1% is considered a strong CTR. Imagine knowing exactly what demographics like to click on your ads and targeting only that group. You may not see as many impressions, but rest assured your CTR will soar!

Increase Internal Efficiency

Marketing patriarch John Wanamaker said, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” That is no longer the case with big data.

Think outside just your marketing and advertising departments. You know where to allocate budgets and how much it costs departments to run. Now, when you look at data to see an even more in-depth analysis of where your dollars are best spent (i.e. what dollars provide you with the highest return on investment) you can eliminate waste from your budget and ensure that your spending – in marketing and elsewhere – is completely optimized.

Engage in Real-Time Marketing

Similar to Responsive Branding, real-time marketing is the concept of engaging with your audience while they are talking and capitalizing on events as they are happening. Monitoring your data in real time is a difficult task. The payoffs, however, can be great. First-mover advantage has never been more valuable than in the online world. By engaging in real-time marketing, you stand to benefit greatly as a result of your leveraging of big data.

These are just a few of the applications of big data. Find out about more by contacting t2 today.

How do you leverage big data? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

5 Questions to Determine if You Should Outsource Social Media

October 7, 2013/by Corey Padveen

When deciding whether or not to outsource social media, there are a few questions you need to answer first.

There is always a lot of debate over whether or not brands should outsource social media. For some brands, running a program internally is going to be the right call. Others might benefit from having an outside firm run the program for them.

In order to figure out if your brand should outsource social social media, you are going to need to answer five questions.

What will go into your social media program?

The first thing you need to determine is exactly what you are going to include in your social media program. For some, a blog is going to be where it all starts and ends. (Although for best results, some social sharing is encouraged.) For others, a profile on every existing network will be created.

You need to know what you plan on doing and where you plan on doing it.

What will your goals and objectives look like?

Whether you outsource your program or you run it internally, you need to have a clear set of goals and objectives that you work towards achieving. Setting your goals is going to make the decision to outsource much clearer. When you know what you want to accomplish, you know if it would be possible to let someone else handle the program.

How long will it take?

Social media is not a 5-minutes-a-day endeavor. Either you, a team member or an firm needs to be seriously committed to sharing content, engaging with fans and followers, monitoring data and modifying programs in order for your social media program to pay off. Figure out how many hours you will need to devote to your social media program and then…

What is your time worth?

This is an answer that varies from business to business. For some, it is easy to determine. If you are a professional, you probably charge by the hour. If you manage your own social media and you bill $200 per hour, 3 hours a day to manage your program costs you $600. You might hire someone internally at a much lower hourly rate but essentially this question needs to be answered in terms of opportunity cost.

You need to weigh this against the cost of an outside firm running a program for you and working towards the same goals. Maybe you find that your return on the three hours above is $500, while the outside firms generates a daily return of $250. Then, it probably makes sense to run the program internally. Before making this call, however, you need to answer this questions with some good-old-fashioned math.

Can you collaborate?

Some people like to micro manage. It’s not for everyone, but for some people, it is how they like things to run. To each their own. If this is the case, you might want to avoid including anyone, outside firms included, in the management of your social media program. It simply won’t work. There needs to be collaboration.

Answer these questions and figure out what is going to work for you. Maybe you want to outsource your entire program and let a team of professionals handle everything. Maybe you want to keep everything in-house and do it all yourself. Maybe you want to outsource some parts of it and run other aspects, like Social Care, internally. Answer these questions before making the call.

Have you outsourced your social media? Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

To find out more about the consulting services offered by t2, click here.

How Social Media is Changing the World [INFOGRAPHIC]

October 4, 2013/by Corey Padveen

Social media is changing the world and the proof is in the numbers!

When we write articles, we are often talking about how social media is changing the world from a business perspective. But when we take a step back, we can see just how important social media is on a much grander scale!

This great infographic from MyLife shows how social media has made a dramatic impact on our lives. Perhaps the most interesting piece of data in the infographic is how people aged 50-64 spend roughly 2.4 hours per day on social media websites! That goes to show how this new media has penetrated virtually every market.

Of course, these data can be looked at from a business perspective. It’s easy to look at these numbers and see how social media has an impact on every aspect of our lives – business in particular.

Take a look at the data below and let us know which data you think is most impressive or interesting. Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

5 Steps to Make Your Company a Social Business

September 27, 2013/by Corey Padveen

There are a few key steps your brand needs to take in order to be considered a ‘Social Business’.

In the last segment of this week’s ‘Social Business’ theme, we thought we would focus on the steps a brand needs to take in order to make itself a ‘Social Business’.

Some of these steps may seem redundant or a little too simple, but the reality is that every one builds off of the last, and the transition of a business into the social era needs to follow a clear outline. Making your business social is not simply about registering your company on Facebook or LinkedIn (although that is among the five steps); there is much more to it.

Step 1: Determine Your Social Business Goals

What is it your brand wants to achieve by becoming social? Like any other business endeavour, you need to set goals for the social functions of your business.

Some goals are going to be obvious and fairly superficial; you might want to increase sales, or improve customer service by offering Social Care. The key is to focus on the business applications of going social.

Every one of the objectives you set for yourself when it comes to making your business social should have a focus on creating value (Social Equity) in both the short and long terms for your brand.

Step 2: Bring Your Brand to the Socialsphere

Figure out what networks are going to help you best achieve the goals you have set for yourself and create accounts for your business on these networks.

Not every network will be right for your brand. Pinterest is a great resource, but only for certain industries. Not everyone is going to derive benefits from Pinterest. Figure out where the audiences that you want to target are active, and share you content with them.

Step 3: Engage Your Growing Audience

Your content strategy is going to help you determine what generates engagement for your three key audiences on social media that we discussed earlier this week. Once you have put together a proper content strategy, you are going to want to start engaging with your audience in order to keep them coming back.

People have an inherently short attention span when it comes to the web. With the virtually endless amount of content out there, you need to give them a reason to keep coming back to you. Being an active brand in the conversation is going to be key when it comes to building a ‘Social Business’.

Step 4: Leverage Big Data

Everything you do on social channels – from blogging to tweeting – is going to provide you with extremely valuable data that you should be incorporating into your strategy.

Simply sharing content is only half of the process – and not the more important half. Study your data, learn about your audience, customers and business and use that data, maybe in the form of Responsive Branding, in order to grow and expand your business in existing markets that you have yet to cultivate.

Step 5: Go Beyond Marketing

Your marketing and advertising departments might be the driving force behind your social selling strategy, but they should not be the only departments active on social media.

People do not necessarily want to engage with a faceless brand. Your C-suite and other departments should be engaging on social platforms and growing their audiences as well. In order to become a truly ‘Social Business’, it is going to take a lot more than your brand being on social. Every department needs to embrace the opportunities social offers.

Follow these five steps and it won’t be long before your find that you are a part of a ‘Social Business’.

We hope you enjoyed this week’s special segment on Social Business! Be sure to let us know what you think. Tell us in the comments below or on Twitter!

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