Domain7

Top 50 Social Media Marketing Research, Monitoring, and Measurement Tools

“If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” —W. Edwards Deming

With that as your mantra, you can make data-driven decisions—even in the hard-to-measure, largely qualitative social media space.

Here is a handy list of my favourite tools for research (prior to crafting a strategy, naturally), monitoring, and measurement. Is your favourite tool missing? Let me know and I’ll add it to the list!

Social Media Freebies

In-platform tools:

• Twitter Advanced Search
• Facebook Insights
• YouTube Analytics

Cross-platform “dashboard” tools:

• Hootsuite (freemium: some options free, others paid)
• Cyfe
• TrueSocialMetrics
• Addictomatic
• Socialmention
• twazzup
• Crowdbooster (freemium: some options free, others paid)
• Social Media Metrics Dashboard (excel template by Erik Ohlen, via Avinash Kaushik)

Blogs & Forums:

• Google Alerts
• BoardTracker

Twitter-specific:

• Twitter Grader
• Klout
• Twitalyzer
• twitrratr
• Seesmic

Pinterest-specific

• Pinreach
• Pinerly

Google+-specific

• All my +

Paid Social Media Monitoring & Measurement

• Sysomos
• radian6
• Lithium
• trackur
• Hootsuite (freemium: some options free, others paid)
• Crowdbooster (freemium: some options free, others paid)
• Sprout Social
• Wildfire
• Beevolve

Keyword Research

• Wordtracker
• Google AdWords Keyword Tool
• Search Grader
• Keyword Rank Checker
• Google Insights for Search
• Wordstream

Competitive Analysis and Trending

• Compete
• quantcast
• Marketing Grader
• Google PageRank
• Google Trends
• WASP

Website Freebies

• Google Analytics (now with social data)
• Feedburner
• AddThis
• ShareThis

Fun stuff

• Wordle

(Next up: a list of website and search optimization tools. Feel free to send me your suggestions!)

Social Media Lessons from a 13-Year-Old

My 13-year-old niece is a social media guru, as are most of her friends. They excel on platforms where marketers and businesses struggle, flop, and fail (right #Rogers1Number?).

You’ve no doubt heard (or even said), “We need a blog,” “We should have a Facebook page,” “We have to be on Twitter,” or “Let’s use social media to make it viral”?

It’s exciting, but then it fizzles. No one blogs. Nothing happens on Facebook. No one knows what to tweet. And there’s no return on investment. Or worse (right, #Rogers1Number?).

Social media channels are not strategic: they’re tactical. Tweens understand social media strategy. Since they may not be able to verbalize it in a way that’s coherent, I’ve done the translating for you.

Homework First

A 13-year-old girl has done her homework. She knows exactly which of her friends and acquaintances are online and on which platforms—and whether their parents are watching (demographics). She knows their personalities, interests, and attitudes (pyschographics). She knows when they post, and what they share (behavioural segments). The influencers are obvious to her, and she knows who she wants to influence (notably the cutie from Spanish class with the long eyelashes).

Tweens are also clear on what’s in and what’s out, which brands are likable and which are not. She’s acutely aware of what her “non-friends” are doing and saying online—the other cliques, schools, soccer teams, and the snobs. This intelligence is paired with deep qualitative and quantitative off-line research—say, insights from last weekend’s sleepover—to get a complete picture of her social media landscape opportunities and risks.

And, necessarily, these insights inform her choices and her actions.

What does it mean for business? Strategies are built from good information: conduct a SWOT analysis, qualitative and quantitative market research, identify your target market, and include a competitive analysis. Don’t succumb bright shiny object syndrome and skip this step.

Me and My Gurls Havin Fun!!!!♥♥ (actual tween quote)

“Liking” the Jonas Brothers page on Facebook was a signal, carefully chosen to align with her friends’ values. Her and her friends upload heaps of photos and take the time to tag and comment on each one, although you’d need a dictionary to decrypt their comments (Ikr?!). They gripe about school, homework, and lost soccer games. They pump up one another’s self esteem with likes and “lols.” It’s a Petri dish for sociologists, but the gist of it is that tweens are using shared values and social cohesion to create community on social networks. Like, duh.

And although occasionally I get fundraising requests for her soccer team, she doesn’t use social media to sell anything.

What does it mean for business? Recognize that social networks are not just groups, but communities, and you can’t just infiltrate them. There’s a social order and rules of engagement. Your social media strategy has got to detail how you’re going to offer and deliver value to the community.

Definitely Family

Offline, it’s skinny jeans, hoodies, Twilight movies, boys and braces. Online, well, it’s skinny jeans, hoodies, Twilight movies, boys and braces. My niece’s Facebook profile is a fairly accurate reflection of her offline personality. She goes by her real name, but identifies herself with goofy photos, funny link shares, misinformation (she “works” at Bob’s Secret: Underwear for Men), and upbeat posts. She has liked dozens of sports teams and athletes (she’s a killer soccer player herself), loads of bands and musicians that I’ve heard of but thankfully never heard, and a fleet of animé-related figures. She knows that if she posts something out of line—whether not characteristic or inappropriate—her friends will call her out, perhaps even suspect someone of hacking her profile. While her posts are frequently written in indecipherable tween-speak and punctuated with innumerable exclamation marks and emoticons, they even sound like her. It’s all completely her.

What does it mean for business? Brand matters. Ensure you have a strong brand, clearly defined brand personality, and a distinctive brand voice. Your brand strategy will ensure that your communications stay “on brand.”

The downside to my niece’s social media strategy prowess is that she can only apply it to her friends, her, and her “brand,” and thus is not yet employable as a social media superstar. But when she and the rest of Generation Z do enter the workforce, they’ll undoubtedly wonder why we had so much trouble getting social media right.

Get Ready to Timeline

Last month I spotted the evolution of a new word which—as a language geek working in the tech field—warmed the cockles of my heart.

Once only a noun, the word “timeline” recently became a verb… as in “Help! I timelined and I don’t know how to undo it!”

If you haven’t already “timelined”, you will, on March 30 when Facebook switches everyone—individuals and businesses alike—over to the new profile format. For individuals it just means rethinking chronologies (who cares about linearity anyway?!). But for businesses—especially ones running promotions—it has some bigger consequences.

To Facebook’s credit, when Timeline completely rolls out on Friday they will mostly avoid the public outcry that usually accompanies their updates. By releasing Timeline to a select group of trendsetters last September, Facebook made it exclusive and therefore cool to timeline. They eased us into it. But as businesses and brands have been invited to make the switch this month, they’ve found some unexpected complications.

The good news is, making the switch to Timeline is easy—as a business, all you need to do is choose a cover photo (ideally a branded image, 720 pixels wide) and hit publish.

The bad news is, that schmancy Welcome/Contest/Promo page you invested design and dev dollars into will no longer appear as your default landing page. Instead it will be relegated to one of the “tabs” that now run across the top of your page.

But never fear. Your money and efforts haven’t been wasted.

Here are some things you should know about sustaining your promotions in the new Timeline format:

Your custom landing page won’t disappear, but you can’t lock it as a default landing page. Instead visitors will have to find your promotion via your “tabs”. Create a relevant, inviting image for your Contest tab, give it a descriptive name, and make sure it’s positioned prominently by swapping its location with other less significant tabs (such as your own list of Likes).

Your current 520 pixel landing page won’t fit perfectly in the wider 720 pixel Timeline format, but it will still work. As you create new promotions in the future they can be designed to fit the new format.

You can still “fangate” your promotions (sort of). Visitors will be able to see your complete Timeline before they “like” your page, but you can still reserve contest entry for fans.

Use “pinned posts” to keep your contest front of mind.Pinning a wall post about your contest will keep it in the top-left position on your timeline for up to 7 days.

Highlight a post to give it extra prominence. Timeline splits your page down the middle. By highlighting a post you can feature it across the width of your page.

The fact is, while Timeline does complicate the way you do promotions, it also introduces lots of new opportunities to tell your story. In the next few weeks we’ll be making some fun changes to ours. In the meantime, check out some companies that are doing great things with Timeline, and talk to learn how to make the most of yours.

A slice of Facebook strategy

There’s a reason you don’t serve guests leftover pizza. When reheated in the microwave, the crust is soggy and the tomato sauce is lava, while the pineapples feel like they’re still in the refrigerator. Conversely, everyone loves pizza fresh from your oven or even from the local pizza shop. The same goes for your social media strategy. People don’t want to see the same rehashed content again and again. They want to feel special.

Crafting a Facebook status update is different from a Tweet—it’s meant to spur conversation rather than simply make a statement. When you recycle your one-sided Tweet on Facebook, people can spot your leftover pizza right away.

Here at Domain7 we’ve made a conscious decision to bake content for each social media platform individually, and because we know it’s where EVERYONE hangs out, we give special attention to Facebook. While we may serve the same information on all our channels, it’s intentionally prepared in a way that suits each setting.

Admittedly, this is a recent change for us. I’ve only been brought into the kitchen here at Domain7 in the last couple months, and since I have been entrusted with the keys to our Facebook Insights, our average number of ‘People Reached’ increased by about 200% per post—just by being intentional about the platform and turning off the RSS Feeders.

While managing your social media channels is a very important task, the person best-suited for the role could be your junior employees, because they’ve been raised on the stuff, and already know what works and doesn’t.

Why don’t you try it yourself?

Start with photos—just fun photos from around your workspace or recent events, and toss in a few new projects or products you’re proud of. They’re unobtrusive, and allow your fans to get back to their regular Facebook creeping.

This engagement with your followers or “likes” is extremely valuable. If your social media strategy is executed correctly, your fans will be engaged with interesting, original content, which leads to brand loyalty. When it comes time to release intentional action-spurring messaging, you already have a faithful audience, ready to act.

That’s a delicious leap in engagement, with minimal effort.

Google+ Pages: a Plus or a Minus?

Quick survey:

1. Do you have a personal Google+ profile?
2. Did you create a Google+ Page for your company after the launch last week?

If your answer to either is “No,” then you must know something I don’t, or you have just stopped trying to keep up. Which, at this point, is totally understandable.

Social media channels are like planets—continually being discovered in a expanding universe. The questions remain the same each time a new planet or social media platform is found: can it support life? and will people go there some day?

Here’s the thing: people are already on Google+. It’s a planet that’s inhabited. Since its release this summer, over 40 million Google users have created personal profiles. Who are these people? They’re mostly designers, software engineers, developers, photographers, marketing strategists and other creative and tech-types. It was a good start.

Then, last week Google launched Pages for companies, and the brands came rushing in. Google+ Pages launched with Angry Birds, CNN, Fox News, the Muppets, the Dallas Cowboys, Pepsi, Toyota and more. Now, companies like Domain7 have a Google+ page.

The features (let’s call them pluses) of Google+ Pages include:

• Circles to segment your staff, customers and prospects for messaging
• Hangouts for video conferencing (which our staff use daily)
• Sharing posts, photos and videos
• Analytics for visitor demographics and engagement
• Direct Connect allowing users go directly to your Google+ Page when they enter ‘+[company name]’ in Google search
• Search for Google+ conversations (similar to Twitter hashtags)

Is it time for your company to take one giant leap onto Google+? Well, it depends. Are social media and search marketing part of your web strategy? Are your customers and advocates socially active? Or, more importantly: will they be? If the answer is yes, then go. Build your Google+ Page. Get started.

The problem (or minus, if you will) is having to update the same content to yet another social media channel. With Google+ Pages joining company pages for Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, you must customize and nuance the content for each audience. Further, the challenge for Google will be attracting more users to compete with Facebook’s 800 million—after all, people will draw the brands and advertising revenue for Google.

Eventually, a few of these social media players will MySpace (verb: to gradually fade from public consciousness) and customers and brands will know where to find each other. Until your customers settle in one place (and Google+ may just be it) you’re going to have to keep moving with them. So, build your Google+ Page for your company and add it to your social media mix. Why? Because it’s Planet Google.

Working Virtually, Keeping it Human

Are you more human than your competition? part 4

Last spring, shortly after our wedding, my wife and I packed up our lives and moved to Halifax, just for the heck of it. We didn’t know anyone here, but it seemed like a great city, and we were in the mood for an adventure. And luckily Domain7 was happy to let me stay on as the sole member of the “Nova Scotia branch”.

Working remotely has been mostly smooth sailing—and it’s nice to be able to support our D7 East team by being in the same time zone. This arrangement wouldn’t be half as successful, however, without Google Hangouts.

Case in point:

A few weeks ago we had a major push to get a website launched on a tight deadline. It was a Monday evening, approaching midnight (Vancouver time!) and we had six team members working together into the early hours of Tuesday to get the site out.

What’s remarkable about this case is that no two members were physically located in the same office. We had team members in Abbotsford, Langley, Vancouver, Bellingham, Texas and myself, here in Halifax.

In our industry it’s not uncommon to have team members and contractors spread out around the continent. Our work is such that it’s easy to operate remotely and get the job done.

The risk is that teamwork becomes impersonal and mechanical. And when that happens, team members might be tempted to disengage and not deliver the same level of personal service to clients and colleagues that they would if they are in one place, spurring each other on towards quality and consistency.

Because the Domain7 offices are spread across multiple locations, we don’t always have this luxury—especially when working into the wee hours of the morning. So to facilitate that same level of communication, we ran a constant Google Hangout through the night.

It turns out the benefits went well beyond just speedy communication!

Here in Halifax I ended up working until around 6am—the Hangout hugely contributed to the success of my work. It didn’t feel much different from those occasional all-night stints back in Abbotsford—there was a general sense of “being in it together”. Other team members said it really helped keep spirits up and motivation high through the night.

I think it was the factor that defined our success on this project.

Some of the other comments that came from the team:

• “I could not have done it without the Google Hangout.”
• “By 4am I didn’t feel tired, because there were people there.”
• “Without the Hangout, the work would not have gotten done.”

As the Domain7 team has been exploring ways we can be more human in our work, we discovered there’s even a human side to working virtually.

Here are some other ways we’ve made use of Google Hangouts around the D7 office:

• To train non-local clients on CMS-use or to walk them through design comps. Screen sharing is a perfect tool for this
• To speed up daily project meets—it really helps clarify intent, and lets you draw insight from body language
• To facilitate inter-site team meetings and Lunch-and-Learns

Got other suggestions for ways to be more human when working remotely? Send them our way!

Read Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 of the series, Are you more human than your competition?