Sergio Balegno

Social Marketing: Will you monetize social media and measure ROI in 2011?

February 1st, 2011

Social media continues to have a profound effect on marketing, and the use of this channel for marketing purposes is rapidly evolving. This week marks the fielding of our third annual Social Marketing Benchmark Survey to determine exactly how this important new marketing channel has evolved and which strategies will work best going forward.

Last year’s study revealed how social marketing was maturing, resulting in a shift from tactical to strategic thinking. However, we found that most organizations, even those in the strategic phase of social marketing maturity, had not yet figured out how to measure the return on their social marketing investment.

Without the ability to prove ROI, social marketing budgets were, and in most cases still are, being driven by perception. What is the perception? As this chart shows, only 7% of the 2300 social media marketers responding to our last study thought social media was producing ROI and, as a result, were willing to budget liberally. While 49% thought it was a promising tactic that will eventually produce ROI, nearly the same numbers (44%) are much more skeptical and unwilling to invest more.

But social marketing has evolved significantly in the past year and many marketers are not only promising ROI, they are proving it.

So, in our new survey we examine how organizations are overcoming the challenge of social media monetization, and which tactics are most effective for achieving this important objective, in addition to the comprehensive coverage of social marketing topics in general.

To share your insights on social media marketing, please take our third annual Social Marketing Benchmark Survey. This survey is being fielded now and will only remain open through Sunday, February 6, 2011.

Related resources

Social Media Marketing: Turning social media engagement into action at Threadless

Measuring Social Media’s Contribution to the Bottom Line: 5 tactics (Members’ Library)

Inbound Marketing newsletter – Free Case Studies and How To Articles from MarketingSherpa’s reporters

Social Marketing ROAD Map Handbook

Categories: Inbound Marketing, Social Networking Evangelism Community Tags: , , , , , , , ,



  1. February 2nd, 2011 at 10:30 | #1

    With all the hype and buzz social media marketing has gotten in the past year, I find it interesting that such a large percentage still doubt its effectiveness and importance in the marketing landscape. Companies have to determine their own ROI when it comes to their social media efforts. Are they looking to increase the number of followers/fan? Drive website traffic? Increase conversion rates? It’s still a new field, so companies can make their own rules when it comes to measuring success.

  2. February 2nd, 2011 at 13:51 | #2

    I am really trying to focus on the content aspect of social media markteting,which these venues are perfect for.

  3. Sergio Balegno
    Sergio Balegno
    February 3rd, 2011 at 07:13 | #3

    Yes, Tom, content is a critical social marketing element for driving the ROI-related metrics that Nick referred to – website traffic, conversion rates, etc. Thanks for the comments guys. -Sergio

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