@robpeck

This is an ongoing debate in social media.

On one side of the fence you have people who say just because you can’t measure the ROI of social media doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it. That it’s pretty difficult to measure the ROI of the phone system you have in the office, but w/o it you’d lose a lot of business.

On the other side of the fence, you have people that measure the time they invest in social media and amount of converting traffic at their website to determine the ROI.

I have definitely seen business come our way we can clearly tag as social media generated, but haven’t gone so far as to codify it because there are so many intangible benefits as well.

@rich-brooks Thanks, I’ve already used your “ROI of the phone system” around the office. 

@deairby Will do. Our PPC estimator is pretty spot on so I think it’s a good starting point. It seems the missing pieces for a social estimator are historic conversion data (we have a few campaigns running, so can gather this shortly) and this complicated function . Any calculus people wanna step up to the plate and help me out with this?

No calculus wizards want to collaborate on the social ROI modeler?

@ptwylie Very interesting indeed. Thanks for sending. 

i dont worry about this  question  because i know its w orking  great for us…. in the  last week i have  emailed with about  10  potential  buyers  who  saw  items  on our  facebook page…. most over  500$$$  … and i hear  about  our page in the store  several times a week.thats  enough proof  for me……i put a question on last night that got over  20  comments..im  constantly amazed  by the power of  facebook…

in a  business it might  be nice to  have perfect proof  of everything  but its  not  going to happen  most times..as  owner  you   mainly  absorb  your  best  info  and   go  from there…

for sure….they  call and mention it when they  want  the price or  measurements…    or  tell me  when they  buy….its  so hard  to track  but   so many  talk about our  facebook in the store that i know its  been  great  for us….just out of the  blue  a customer will say i follow  you on  facebook…or i  saW  YOU  GOT x back in…..

also on the  point of  hard  to  track…..yestereday i  posted a link to our  website….the post itself  only  got  3 or 4  comments….buti i looked on   my  stat counter and   over  50  people had  gone  from  facebook to our   website that day….i assume  none of  that  would  show  if  you  were tracking   engagement…

@robpeck 

WE DO ABOUT  EVERYTHNG…EMAIL, BILLBOARD, PAID  NEWSPAPER ADS, CONSTANT  CONTact  and i  would  rate  facebook  number 1….could i  put it in an roi  format?..no   but  that  doesnt mean its not happening….    

i hope your  clients  are in a  field  where this could happen….our store is perfect for  facebook… i dont think our  experience would happen  for   a lawyer, accountant, a web  person or  an electrician………  our thing is  for women and  decorating and  fun shopping….cant  beat that,,

i think   a  good thing  would  be to  get a  case  book of  places  where  facebook is   really  working  for   businesses and  show  that  to  clients……. for  example,  in our town there is us, a  great  resturant and a  fun boutique…all 3 of us have  lots of  fans and    are   totallly  happy and thankful  for  finding  facebook…