At 7:40 seconds into this video I’m not sure I agree with Wendy Hofstetter of Room214. She’s their Marketing Architect and she says (watch the video if you don’t want to read it)…
Well there are some things that we’re doing actually to track interaction within Twitter and Facebook. Facebook has their insights which aren’t great you know, but they are there and show what fans are doing on your page as far as video views, commenting and that kind of thing. On Twitter a strategy that we use is Bit.ly.You know, we are posting things and using Bit.ly links to link back to our content. Then we are able to show, you know if it’s Travel Channel and we are linking back to content on their page about bambi (sp?) foods. We are able to track how many people are actually clicking on our links and viewing that content and that’s what its about. So if you are getting a bunch of people following you but they are not doing anything after that. It’s just you know, they want a follow back then that doesn’t do anything for your brand. But if we can show them…
1) Here is how many Twitter followers you’ve
2) Here is how many clicks this link to your talents blog got from our Twitter post.
That’s what meaningful and that’s showing hey they are engaging with your brand and actively… what we like to call active influencer’s. They are actively engaging with your brand and posting comments, sharing and again retweeting.. how many people are retweeting or replying what we are posting on Twitter.
A click on a Bit.ly link is no better then a click on a banner. You can’t prove there was any real value just because someone clicked on it. Retweeting is great but it’s more important what they do when they get to your page. Leaving a comment there or signing up for your contest or newsletter is what you can show to clients as real value.
If you’ve 10,000 people clicking on your link but only a few hundred views and or comments on your video or signning up for your newsletter then that’s not really getting the client what they wanted. I think Bit.ly is great but just showing that to the client isn’t enought these days. Any client who takes that as value is wasting their money.
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2 Comments
Hi Duane, I think you bring up and interesting and point (and not just cuz I’m friends with the folks at Room 214). Bit.ly is a tool in an arsenal. I agree with you that simply telling clients you had X number of click-throughs is a waste of money and not a very valuable measure of ROI.
That ROI comes in two other components of the link being used.
1. The tracking of the link with referrers, user-agent, time of day and IP can help to build better campaigns that more accurately target the most engaged audience.
2. I know Room 214 has a practice of dealing with “the placement crash”. Which is what you describe above. All companies should do what you suggest and make sure that the landing pages are creating conversions or comments. That is engagement. And the real value to a client’s brand.
There are new services like http://awe.sm that take all of this to the next level with tracking beyond Twitter but by building profiles of users. Thanks for the post.
Hey Kris
Thanks for the comment. That was my only real issue with the entire video and something that needs to change in our industry. To many firms are simple letting clients think a click is of value when it’s not if you are not getting the user to take real action.
Bit.ly is indeed great for tracking data and one of the big reason I use it on my different sites. But it’s only the starting point as we agree and not the end point. I’ll have to check out awe.sm and see what it’s about. Thanks again for the comment.