The most common question among business owners and C-suite executives is the following:
If I get involved in Social Media Marketing, what can I expect for a return on my investment?
Let’s do a little comparison…
I live in Palm Beach County, FL, so I’ll use a few basic numbers from around here. Let’s say that for the purposes of this comparison that you own a local home and garden store, and you are expecting a shipment of new lawnmowers. Obviously, you’d like to sell all of those lawnmowers.
You could advertise your lawnmowers on the local radio station and in the newspaper.
The local paper reaches approximately 800,000 people each week. But those people are spread across 7 counties, they don’t all live in Palm Beach County. The local adult contemporary station reaches about 370,000 adults, and the local talk station reaches a little less than 50,000. Let’s say that they all offer you a good deal on advertising, so you run your ads.
Of the people reading the paper or listening to the radio, how many of them actually need a lawn mower? And of those, how many of them are ready to buy one this season? You don’t really know. Even among the group that might actually stop by your store because they heard or read about your lawnmower sale, how many of them are still shopping around and not really ready to make a purchase decision? Of the little handful of people that are left, how many of them are actually going to let you know that they found out about you because of your ad? You’d be really lucky if one or two ever actually mention it. But you paid for that ad as if everyone who reads that paper or listens to that station at a particular time of day really paid attention to it.
More and more the average consumer has become extremely talented at tuning out the ads that interrupt what they were enjoying. How many of you will turn down your car radio for a few minutes to avoid a long commercial break? How many of you love your Tivo because you can skip over all the commercials and get right back to the game or your favorite reality show? Does ANYBODY even look at the messages that wind up in the spam folder of your email? It’s not that consumers don’t want information, far from it. But they don’t want the flow of their lives constantly interrupted by it.
But what if you had an active social media presence?
On Facebook alone there are about 811,000 users in or very near Palm Beach County. If you built up a fan page for your business, you could keep people informed of new products you carry, give them home and garden tips, and help them make their home a great place to live. And it wouldn’t cost you a dime. If you wanted to advertise your new lawnmowers, you could tap into the targeted Facebook advertising and reach just the people in the area that show an interest or need in lawnmowers. Even if they are still very early in the buying process, you’ve opened the door to conversations that will enable them to make some decisions. And those fans that love your composting tips are very likely to share what they are learning with friends and family. There’s no better way to win a customer’s trust than a recommendation of someone they personally know.
What’s the return on your investment in social media marketing? That depends on you and how dedicated you are to the community around you. A better question might be, what are you losing by not being an active voice in the social media community?
by Michelle Stinson Ross
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