It's time to evaluate

Are you aware that there are currently at least 54 social media tools that can help you measure your online presence? Yes, you have read that correctly - 54. And those are just the free ones. I'm shaking my head only because I've heard so many conflicting things about online measuring tools. Whether it's better to spend the big bucks for a more "accurate" reading of your web presence, or if you are better off with using the free tools that are available at the click of a button. I think these conflicts/questions/issues can be answered with one word: money.

Money dictates everything we do, whether it's personal or in business - period. Social media is not free. If you don't have the cash, you can't use the expensive, or for that matter ANY monetary valued monitoring services - end of discussion. That's not to say that anyone on a strict budget (or no budget) can't benefit, because there are some excellent monitoring services available for free.

Before the topic is discussed in a little more detail, this is just a brief, but humourous, digression on social media by parody masters the onion:



Had to laugh at that, but back to the topic at hand.

Measuring the overall success of any type of social media strategy can often be complicated and confusing. There are, however, a number of tools that can make it a little easier to navigate the social web waters. Below are three tools (all free!) that can help you determine how your messages are being discussed on the social media world.

1.Google Analytics

Google has developed a comprehensive analytics service that helps track user activity on your website in real-time. Within a matter of minutes, you can have Google Analytics set up to give you actual numbers of the daily visits to your site, the demographics of your users, how they got to your site, how long they stay, and which of your pieces of content are most—and least—popular.

2.Klout

The Klout Score measures influence, which Klout defines as “your ability to drive action on social networks,” and, increasingly, in the real world. Specifically, it measures the influence of your network across your social media platforms. Once you’re signed-up, Klout will let you see a map of your social media activity over the past 90 days, enabling you to cross-reference the exact moments your score increased (under their algorithm, at least) with the content you posted or ways you engaged at that time.

3.My Top Tweet by TwitSprout

This tool provides an easy way to figure out which of your tweets got the most retweets. With My Top Tweet, this measurememt tool can rank your top 10 most-shared tweets and the number of times they were retweeted. Not only is this helpful for your own brand, but it gives you an idea on how your brand competes with competitors.

Once you can see the analytics behind your social media outreach, you’ll have a much better idea of what’s working and what’s not.

Thinking out loud: a guest lecture commentary

We were lucky yesterday to have guest lecturer Jonathan Laba discuss the many exciting new projects in social media that are coming our way. He talked about location aware applications -- which ones are on the way up, and which ones won't last (hello Foursquare!). He discussed augmented reality, a mind boggling concept that is pretty cool once you get past the code speak. These were great topics, but it was the upcoming projects and products that really caught my attention. One in particular, was the new Google glasses click here for more info .

These glasses work like a visor, and are equipped with a mini camera embedded in the lens so you can film anywhere, anytime, anyplace. You are basically a 24 hour walking camera. I personally think the concept is cool, but the glasses themselves are hideous. It's akin to putting a jockstrap on your head! Google was smart by trying (with clear emphasis on the ‘trying’ part) to lift the image of the glasses, by placing them on models and celebrities:



See? On them it looks great (sort of). Angles and proper lighting, not to mention a pretty face can make anything look good, but lets be fair here. Models and celebrities won't be the ones wearing them: WE will. This is how they really look on ordinary people - check out Sergey Brin, founder of Google. Do you think the glasses look good on him?

Aesthetics aside, the bigger question for me was what effect this product would have on our roles as pr practitioners. When the question was posed to Jonathan, he, like most techie developers, only saw and focused on the big, bright future which was fine, but it made me wonder if he thinks or had thought about the potential negative consequences of the glasses. Believe me, my classmates did and brought up some pretty serious concerns, which was met with an almost detached, mostly confused reaction from Jonathan. It’s like he couldn’t quite believe that these concerns were concerns. We know that social media has already completely changed the way people connect with one another, and has changed the way pr practitioners do their job. This product in particular, really looks like it has the potential to have a more serious impact, both positively and negatively, on the social media landscape and people in general. I hate being a Debbie downer, but as communicators we have every right to explore and even ask uncomfortable questions regarding the impact of social media platforms; what will work for us, how the product may work against us, and what really is or isn’t necessary for us to perform our duties effectively. Google glasses definitely raised my concerned antenna simply for all the reason any new social media product would.

This was a great lecture overall. It’s always interesting to see what concepts and products are created in the social media world, but it’s infinitely more interesting to witness peoples reaction to them.