Money Rail: Twitter Leads to Double the Leads and Other Social Media Facts [Infographic]

Even though it’s hard to prove, most marketers are sure that social media is worth the time, so it’s nice to see some statistical data saying that it is so. Today, that comes from an infographic by Cox Business. They gathered the data from a variety of sources, so this is kind of third hand, but there are a few points I’d like to discuss, beginning with. . .

I’m a Twitter fan and I think it’s good for business. I admit that the speed of the feed and the noise level can be a problem but good things manage to get through all the time. Of all of the social media channels, Twitter is the one I use most for discovery. I’ve found new bloggers to follow and I’ve hooked up with app developers and other marketers — it’s a good channel for me.

As for our old friend / foe Facebook. . .

I don’t know who came up with this number but I find it hard to believe that 1,000 likes lead to 1,400 pageviews a day. Maybe this was before Facebook sent all of our Page posts in to the cornfield. Certainly, a higher number of likes should lead to an increase in traffic but 185% is a crazy number. I guess it also depends on your category. 1,000 likes on a new movie page is bound to convert more than 1,000 likes on a page for a new soft drink.

What do you think? Are they in the ball park with these numbers?

Finally, let’s talk time on task. People unfamiliar with social media marketing think it’s a job that can be done in just a few minutes a day.

So not true.

Tools like HootSuite have made it easier to handle multiple accounts from one place, but it’s still not a ten minute task – not if you’re doing it right. First of all, simply putting up duplicate posts on Twitter, Facebook and Google+ is a waste of time. If you’re also covering the secondary sites such as Pinterest, Tumblr or Instagram, social media marketing can be a full-time job.

Looking at this slice from the Cox infographic, it’s good to see that spending more time on social media does make a difference. I’d hate to think that all this effort is going to waste.

The important takeaway is that you need to make social media as personal as possible. That means responding to comments, especially negative ones; sharing assets from others including reTweets and Facebook shares, and doing your best to keep the conversation from sounding like a two-hour infomercial for your brand.

Got all that? Now go out there and show us how it’s done. . . then come back here and tell me how you did it. I’m always open to learning new things.

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