But if I never manage to definitively prove some fancy formula for “social media ROI” in a business context, I’ll still be here. Why? Because there are personal rewards to participation here that go above and beyond awareness, or sales, or anything of the sort.

I have met friends through whom I’ve rediscovered the meanings of trust, faith, and loyalty.

I’ve found a home for some of the personal battles I’ve fought, and solidarity through hearing the stories of others.

I have seen people raise money and awareness for causes that deserve more than we can ever collectively give them, but that might not otherwise stood a chance of getting seen.

I’ve seen the weak find strength in the voices and actions of others.

I’ve laughed more richly and more genuinely than I have in a long, long time.

I’ve walked into rooms and hugged people as if I’ve known them for decades, thanks to the late night chats on Twitter or a string of discussion on a blog. And I’ve shared drinks or dinner with many of those people and forged bonds of forever friendship that started on these “silly” social networks. We may have found one another on the web, but that’s just the spark that lit the fire.

I’ve reconnected with friends who I’ve always regretted losing track of, and I’ve been able to apologize for that in person. I’ve seen people closest to me rediscover the love of their lives many years later and forge a future together because of a serendipitous click.

We used to be bound by geography and circumstance in order to encounter people. Now, our potential for connection – and our ability to do so regardless of where we are or where we go – is amplified many times over, and more fluid and unencumbered than it’s ever been.

There are skeptics and naysayers all over. There are the “yeah, but”s of the world masquerading as pragmatists or realists when they’ve really got a perspective or attitude problem of their own. There is always the other side of the coin. But I choose to focus my energy elsewhere, because I’ve personally experienced how these relationships have enriched my life, my work, and my perspective on the world around me.

I will and do support the idea that quantifying social media’s impact is important to justify continued investment as a business. But I can’t believe nor understand how many companies can’t also accept the fact that deeper and broader personal connections can net stronger business ties, too, whether or not you can capture the data proof points that bear that out. It’s been that way since the dawn of time. We prosper in business through better connections, stronger relationships, deeper trust. We’ve always known that. We’ve rarely demanded to see the evidence until we got all up in arms about the fact that we were talking on this internet thing instead of over the golf course or a drink.

But I’ve found all of these things in spades through Twitter, my blog, the blogs of others, Facebook. I’ve found them in you, friends and readers and those that have provided so much information and insight for me to learn from. I’ve made business deals, yes. Numbers of them. But I’ve also exponentially enriched my life through the people I’ve met, the ideas I’ve discovered, the learning I’ve done.

I’ve found personal gold here on these crazy places on the web, simply because they give me potential. They give me personal inertia. They’ve brought me the gifts of people and friendships that will last long beyond the wires that first connected us.

That’s my personal social media ROI. What’s yours?

A post from Brass Tack Thinking
The Personal ROI of Social Media

Today’s post is a guest post from our friend and tack-minded cohort Matt Ridings, Founder of MSR Consulting, and a thought leader on integrating social media into the realm of Relationship Marketing. He blogs over at Techguerilla, and you can find him on Twitter at @techguerilla

I recently had the pleasure of finally meeting Jeff Pulver in person. While here he gave a brief talk to the group of people present in which he made the statement that “sometimes, ROI can mean Return On Inspiration, or Return on Innovation”. As soon as I heard it I started dreading what was going to come next.

Like clockwork I started seeing tweets about that statement. By far it was the thing most commented on. People loved that remark. It resonates with that part of us that thing all businesses are selfish and if we’d just care a little more the world would be a better place. It certainly resonates with me.

I then prepared myself for the fact that I was going to be approached by several people who knew that I have argued vigorously against that very statement before. Sure enough, I was soon surrounded like the leader of some cult compound. And I was in a tough spot. On the one hand, I didn’t really have any issue with what Jeff said in the context of the moment.

On the other, I’m a well-known proponent of the fact that ROI is ROI and that it means one thing and one thing only. Moreover, we should not be trying to re-purpose it into having any other meaning. How do I explain that I didn’t feel his statements and mine were in direct conflict with one another?

Context is Everything

The keys here are context and objective. What was Jeff’s *objective*? I don’t want to put words into his mouth but I think his objective was to tell a story. To illustrate the power of a medium to make a difference. To inspire others to socially think beyond themselves. In that *context* it makes perfect sense to say that one doesn’t have to only be motivated by business financials (ROI) but that you can also reap rewards outside of that realm (Inspiration, etc) that can make things worth doing. And I 100% agree with that.

I tell that story as a mild illustration of what is a real issue within the social media community. Make no mistake, the problem exists in virtually all other facets of society as well, it’s simply that social media has better acoustics in its echo chamber than most other arenas of life. That problem is “contextual confusion”, or in many cases contextual laziness.

The pace at which we move through this social realm is staggering. Read a tweet, rinse, and retweet. An idea, no matter how incorrect, can build momentum and become a commonly held belief within moments. So there’s a drive to jump on a hot topic, insert an opinion in a wizened Yoda-like voice, and shove it out to the world lickety-split. What we lose in that process however is any reflection on that hot topic. What may sound completely logical in passing might make no sense whatsoever if broken down into elements that contain context and objective.

Educated Guessing or Just…Guessing?

Let’s take a popular topic like the Old Spice social media campaign as an example. Here is a campaign that within 24 hours had a surge of comments to the effect that it was “genius”, as the hours wore on there were those who took a different tact and said it was a “failure” and waste of money. On either sides of those opinions you could find really good reasons for why either one was right. But both sides had no actual context or objective by which to make the statements they did.

What if there had been no bump in sales at all? That’d be a failure right? Not so fast. What if their *objective* was simply to experiment with using social media as a means for changing their brands perception in the marketplace? What if it was a PR stunt used to setup some future campaign strategy? If I know that information then I can put the activity into *context* and try and make a judgement, otherwise I’m simply turning over my Magic 8-Ball and making uneducated guesses.

I’m ok with guessing. There’s nothing wrong with a little monday morning quarterbacking, just please drop the certainty from your voice if you have no insight into the objective or context. Or better yet, how about following the old programming model of If->Then->Else (if the objective was x, then the answer is y, else the answer is z). I can respect that. It shows that you may not have all of the information, but that you have formed educated opinions based upon the “possibilities”.

Thoughtful Conclusions

So back to the original storyline. Jeff’s job is to inspire you to think beyond the business. My job is to make your business money. It is perfectly acceptable within his context and objective to use language like “Return On Inspiration”, he’s painting a picture for you that there is more to life than financial success. If, on the other hand, he was using that language to try and sell a business on the fact that they didn’t need to really measure their social media activities in financial terms I’d blow him out of the water.

Some in that audience that night will take his statements as justification that true ROI isn’t that important. We tend to say things like “they misunderstood”, or “they didn’t get it”. But what actually happened is that they were simply being contextually lazy. When we say things like “they are just inexperienced”, what we really mean is that they haven’t had enough exposure yet in their life to various objectives so as to place something into possible contexts.

This is why some of the most effective problem solvers you meet tend to immediately question facts when presented with them. How were they arrived at? Who produced them? Are they biased? What was the intention of the data? etc. They are attempting to find the objective and context. Go ask Tom Webster (@webby2001) if he instantly accepts information that is put in front of him.

So no, I have not changed my opinion about the usage of the term ROI. I will still absolutely jump in if I see you trying to re-purpose the word to justify not having to measure your work. But in the right context, I will still sit in the audience and feel just as inspired as you when someone chooses to manipulate the word to make a great point about life.

Matt Ridings – @techguerilla

A post from Brass Tack Thinking
Contextual Laziness

I know some of you are here for the get-rich quick answer, and if you are, you can stop now. That headline was bait, pure and simple. Sorry. But the claim is true, and I’ll explain.

Today on Twitter’s #SMChat, DJ Waldow asked about professional uses for Twitter and what we got out of it.

In my first year as an independent consultant, I can attribute over $100K in revenue for my business directly to Twitter. How?

1. I went on Twitter and I followed people who were in industries that interested me, and those that reflected the kind of customers I wanted to have. That was PR and marketing agencies, and mostly mid to larger size brands (because they have money to spend). Twitter is far more about who YOU follow than who follows you.
2. I talked to them. Said hi. Had lots of conversations about everything from work to cooking to horseback riding to beer and cars and pets and books. All sorts of stuff. Just getting to know people. I spent a couple of hours a day doing this with nothing more than the intention of building relationships and conversation systems with people.
3. Eventually some of those people became business friends and acquaintances. And when it came time for them to ask what I did, I told them. Without the sales pitch.
4. If they needed what I did, they said  hey, that’s interesting. Can I email you a couple of questions? They did. We talked.
5. I wrote proposals. I went on pitches.
6. I won some work.
7. I worked my ass off to deliver.
8. Repeat.

Over the course of a year, it amounted to about $100K in revenue through client work that followed this path, starting with Twitter.

The magic in making money with social media isn’t that the site or social network becomes a revenue center itself. I didn’t sell stuff on Twitter. I gave people access to me and my expertise, and paid attention to when the time might be right to talk business.

That’s the trick here, folks. Social media is rarely the cash register. It’s communication tools that help form the foundation for healthy business relationships that might eventually lead to sales elsewhere. Whether you’re B2B or B2C.

Twitter was just the handshake that got the conversation started. It required an investment of time and effort for me to spend time there and converse without the intent to sell something, and lay the groundwork for trust and relationships. Much like having lunch or going to networking events. I spent time getting to know the people that might eventually be the decision maker for a project that I could be hired for. And when they needed something like what I did, they often thought of me.

It’s that simple, and yet that complex.

There’s no shortcut to success. No formula or checklist that you can complete and be guaranteed results. And in the end, all I’ve done is show you that Twitter is a way to get introduced to people that might want to work with you.

The rest? Well. It’s up to you to do work that’s worth paying for.

[quick point of clarification: I've been working for Radian6 for the last year, and no longer do independent consulting. These are the results from when I was a consultant, and my first year of operation in 2008.]

image credit: Jo Jakeman

A post from Brass Tack Thinking
How I Made $100K With Twitter