One of the most challenging tasks in selling digital marketing to the C-Suite is defining the return on investment (ROI). It can be particularly challenging when justifying the budget for social media marketing (SMM).
Many SMM efforts lend themselves to brand building, community building, and customer service. Unlike "traditional" SEO, these activities aren't always transactional in nature.
Marketing ROI has traditionally been measured like this:
Return on Investment (%) = (Net profit / Marketing Costs) × 100.
Sometimes, cost per customer acquisition is the measure. As recently as 2010, the dawn of social media marketing, those in the C-Suite attempted to apply the tried and true transactional ROI model to SMM. The CMO Survey, as reported by Forbes, lists the most common metrics used to measure social media investment.
