Are You Likeable? · 5 Are You Likeable? How To Truly Measure Your Brand’s Social Media Success...

Are You Likeable? How To Truly Measure Your Brand’s Social Media Success

Executive Summary 3

Introduction 4

What is Likeability? 6

How Do You Measure Likeability? 11

Indexing Likeability: Introducing Likeable IndexTM

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Conclusion 19

About Likeable Media 20

Footnotes 21

CONTENTS

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www.likeable.com | 212.660.2458 | [email protected] | Copyright © 2013 Likeable Media

Likeable Index is a trademark of Likeable Media.

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Likeable Media has always valued being a likeable business above all else. But why?

In this report we will explore what likeability really means and why it matters for your brand. We will take a look at how likeability and social media are being measured by brands currently. With a critical eye, we will identify inadequacies with the current methods of social media measurement and conclude by suggesting a new way to measure. By the end of the report, you will learn that likeability isn’t just a quality to embody, but is also a metric that can be measured and can result in real success for your brand.

As you read through, we would love to hear your thoughts and feedback (good or bad). Feel free to tweet us @LikeableMedia, post on our Facebook page (fb.com/likeablemedia), or email [email protected].

Thanks!

CARRIE KERPEN CEO

CARA FRIEDMAN MICHELE WEISMANSr. Director, Marketing Manager, Social Media & PR

ExecutiveSummary


THE LIKEABILITY REPORT


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As much as consumers would like to think that they make purchase decisions solely based on hard facts such as price and quality, the truth remains that we live in a world of emotional decision makers—not robots¹. Consumers base decisions on their personal feelings toward a brand, connections they may have, and ultimately how likeable they find a brand. A Forrester study in 2012 found that half of repeat clients and a third of new customers make contact with multiple touch points before completing a purchase². Now more than ever, people are sharing these personal opinions and creating touch points with brands on social media. Brands are learning to go where their audience is and discovering that there is no place to demonstrate likeability better than in the social space.

Introduction


The notion of likeability in marketing is not a new concept. According to a study³ done in 2005, an ad’s likeability accounted for 80% of whether it was remembered later. Tim Sanders, author of The Likeability Factor: How to Boost Your L-Factor & Achieve Your Life’s Dreams,⁴ echoes this thinking and equates life to a series of popularity contests. Sanders’ research shows that people choose (and purchase from) who they like and that the more you are liked, the more positive things will come to you.

FUN FACT

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With about 38 million consumers in the U.S., ages 13 to 80 years old admitting that social media influences their purchasing decisions,² it is time marketers shift focus (and budgets) to social media marketing. This trend is already in motion. Currently, marketers allocate 7.6% of their budgets to social media. CMOs expect that number to reach 18.8% in the next five years.⁵ Social media ROI has evolved to a point where we can pinpoint the exact dollar amount of a Facebook like ($174) or a pin on Pinterest ($0.64). A social share of an online product will drive an average of $2.04 direct revenue to the online retailer.² On Twitter alone, 22% of users have purchased something after tweeting, retweeting, or favoriting a tweet,² and on Facebook that number goes up to 33% of users who are sharing, liking, or commenting on a post.

Being likeable has not been a priority for most brands, but it is now proving to be essential to success. The increased marketing budgets for social media aren’t for brands to create advertisements in a new space, but instead to invest in community growth and engagement. The core of all purchasing decisions comes down to whether or not someone likes your product.


... one of the more unexpected results of the Advertising Research Foundation (ARF) Copy Research Validity Project was that scaled response about the likeability of a commercial was the single best predictor of sales e�ectiveness.— John Philip Jones, How Advertising Works: The Role of Research⁶

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‘Nice’ CEOs and managers are the best leaders; run better companies, attract innovative and more loyal employees, get into legal and regulatory trouble far less frequently (if ever), have better relationships, get more done, and are even healthier than the bad guys.— Peter Shankman, Nice Companies Finish First: Why Cutthroat Management

Is Over—and Collaboration Is In7

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Happy customers are your best advertisers. If people like you and like what you do, they will tell their friends.— Andy Sernovitz, Word of Mouth Marketing: How Smart Companies Get People Talking8

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What isLikeability?

Likeability as a concept has typically been looked at subjectively. Whether or not your brand was considered “likeable” depended entirely on who you were asking. We have seen trends toward rewarding brands for their value and good content, but now we need a metric that can tangibly and objectively measure likeability. At Likeable Media we look at likeability as a hard, quantitative metric. It is a number that can be measured systematically across all brands by pulling in the most important social metrics available to us. In order to measure likeability, we need to understand where it comes from. Below demonstrates a hierarchy of needs to establishing likeability.

SizeThe first level of the hierarchy is size. This is your starting point to becoming a likeable brand. To have any sort of impact, you need to have an audience. What use would your content or sales pitch be if nobody was there to hear it? While it’s important to understand that community size isn’t everything, it ultimately still plays a role in how likeable your brand is. Size should not be viewed in sheer numbers, but should be looked at in context. Size is relative to your industry and customer base. Having a community with 5,000 of the right people is always better than having a community with 5 million of the wrong people.


Purchase

Sentiment

Engagement

Content

Size

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Developing a strategy for growing your community is an essential step toward social media success. There are two different kinds of growth a social community may experience: paid and organic.⁹ Paid growth includes any community member gained through an advertisement or sponsored story. Organic growth refers to community members who have found your page without the assistance of paid advertisements.

While many value organic growth over paid growth, the truth is that both are necessary. Social media rewards paid reach with higher exposure, often over organic reach. Using paid media as a tool that can be leveraged will in turn increase organic growth as well. It was found in 2013, 77% of Facebook Pages’ reach is a result of paid services.¹⁰ Higher paid reach leads to higher organic reach and larger community sizes. Never stop focusing on growing your community because the size of your audience will always have an affect on your brand’s likeability.

ContentOnce you’ve established an audience, it’s time to focus on communicating with them. To be a likeable brand, you must create compelling and engaging content. Social media differs from traditional marketing in many ways, including its purpose. While traditional marketing has always been focused on selling and conveying a message to customers, social media marketing has been focused on providing value.

Content comes in many forms on social media. Whether you choose to communicate through Facebook updates, tweets, or blog posts, the important thing is to focus on the quality of the content. When creating content you need to have the consumer in mind, and to do so you have to ask yourself, “Why?”¹¹ What benefit or use will the consumer have with this content? Is this something that will provide value to your community? Remember, when you post content on social media, you

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are not just competing with other businesses. You are competing with your customers’ friends and family. This kind of marketing is very different from the 30 second television ad you used to place where you had your customers’ undivided attention. When the goal isn’t to strictly sell something, and is instead to connect and provide compelling content and information, your brand becomes more likeable.

EngagementUnlike traditional advertising and marketing, social media is not a one-way street. Once you have an audience to listen to you and content to provide, the next step is to focus on the conversation. Interactions between your brand and your consumers are critical. Not only should you be talking to your community and providing value, but you should also be receiving feedback. All your content should be written with the intention of eliciting a response. Whether that’s a like, a comment, or a share, you want to make sure the community is engaging back with you. This will indicate whether or not they like your content and your brand.

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This concept of focusing on engagement is not new. In 2012, Pivot Conference asked brands what metric they would be focusing on in October 2013, and the number one choice was engagement. Having a conversation with your community and connecting with them through social media tells you that your content is working. It tells you that consumers like your brand enough to talk about it with you and provide thoughts, comments, and feedback. Make sure you are creating content that allows people to be heard and that your brand is properly engaging back with your audience. It is essential that you don’t limit this to the confines of your own communities. Consumers may be talking about your brand outside of your communities and owned spaces. Engaging and interacting with those customers will set you apart from your competitors.

SentimentWhen you have a large community that is engaging with your compelling content, you want to make sure that they are doing so positively. We have seen countless brands with high levels of engagement and community growth, but for all the wrong reasons. Numbers can fool you. Many unethical and deceitful PR stunts have resulted in high engagement levels and huge growth spurts for brand pages. That doesn’t necessarily mean a brand is becoming more likeable.

You want to have all the previous elements of the hierarchy, but with positive sentiment. Your brand should strive for growth because people feel positively towards your brand. Your brand should create compelling content that will elicit positive engagement on your page. To really prove your brand is likeable, you must have positive sentiment surrounding your customers’ interactions.


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PurchaseThe hierarchy is complete when the customer makes a purchase from you. While your company’s goals should be to engage with your customers, create connections with consumers, and provide value to your community, your goal is ultimately to increase sales. In order to show true ROI from your social media efforts, and for people to really like your company, you need all of the elements of the hierarchy. There’s a reason buying followers doesn’t work. You may have a million fans, but that doesn’t matter if none of them are qualified leads.

Take a look at the traditional sales funnel. All of this can be achieved through successful social media efforts. By applying the hierarchy to your brand, you will create awareness with a sizeable audience, generate interest through compelling content and high engagement, create desire from potential customers in your brand, and end by having users taking action and purchasing your product. These steps will lead you toward having a likeable brand that converts sales.


AWARENESS

INTEREST

DESIRE

ACTION

GeneratingLeads

CONVERTING LEADSINTO SERIOUS BUYERS

CLOSING THE SALE

¹²

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Social media measurement has been a hot topic ever since the industry was born. While initially there were questions surrounding measurement, the days of not being able to measure your brand’s success in social media are over. The industry has evolved to a point where social media measurement is expected as a standard business practice. Plans for growth and management buy-in cannot be done without pinpointing metrics for success in social media.

The current methods that brands use to track metrics aren’t optimal. Some brands are considering virality of content, while others are concerned with number of Twitter retweets, and still others are focused on post reach. The lack of consistency across brands results in difficulty in identifying which metrics are the best predictors of business success. The biggest problem marketers are currently facing is that they are looking at metrics in silos.


How Do YouMeasureLikeability?

SENTIMENT COMMUNITYACTIONS

COMMUNITYFOCUSED

BRANDFOCUSED

ACTIONFOCUSED

LIKEABILITY(BIG PICTURE)

BRANDRESPONSIVENESS

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Measuring part of the story can be detrimental to your brand and can leave you with unanswered questions. Take the following examples:

Sentiment + Community ActionsWhen you focus on sentiment and community actions, you essentially take your brand out of the equation. You are no longer measuring how your brand is performing on social media, but instead are measuring how people are performing around your brand. This measurement only accounts for outside parties talking about or interacting with your brand. As mentioned previously, social media is two-way communication and your brand needs to be actively participating alongside your community.

Community Actions + Brand ResponsivenessWhen measuring community actions and brand responsiveness, you are creating a laser focus on the conversations between you and your community. The back and forth communication may be a priority, but you aren’t taking into account the reason for the back and forth. The individuals most likely to interact with your brand are those who absolutely love your brand, as well as those who absolutely despise it. Strong emotions from either side of the spectrum are the ones you’ll hear from the most on your social channels. When you leave out sentiment out, you are just assuming that all conversation is neutral. Sentiment helps you understand whether the conversation consists of five star or one star reviews.

Sentiment + Brand ResponsivenessTo only measure sentiment and brand responsiveness would be to ignore the real power of social media. When you are only focused on


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actions your brand has taken in the social space, you miss what your community has to say. You may be receiving insights from your customers and sending out speedy generic responses, but are you really focusing on providing value to your community? Without focusing on the actions of your community, you are saying you don’t really care what they like, what makes them engage, and what makes them respond back to you.

To be truly likeable, you need to see the full picture. Sentiment, community actions, and brand responsiveness are important to look at when measuring success in social media, but they must be viewed together. Based on the following information and the social media hierarchy, a new metric was born.

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IndexingLikeability:IntroducingLikeableIndexTM

Marketers and business executives are all striving toward the same goal: finding a way to answer the question, “How is my brand doing on social media?” with a simple metric. While the previously discussed metrics cannot be ignored, there is just too much to measure and no standard to measure against to see success in social media. Likeable Media presents a solution.

The next time you look at social media success, think about if you would LIKE your brand. Social media success can be based on four things: (1) listening, (2) interactions, (3) kinetics, and (4) extension. In order to measure these concepts, Likeable Media has created Likeable IndexTM, a platform that allows brands to see how likeable they are, broken down into those four categories. Your Likeable IndexTM score will be one tangible number that truly answers the question, “How likeable is my brand on social media?” as well as, “How does my brand compare to others on social media?” The Likeable IndexTM score is measured based on the following:

ListeningFor any brand to truly understand how consumers feel about it, it must listen to the conversation surrounding that brand and look at sentiment. Social media plays a critical role in listening and sentiment analysis. When looking at any social media metric, it needs to be done in tandem with listening to understand the context surrounding that number. Listening explains the reasoning behind the metric. It explains why the metric is the way it is and tells the behind-the-scenes story that will allow you to change that number going forward.

Dave Kerpen,¹³ author of Likeable Social Media: How to Delight Your Customers, Create an Irresistible Brand and Be Generally Amazing on Facebook (& Other Social Networks), says the number one rule in social media marketing, and business, is to listen first and never stop

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listening. Instead of crunching numbers from Facebook Insights and solely relying on that to shape your ongoing strategy, you must first listen to your customers. When you listen first, and analyze second, you begin to truly understand where those numbers are coming from and what changes need to be made to impact success.

InteractionsTo get a full picture of how likeable your brand is, you need to look at all the interactions a consumer makes with your brand. Often, brands only measure engagement to view social media success. However, there’s a difference between engagements and interactions.¹⁴ When a consumer engages with your brand, he or she is normally reacting to something your brand has put out to elicit a response. Unfortunately, engagements alone don’t paint the whole picture — they leave out other actions consumers may take with your brand.

For example,¹⁵ marketers don’t normally calculate number of page views as engagement. However, the reason behind a page view can be very valuable. When a user is reading your blog, website, or online content, that shows a level of investment and interest in your brand. This interaction (not engagement) helps tell the complete story of how likeable your brand is.

In its simplest terms, a brand’s goal on social media is to elicit a response. Any response by a consumer can be considered an interaction. Interactions are prompted by content. Now more than ever your brand needs to focus on creating relevant and captivating content to be shared via your social networks. Engaging content is the key to having substantial and valuable interactions.


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KineticWhen something is kinetic,¹⁶ it is in motion. When you think about something kinetic on social media, you look to the most fluid motion available: conversation. Your social media should have a kinetic energy. After a consumer puts the conversation in motion, it is your job to keep it in motion. Responsiveness from a brand is one of the most likeable qualities it can have. It is also an area many brands are lacking.

Conversation should never be one-way. It is important to not only focus on the engagement and the conversation coming in, but also the rate in which you are continuing the flow. Response rate and response time are both underutilized metrics, with even some of the most popular brands ignoring them.¹⁷ Some of the largest brands on social media are also the least kinetic, and frankly, it’s no longer acceptable. 50% of Facebook users and 80% of Twitter users expect a response to a customer service inquiry in one day or less.¹⁸ To be a likeable brand, you must value responsiveness.

ExtensionAs discussed in the hierarchy of likeability above, size plays a factor in how likeable your brand is. Even if you are doing everything else right with engaging content, quick community management, and top-notch listening, you still need to have a community to hear you. The size of your community is your extension — how far your brand reaches. This may include users who have actively decided to like or follow you, but may also include friends of those who like you or even those with interests that align with your brand’s values.

To measure likeability without taking extension into account would be foolish. The size of your community and the reach of your community are excellent indicators of how likeable your brand is. Although it is an indicator, it is not the only one. We must remember that social media


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gives all brands an opportunity to play on an equal footing. Size of a brand cannot solely determine who is the best. The Likeable IndexTM takes this into account and presents scores based on a universal scale. Extension, together with listening, interactions, and kinetics, ultimately determines how likeable your brand is.

Using the beta version of our proprietary index, we took a look at some popular brands, calculated their Likeable IndexTM score, and correlated those scores to overall company success.¹⁹ If you needed any more proof that being likeable is better for your business, take a look at the following brands.


L = Listening I = Interactions K = Kinetic E = Extension

Coca Cola and PepsiBoth Coca Cola and Pepsi rank in Interbrand’s Top 100 Global Brands of 2013²⁰

with Coca Cola ranking 19 spots higher than Pepsi. When measuring both brand’s likeability on social media, findings were consistent with business success. Coca Cola has both higher overall profits, as well as a higher profitability margin. Coca Cola’s Likeable IndexTM as compared with PepsiCo is reflective of their larger audience, better responsiveness, and overall more effective effort in social media.

Emotional Ranking²¹Profitability %Total ProfitsTotal Annual Revenue

Coca Cola

PepsiCo

$46.542 billion

$66.504 billion

$8.572 billion

$6.433 billion

18.4%

9.7%

71.6

70.6

TotalEKI

Coca Cola

PepsiCo

36

36

L

36

36

71

50

81

75

55

47

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Starbucks and Dunkin’ DonutsOverall, Starbucks is a much larger corporation than Dunkin’ Donuts. Just in sheer numbers, Starbucks has many more franchises, as well as greater geographic reach. While in this case company size is indisputable, it is only a small factor in likeability. Both Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts can be measured on the same scale. Despite its smaller reach, Dunkin’ Donuts has a greater Likeable IndexTM and is able to generate a significantly higher profitability margin than Starbucks.


Starbucks

DD

$13.299 billion

$658.181 million

$1.383 billion

$108.308 million

10.4%

16.5%

66.3

N/A

TotalEKI

Starbucks

DD

37

42

L

53

60

64

79

86

48

57

59

Google and Yahoo!The battle between Google and Yahoo! has been going on for years. While Google has been the clear front runner for a long time, Yahoo! has been making some pretty impressive strides recently.²²

Regardless, Google is still leading in both profitability and likeability.


Google

Yahoo!

$37.905 billion

$4.984 billion

$9.737 billion

$1.048 billion

25.7%

21.0%

74.2

74.3

TotalEKI

Google

Yahoo!

38

36

L

44

15

29

29

79

54

41

34


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Conclusion We are in the midst of an exciting shift in social media measurement. Now, more than ever, it is important to measure the success of your social media efforts, but it’s also important that we measure the metrics that matter. The most important thing your brand must strive for is likeability. It’s time to stop worrying about viral content or page impressions, and start considering the whole context of your social media efforts. Making the decision to become a more likeable company is the first step to greater success. The next step is to measure it. Just like any other company goal, becoming more likeable should be—and can be—a measurable metric.


Want to know how likeableyour brand is? Email [email protected] for an evaluation call.

For media inquiries, please contact: [email protected]



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AboutLikeableMedia

Likeable Media is an award-winning, global social media andword-of-mouth marketing firm with a focus on creating compelling content. Likeable Media has worked with over 200 brands and is recognized as one of Facebook's top 90 Preferred Marketing Consultants. Likeable Media is the only agency to win three consecutive WOMMY awards from the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA). In 2012, Likeable Media was named number 146 on the Inc. 500 Fastest-Growing U.S. Companies List and the 28th "Best Place To Work in NYC" by Crain's New York Business. In 2013, Likeable Media was named one of the Top 50 Fastest-Growing Women-Owned Businesses by WPO and American Express OPEN.


Design by Thomas Zukowski

¹ 3 Reasons Why Likeability Will Decide The Next US President: http://mashable.com/2013/04/17/facebook-fan-value-researcher/² Social Media Is Changing The Way Consumers Shop Online [INFOGRAPHIC]: http://socialbarrel.com/social-media-changing-way-consumers-shop-online-infographic/53597/³ Like-minded: Does likeability determine effectiveness?: http://www.5metacom.com/documents/marketing_insights/marketing_insights-ad_likeability.pdf⁴ The Likeability Factor: How to Boost Your L-Factor & Achieve Your Life's Dreams: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Likeability-Factor-L-Factor-Achieve-Dreams/dp/1400080495/⁵ 33 Stats That Paint a Picture of the Future of Marketing: http://socialbarrel.com/social-media-changing-way-consumers-shop-online-infographic/53597/⁶ How Advertising Works: The Role of Research: http://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Advertising-Works-Role-Research/dp/076191241X/⁷ Nice Companies Finish First: Why Cutthroat Management Is Over‒and Collaboration Is In: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0230341896⁸ Word of Mouth Marketing: How Smart Companies Get People Talking: http://www.amazon.com/Word-Mouth-Marketing-Companies-ebook/dp/B007Y7A50W/⁹ Facebook Metrics Defined: Paid Likes vs. Organic: http://simplymeasured.com/blog/2013/09/25/facebook-metrics-defined-paid-likes-vs-organic/¹⁰ Paid Content is King: Promoted Posts vs. Organic Reach: http://www.socialbakers.com/blog/1901-paid-content-is-king-promoted-posts-vs-organic-reach¹¹ Content Marketing: How To Attract People With Content: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/content-marketing-with-joe-pulizzi/¹² Purchase Funnel: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchase_funnel¹³ Purchase Dave’s books here: http://www.amazon.com/Dave-Kerpen/e/B004S4EVRW/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1¹⁴ Why Interaction Is Not The Same As Engagement: http://searchengineland.com/why-interaction-is-not-the-same-as-engagement-87554¹⁵ Why Our Definition of Social Media Engagement and Interaction is Wrong: http://www.thesaleslion.com/definition-social-media-engagement-interaction-wrong/¹⁶ The Free Dictionary: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/kinetic¹⁷ Facebook CRM: 10 Best and Worst Brands: http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/facebook-crm-10-best-and-worst-brands-146889¹⁸ Social Media Is Changing The Way Your Customers Shop Online: http://socialbarrel.seermarketingpty.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/ social-media-is-changing-the-way-your-customers-shop-online.png¹⁹ Scores as of October 18, 2013.²⁰ Best Global Brands 2013: http://www.interbrand.com/en/best-global-brands/2013/Best-Global-Brands-2013-Brand-View.aspx²¹ The Top 100 Loved Brands: http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/check-out-top-100-beloved-brands-last-decade-153026²² Yahoo Is Now Actually Beating Google In Traffic. Here’s How: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/22/yahoo-vs-google_n_3796402.html

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Footnotes


Are You Likeable? · 5 Are You Likeable? How To Truly Measure Your Brand’s Social Media Success...

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