How is social media activity measured?

Our last few assignments have revolved around the often multifaceted relationship between different businesses (companies, organizations, brands, etc.) and social media: Why do these businesses use social media, and for what purpose(s)? How can participation in social media benefit a business? What are the best business practices in relation to social media? How can businesses increase audience engagement on social media? We have discussed all of these questions and more in gauging the relationship between business -- both big and small -- and social media. This week, we're going to delve a little bit deeper, beyond "likes" and shares, and delineate the measurement of mass social media activity by highlighting a few examples of analytics tools and strategies.

An article on VentureBeat.com called "Top 10 Social Media Analytics Tools" highlights some of the most instrumental resources in social media analytics on the web, whereby professionals can monitor the impact of their social media efforts. I've cherry picked a few of the more notable among the bunch and listed them as follows:

• According to VentureBeat, 33Across is the ultimate social media advertising solution, striking a delicate balance between analytics and marketing. 33Across helps paint a more complete picture of a brand's online audience by "analyzing how [the audience] interacts with the brand's social media interactions." Further, it helps brands focus their marketing efforts, resulting in advertising that is more relevant to users.
• Brandwatch is ideal for corporations with a more international reach, thanks to its support of over 25 languages. Beyond multilingual supports, Brandwatch -- which monitors conversations across all major social networks, like most analytics suites -- claims to use a sophisticated set of data-gathering and parsing tools which "cut through social spam to find the conversations that really matter."
• Hootsuite, one of the most popular analytics platforms, offers a streamlined and user-friendly "dashboard" format to manage several social media accounts at once, including Twitter, Facebook, and Google+. Beyond account management, Hootsuite employs its own brand of analytics tools to yield insightful data. The company has recently partnered up with Brandwatch to expand the reach of its analytics.
• Topsy is able to provide a wide, almost cross-sectional look at what is going across all platforms on the social web, and, as a certified Twitter partner, it also has the unique distinction of having access to every Tweet ever sent out, dating all the way back to the very first back in 2006.

These are only a few examples of the sort of analytics tools professionals utilize in attempting to measure social media reach. Beyond these concrete examples of strictly technological resources, there are also more abstract, strategic, and logistical means of measuring activity and engagement, as outlined in Hootsuite's "Beginner's Guide to Social Media Metrics." Examples include:

• The two most basic forms of activity across platforms: engagement and amplification, i.e. replies and retweets on Twitter, likes/comments and shares on Facebook, etc.
• Measuring growth, performance, and reach on each specific social network over time and determining particular strengths or trends in growth over time.
• Tracking competitors' exposure to view potential "share of voice."

Links:

http://venturebeat.com/2013/12/20/top-10-social-media-analytics-tools-the-venturebeat-index/

http://blog.hootsuite.com/beginners-guide-engagement/

http://blog.hootsuite.com/beginners-guide-to-social-media-metrics-reach-exposure/