Better late than never!
I just got wind of a old (Jan. 25, 2007) report by Forrester that takes on a real sticky wicket: calculating the ROI of running a corporate blog.
I’ve ranted on more than one occasion that marketers should use social media, including blogs, as an R&D tool and not to expect a hard return. But, if anyone can build a more hard-core argument for blogging, I’m all for it. After all, these are difficult times, which means money talks.
According to this post on Forrester’s Groundswell blog, if R&D (i.e., gathering customer insight) is one of your goals, you can measure your ROI by figuring what it would cost you to gather those insights via traditional means, such as focus groups, surveys, ethnographic studies, etc. If you can gather comparable or better insights via your blog at a lower cost, the difference is your ROI. If a monthly focus group costs $15k and your blog costs you $10k, your ROI is $5k.
The article makes some interesting points, including:
- There is no standard ROI model for blogs
- Your ROI depends on your metrics, which depend on your specific goals
- Measurable blogging goals might include:
- Increased brand visibility
- Savings on customer insight
- Rduction of impact from negative user-generated blogs
- Increased sales efficiency
Update:
I nearly forgot, but Gary Vaynerchuk recently posted a frantic and entertaining rant on the benefits and ROI of online marketing in a soft business market. Ya gotta check it out!
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