My Phenomenal Social Media ROI vs. Apparent Lack of Influence

In the past year and a half since I started using social media in an effort to grow my freelance web and graphic design business, I have seen what I consider to be a phenomenal return on the amount of time I have invested. In contrast, a recent campaign I pushed through my social media accounts – trying to garner my friends’ and followers’ votes for a contest my wife and I entered – has revealed the limitations of my actual influence, or lack thereof. This has led me to examine the two and raises questions about the importance of each, as well as how these ‘buzz words’ may be defined differently for each individual. In this post we will take a brief look at my own personal experience with social media ROI and influence.

My Social Media ROI

Through trial and error I have carved out my own little niche on Twitter that has helped me achieve my original goals of attracting clients for my freelance business and enlarging my online presence and brand. The key ways I have found to do this are:

»    Provide quality, relevant and fresh resources on a consistent and somewhat prolific basis by sharing links from my RSS feeds in the fields I’m interested in reading about myself: design, social media, technology, freelance, and SEO.
»    Make and nourish relationships with people of similar interests and common philosophies and values.
»    Give WAY more than any type of self-promotion. I average between 100-150 tweets per day, with an average of only 10-15 tweets per week about my own blog posts. I think this helps people see that I’m more about connecting and sharing than I am about me me me.
»    Offer to help others without expectation of reciprocation.

These 4 keys have become foundational in my Twitter usage. In turn, they have helped to grow my Facebook, LinkedIn, Flickr and other social media accounts as Twitter and blog followers have subsequently connected with me on other channels. This takes time and effort every day, but the return has been nothing short of phenomenal for my business.

» Almost every single one of my new clients over the past year has come either directly or indirectly from my social media investment. Whether through word of mouth, a blog post I’ve written, or a discovery through resources I’ve provided, the new clients continue to come, and almost every time they say, “I found you through (insert social media here).”
» I have unexpectedly discovered a wealth of information and amazing online communities that have greatly contributed to my growth as a freelancer and a designer, among many other things.
» I have actually made what I consider to be real, true friends. Sure, I’ve never met most of them in real life, but they have given to me and shared with me and helped me in countless ways, and I have tried to do the same for them. We have made each other LOL and ROFL and LMAO, and we have encouraged one another when anyone is feeling down or going through difficulties. If that’s not true friendship, what is?

So the return on my social media investment has been priceless for me. I am a different man than I was a year and a half ago because of it, and hopefully for the better.

My Lack of Social Media Influence

For all the invaluable ROI I can speak of, I am seriously questioning if I have a significant amount of influence. This is not necessarily a social media deal breaker for me, and not something I really thought much about before since my predetermined goals were being achieved beyond my expectations. Yet my recent foray into trying to influence my followers and friends to vote for my wife’s entry into the CB2 The Selby Is In Your Place contest has revealed what I consider to be slightly disturbing numbers. This may have less to do with influence and more to do with other elements, such as getting people to vote is always a bit of a challenge, or login glitches on the voting website, or a fear of casting a vote by connecting with your Facebook account. All of these are legitimate factors in what is a relatively small vote count, but the question of influence still arises.

Influence is defined as a power to affect persons or events, causing something without any direct or apparent effort, and to have and exert influence or effect. I know that there are those amongst my social media connections who influence me, and I realize that I have influenced a number of others, but looking at the numbers in this recent experiment raises some questions.  I typically don’t like to focus on numbers, but in this instance they can’t be ignored. Take a look:

» I have over 13,000 connections via social media, with the most (11,400) being on Twitter.
» I tweeted and Facebook messaged and blogged and videoed requests for my friends and followers to please vote for our entry repeatedly over the past 5 days – more self-promotion than I have ever done, but trying to still maintain a balance and not spam people or drive them nuts with my requests.
» In 5 days we have garnered just over 325 votes. Several social media friends have gone the extra mile and posted their own requests on Facebook and Twitter for their friends to vote, and I believe this has made a significant impact (and I am extremely grateful!) But the vote count represents 2.5% of my social media connections!

If I was a social media marketer and I was strictly looking at the numbers, I would have serious cause for concern. 2.5% influence is not going to get my promotion very far, correct?

I’m not a social media marketer, and this is just a silly, fun little contest that my wife and I were thinking we could win if we utilized our social media promotional influence. It’s really not a big deal, and I am not complaining or rethinking anything in regards to my social media usage. But it is a conundrum, and, I admit, a little disappointing and humbling to realize the huge amount of followers I have doesn’t necessarily amount to a huge amount of influence – at least in the promotional, vote-for-me and help-me-out sort of way.

I guess I am writing this post to think out loud as well as to get your take on this. I’m really interested to hear your thoughts. Would you please share any insights you have in the comments below?

Oh, and since you made it this far, would you take a minute to vote for our CB2 contest entry if you haven’t already? Simply CLICK HERE, click VOTE, and then either register with your email address or login with your Facebook account by clicking on the Facebook icon toward the top of the page. And if you’re really in a good, giving mood, would you consider asking your circle of influence to vote too? A quick post on your Facebook could really help us out, and you might also see how much influence you personally have. The contest ends on Wednesday, September 15^th, at 11:59 pm, so any help you can offer in this final 2 days is greatly appreciated!