Too often do I get the question during my seminars "VJ, what is the ROI - what can I expect to make on money and how many cars will I be selling at my dealerships, when I am "signing up" for Social media?"....here we go again. I am not complaining that I receive this question but I am foremost dazzled that question is still comparing Social Media Marketing with the "old" way to do Marketing and Advertising.

What was in past (and of course still is) known as Monologue Marketing strategy - the shouting out of Marketers messages to the "may be listening" audience via T.V., Radio and other traditional marketing media has by far nothing to do with the Social Media approach and the possibilities to integrate into your existing marketing mix. Because we are now trying to communicate with potential clients and hope for a response to us, we are pretty much sure that we are now hoping to convert into a Dialogue with our new friend. We want to find out if they "like us" (you probably have already noticed that Facebook "Friend" button was exchanged into the "Like" button), if they (customers of course) are talking about our organization and hopefully only good stuff, if our influence and brand recognition in our community is growing due to positive WOM (Word-of-Mouth) actions.

A positive WOM campaign will end most likely up into positive comments on reveiw sites like Yelp, Merchant Circle, Presto Reviews and dealerrater (the two ladder mentioned are dedicated automotive dealer review sites), which fulfills the objective having postive listed online reviews talking great about you. That is what we want - positive reviews about our business from neutral sources, which are seen by consumers more than 70% reliable than a typical advertising message about your good doing.

With these so called "soft ROI factors" [a.k.a. Return of Engagement (ROE)] we are indeed on the path to create a positive impact on our products, company and ourselves. The video below (launched February) will show you a few more ideas what ROI in the Social Media environment means, and I hope that with changing the focus from former traditional

ROI = (Gain from investment - Cost of Investment) / Cost of Investment

into

ROI(E) = Dialogue X WOM = Penetration + SERP = Walk in Traffic

the idea becomes more clear.

And one last advice please - Social Media Marketing embedded in your Marketing Mix is a long-term goal and not a quick fix to work the old "Monologue" practices in a mass market.

So, I am still hoping to get the question, which pointed out in the beginning of this post, because it tells me that there is more work for me to do. More seminars and workshops I need to set up to assist dealerships and dealer groups in their process to integrate Social Media Marketing into their overall Marketing objectives.
Thank you for reading and thanks for commenting. Looking forward to your responses.

VJ

Source: Video-Socialnomics; Picture-eMarketer