Just Give Me These 3 Twitter Analytics and I’ll Go Away

I’ve been rocking HootSuite now for my Twitter posts for some time so that I can get the “enterprise” bells and whistles that it adds (e.g., a still-needs-work user admin piece). But I do see HootSuite as a useful first step in the evolution of Twitter for retailers. Once Twitter can be better tracked, more marketers will come. Today, I want to specifically talk about 3 Twitter analytics that retailers will need to get excited about Twitter (apart, of course, from more total users on the system and some belief that this is more than just a fad).

A retailer wants to use Twitter as a tool that helps drive new sales, communicate directly with current and potential customers, and disseminate brand. If I’m a retailer I want all of this in one tool. I don’t want to amalgamate a bunch of different Tw-prefixed web apps based on bird themes if I don’t have to. So, if I’m a retailer, give me these 3 Twitter analytics. Now.

Clickthroughs

Dude, this one is so obvious, I barely wanted to bring it up. But I’ll jot it down because we can’t live without it. And it’s available today. HootSuite has this one covered. But HootSuite’s insistence on using its interface - and really, the ow.ly URL condenser - to make tweet links trackable is a little draconian for my taste. (Aside: I wish HootSuite was a little more about tracking tweets and a little less about tweeting.) Clickthroughs, of course, will show us how interesting a tweet was/is. Was the tweet interesting enough for others to follow the link? And which types of tweets drive more clickthroughs in general? Basically, what works to drive traffic? At the same time, I’d love to know how many retweets my original tweet got. retweetrank.com does a decent job here. If I take both of these metrics together, I know how many total people likely had my tweet pass through their Twitter devices and I know how many people were engaged enough to click on through to whatever information I’m pimping. Not too shabby. But I’d still like to see all of this in one application.

Adoption

When do I acquire followers? Which tweets drive the most new followers and at what times? To date, the rule of thumb on Twitter is to follow others so they will reciprocate and follow you. It pains me - like “I’m embarrassed for you” pain - when others follow me just to drive up their own follower numbers. After all, it’s not about size, right? Well, I hate to say it, but for retailers on Twitter, the answer is: sure it is. Now, I would never recommend that a retailer go and follow everyone and hope for reciprocation. After all, what is mildly annoying coming from an insecure individual is downright predatory coming from a corporate entity.

No, retailers can’t just go out and start carpet bombing the Twitterverse in hopes of achieving a critical mass of followers via reciprocation. They need to do it a little more strategically. And knowing what kinds of tweets spark the following behavior and which send times drive heavier following is important knowledge when it comes to figuring out how to go about lassoing new followers. Since no single retailer has definitively shown the single best way for retailers to use Twitter, it makes sense that acquiring followers should be priority A1 for the time being. Ol’ catalogers know that having a big list is better than having a little one.

Network Strength

HubSpot’s Twitter Grader, which I wrote about in Fans of Twitter Grader Should Check Customer Scorecard, does a pretty good job of helping you calculate the strength of your network. (Check the probably-too-humble Dharmesh’s post on the algorithm behind the grading here).

Basically, I like that fact that the Twitter Grader uses the follower/following ratio, penalizing users that have a lower ratio. And the Twitter Grader does track engagement, explained by Dharmesh as “how well a given user is fostering conversations in the twitter community.” Nonetheless, if I’m a retailer, I want my followers to have legions of their own followers, I want them to tweet often, I want them to retweet often, and I want their tweeted links to be clicked often. I can’t be sure that the Twitter Grader looks at each of these metrics in the way it should, so I think the call is still on for an application that properly explores the commercial potential of a Twitter username’s network.

If anybody knows of any current applications tracking these metrics in deeper ways, or even thinks they know of applications tracking these metrics, please let me know (@istobe or @daddymention).

Tags: followers, HootSuite, HubSpot, retweetrank.com, Twitter, twitter analytics

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This entry was posted on Thursday, March 5th, 2009 at 10:28 pm and is filed under Customer Analytics, Twitter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.