{"id":15665,"date":"2018-06-22T16:59:41","date_gmt":"2018-06-22T16:59:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/?p=15665"},"modified":"2019-11-19T23:23:50","modified_gmt":"2019-11-19T23:23:50","slug":"leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/","title":{"rendered":"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Data fatigue is real. How do you know which data to use to make strategic marketing decisions?<\/p>\n<p>This question can be especially important for agencies, who are dealing with a barrage of data on behalf of each of their clients.\u00a0Our guest in this installment of The Data-Driven Marketer is Lee Odden from <a href=\"http:\/\/rankmarketing.com\/\">TopRank Marketing<\/a>. Lee and Seth Bridges, our co-founder, set out to answer this question and many more in this recorded webinar session.<\/p>\n<p>TopRank Marketing is a data-driven digital agency that helps start-ups and established brands alike connect with and convert customers. Lee walked us through how his team data to help his clients understand their current performance and where they can focus their efforts to engage and widen their audience.<\/p>\n<p>In this interview conducted by our very own co-founder, Seth Bridges, Lee shares:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>How to determine the kind of data to use<\/li>\n<li>Ways to use industry level research<\/li>\n<li>Which metrics to prioritize<\/li>\n<li>Examples of strategic uses of client data and industry benchmarks<\/li>\n<li>And so much more&#8230;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><script src=\"https:\/\/fast.wistia.com\/embed\/medias\/fh4oaqb4ji.jsonp\" async><\/script><script src=\"https:\/\/fast.wistia.com\/assets\/external\/E-v1.js\" async><\/script><\/p>\n<div class=\"wistia_responsive_padding\" style=\"padding: 56.25% 0 0 0; position: relative;\">\n<div class=\"wistia_responsive_wrapper\" style=\"height: 100%; left: 0; position: absolute; top: 0; width: 100%;\">\n<div class=\"wistia_embed wistia_async_fh4oaqb4ji videoFoam=true\" style=\"height: 100%; position: relative; width: 100%;\">\n<div class=\"wistia_swatch\" style=\"height: 100%; left: 0; opacity: 0; overflow: hidden; position: absolute; top: 0; transition: opacity 200ms; width: 100%;\"><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"filter: blur(5px); height: 100%; object-fit: contain; width: 100%;\" src=\"https:\/\/fast.wistia.com\/embed\/medias\/fh4oaqb4ji\/swatch\" alt=\"\" \/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<h2>Full Transcript<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong> <strong>Bridges<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hey, everybody. Good morning. My name is Seth Bridges, and I\u2019d like to welcome you to the most recent episode of the Data-Driven Marketer. Today, I\u2019m really excited. Our guest, Lee Odden, is the founder and CEO of Top Rank Marketing. They\u2019re a digital marketing agency in the greater Minneapolis, Minnesota area. He is gracious enough to come spend time with us before he takes off to his next big speaking gig in India. And you\u2019ll see him later this year at Content Marketing World in early September as well. So, Lee, I\u2019m really excited to have you. Thanks for being here. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee Odden<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thanks, Seth. I\u2019m excited to be here, even though it doesn\u2019t look like I\u2019m here. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, sorry, everybody. A little technical difficulties. The internet is not exactly working today, but you\u2019ll see\u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It\u2019s all good. It\u2019s all good. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But imagine with me. And yeah, we\u2019re recording this. So, even if you\u2019re not able to or have friends and colleagues who aren\u2019t able to make it today, the recording will absolutely go out on our blog with the transcript and questions. Please ask questions as we go. One of my teammates has got Slack up, and she\u2019s going to be aggregating questions and trying to feed them into me as we go. If it makes sense, we\u2019ll jump right in, and I might even interrupt Lee and have him answer some of the questions. If not, we\u2019ll definitely save the time at the end to do your questions. So, please keep them coming. This is a very smart individual who knows a lot about what we\u2019re going to talk about today, which is how to use data to improve social strategy, content strategy, and your digital marketing in general. So, Lee, are you ready to get going? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I\u2019m ready, Seth. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">All right, let\u2019s do it. So, one of the things that you hear as a phrase in life is data-driven. So, data-driven marketing, data-driven sales, data\u2026 Fine, we\u2019re all guilty of that. But I think data matters. But from your perspective\u2026 You\u2019re the one out working with a broad array of clients. How important is data in the work that you do with any and all of your clients? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That\u2019s a great question. And I think there\u2019s just a little bit of irony to the fact that it\u2019s actually due to data and information overload that consumers are facing on a daily basis that data has become even more important for marketers to stand out, to be more relevant. I\u2019ve seen some\u2026 I don\u2019t know if you know, but I saw a stat from a university. In America, in the United States, we are confronted with an <a href=\"https:\/\/news.usc.edu\/56894\/americans-consume-media-in-a-major-way-study-finds\/\">average of 64 gigabytes of media on a daily basis<\/a>, which is amazing to imagine. And that\u2019s like a paradox of choice at scale. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because people are tuning out and so on and so forth. So, really in order for marketing to be successful, it\u2019s not just about creating useful content that informs buyers, because good luck contenting with them because they\u2019re a thousand other messages as well. It\u2019s got to be even easier for those customers to find the content in all the right places and for that content to deliver a combination of utility and experience. And without data insights about customer preferences, it\u2019s really difficult to deliver on that. And we do some work around tailoring data. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There are a number of factors that kind of fit into that, and it really depends\u2026how much or how little depends on the sophistication let\u2019s say of the client and the approach follows. And an agency that primarily creates content to help clients solve marketing problems, we use a customer empathy model. And that focuses on the relationship that prospective customers have with information during the buyer journey. So, it\u2019s a simplistic three-tier model. And the data fits underneath each one of those segments of information that represents sort of a mini buyer journey. You know, \u201cHow do they discover content or solutions content? What are their preferences for consumption? And what the triggers that motivate action?\u201d And we can go light or deep depending on the situation. And it\u2019s all about the data. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, depending on that\u2026 You were kind of talking about where a particular customer is with their either organizational maturity or the maturity of the marketing organization within a larger organization. It sounds like data\u2026using data to focus and prioritize content in any part of this journey is important. But do you actually tailor how much data you bring or data insights you bring to the client versus what your team is using internally? And does that change as a function of that maturity? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, the magic of that sort of three-tiered model allows for simplicity or sophistication according to the client\u2019s situation. So, when clients have customer segments and even things like personas all sorted out, we can get very specific and very sophisticated because we\u2019ve already got a lot of that utility and emotion all wrapped around who is that best customer, and what do they care about. If they don\u2019t have that, then we usually use a phased approach, and we grow with the foundation of what we can trust, and we grow from there. We built on, we optimize, we elevate our understanding as we complete our understanding of who the buyer is and what they care about. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you take that sort of more simplistic end\u2026 Because I know\u2026I\u2019m sure there\u2019s a range of viewers right now from sophisticated to simple or serving clients who are also from sophisticated to simple. Can you give an example of an engagement where you step in, and there\u2019s not a lot of established content and\/or the client\u2019s maturity with respect to either content creation or persona understanding is somewhat simple. What do you do? What does that look like in terms of getting to a place where you feel like, \u201cAw, this is where we need to be.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, what we\u2019ll do is some primary research there. If there\u2019s a lack of data, CRM data, analytics data\u2026 It\u2019s not always a lack of data, sometimes it\u2019s a lack of access because IT loves to keep the gates closed. So, we\u2019ll do some primary research. We\u2019ll do some surveys with stakeholders within the organization, and we\u2019ll ask them questions that help reveal their understanding of the buyer\u2019s preferences according to discovery consumption and engagement. And there\u2019s an example I\u2019m thinking of, an IT service management company that\u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There\u2019s actually a report that we generate, we call it a rhythm report because we want to get the rhythm, I guess, of that target customer, what\u2019s the rhythm. So, what we\u2019re trying to understand there is things like search keywords, social conversations, and topics, what publications they read, what\u2026who influences them and what influences them. That\u2019s all in the discovery bucket. And so we did that. And this is for a CTO, chief technology officer, that would be most prone to be the buyer of IT service management solutions. B to B enterprise sort of offering. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And so by collecting that information through a combination of primary research to get things started, asking questions about\u2026 \u201cYeah, what publications do your customers actually read? What do they subscribe to? Who do they listen to? What people are tasked on the buying committee to make recommendations?\u201d Stuff like that. Also asking questions about content preferences like, \u201cWhat devices do they use? iPhones, iPad, desktop? Are they reading white papers or not? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Are they looking at eBooks, infographics, videos, and so forth?\u201d And then as far as triggers that motivate action, we take a look at early\/middle\/late stage. So, things that surface, an idea or a solution, just as it\u2019s first entree into the conversation to consideration like, \u201cWho\u2019s the best?\u201d And the kinds of things that motivate them to actually make a decision. We ask those questions during that sort of initial survey, and that then helps us create this rhythm report that articulates the go forward for constructing a content plan. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And what are some of the\u2026? If you have an engagement where, again, it\u2019s sort of a clean slate, obviously if the internal team understands the customer\u2026is spending enough time with a customer, understands the business where you can actually do that survey, great. What do you use in terms of data sources to analyze or to understand, \u201cCool, they\u2019ve told me that they read these ten periodicals, or journals, or online newsletters, magazines, whatever.\u201d Where do you go from there in terms of understanding what that content is, how it resonates with these audiences, etc.? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, we do take\u2026I don\u2019t want to say with a grain of salt\u2026something like that. We do understand the inherent bias in the individuals that are answering these surveys, you know, the stakeholders inside the organization. We understand this is just a relative measure. But what we\u2019re looking for is points of interest that we can then use to validate. So, in particular, we\u2019re looking for individuals that represent that ideal customer. And so once we understand an entity or an individual identity, then we\u2019ll be able to use tools to find out where they\u2019re interacting publicly on the social web. So, obviously we\u2019re a customer of Rival IQ, but we also use tools like <a href=\"http:\/\/buzzsumo.com\">BuzzSumo<\/a>, because we do so much with influencers, we actually use a couple of tools. One is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.traackr.com\/\">Traackr<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Another one is Analytica. And this is all public information, of course. So, we have no access to their private information. And so we\u2019ll poke around there and try to get an understanding of the places where they\u2019re spending time, the publications that they\u2019re referencing, siting, and sharing, where is there engagement for that ideal customer. And so if we get 10 or 20 of these ideal customers, these are actual customers, or they\u2019re actual prospects, then we can model some insights around what we find about those people and their behaviors and their intent. And that helps translate or augment the\u2026translates into a component of the rhythm report that then is used to architect a content plan. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, that makes a ton of sense. I\u2019m glad you mentioned BuzzSumo and Traackr. But I was thinking about BuzzSumo particularly once you\u2019re able to identify sort of places where you know these target personas or target customers spend time, because then you can actually go figure out content resonance, some of the influencers who are sharing, and understand a little bit more about who these people like to engage with. So, yeah, that\u2019s awesome. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let me take this survey thread and pull it and kind of go more broadly. Great that you\u2019re able to have access to the team and do surveys there. Are there industry level surveys or\u2026? I know we produce <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/2017-higher-ed-social-engagement-study\/\">annually for higher ed<\/a>, and for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/2018-social-media-industry-benchmark-report\/\">social media benchmarks<\/a>, and things like that. But obviously\u2026 And I\u2019ve read a lot of the writing of your team. You all obviously consume a lot of industry level benchmark reports and guidance reports. Can you talk a little bit about how that kind of broader level survey data feeds into some of the actions that you take as well in these sorts of engagements? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. Especially with a situation where we need to create some validity, some third party validity, around a recommended solution or approach, this is not unusual. Obviously, everyone does this. But this is the most common thing we\u2019re doing is sighting third party statistics. So, if we\u2019re trying to convince someone that\u2026 And we\u2019re really not in the selling business. It\u2019s just when we\u2019re working with actual customers that we\u2019re trying to decide a course of action of some sort, we\u2019ll leverage industry stats to support that\u2026a particular direction. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, like a blog. Like if someone was resistant to a blog\u2026 I just saw this stat on CMI. After reading recommendations on a blog, <a href=\"https:\/\/contentmarketinginstitute.com\/2017\/10\/stats-invest-content-marketing\/\">61% of US consumers made a purchase<\/a>. That\u2019s interesting. [Laughs] And so things like that, we\u2019ll all go, \u201cHm.\u201d They\u2019ll make that executive or that decision maker go, \u201cOh, that\u2019s interesting.\u201d And of course, we try and augment. I have to say this is where the magic happens. It\u2019s not just adding third-party statistics to an argument posed by the agency or the internal marketer, but it\u2019s when you\u2026it corroborates other hypotheses that are formed by some private data. That\u2019s where the magic happens. Or makes it a lot more powerful. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sure. I think it\u2019s interesting\u2026 you talk about\u00a0that as\u2026 It seems maybe obvious, but if you\u2019re working with a team who needs broader buy-in and is part of your job as the agency to help them make the case that these investments are worth it, that absolutely seems like kind of a masterful bit to use that. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, and actually there\u2019s a lot of value, too, in the third party industry statistics in a lot of different ways. In fact, one of the things I would share\u2026this is like a content tip almost. I have someone who\u2019s doing curation for us every day. They\u2019re just doing curation and sharing, and managing social channels. What I have them doing is when they find industry statistics that are germane to our business, they save them in a spreadsheet, and they tag them with keywords. So, over time, we have this huge library of\u2026a great taxonomy of industry statistics that make it super easy to then go find that stat for that obscure scenario that client XYZ really wants to get some third party data proof about something. And this is a habitual sort of thing that can really scale up to something really useful for an organization. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Can you give me an example of an actual big win where it wasn\u2019t\u2026not that it wasn\u2019t going well, but, \u201cMan, I pulled this stat about the blog,\u201d or something from a social perspective where you\u2019ve gotten that resistance, but you came through with a\u2026a stat corroborated? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think\u2026 So, there\u2019s a fuzzy and a specific example maybe. A fuzzy example is one where someone was reluctant to invest in a strategy. And I don\u2019t have the exact stats off the top of my head, but it was a very inverse proportion where from a content marketing study that showed the percentage of companies that had a documented content marketing strategy achieved this significant proportion of results and effectiveness compared to those who did not. And that led to an investment, a financial investment into some research and answering the question of why as opposed to just executing on production. Because a lot of companies think, \u201cWell, we just want you to make blog posts. We just want you to make eBooks, and videos, and infographics. Just go make them.\u201d As opposed to really connecting them to solving a problem for the customer. Yeah, imagine that. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Imagine that. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Laughs] Maybe a more specific example is\u2026well, we have\u2026 We\u2019re a many service digital agency, so we\u2019re doing ads and organic sorts of things. And so we\u2019ve had\u2026 I\u2019m thinking of a particular client that was very focused on doing nothing with content or inbound really. They\u2019re only focused on ads, targeting ads. And there was a stat, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.demandmetric.com\/content\/content-marketing-infographic\">content marketing generates over three times as many leads as outbound marketing and costs 62% less<\/a>. I remember that because that was pretty compelling. And that changed some minds, again, about investing in a different way. And investing in a complementary way. We don\u2019t play this mutually exclusive game at all, because of course what matters is the customer. And so if a customer, a percentage of customers, respond to ads, and a percentage of customers respond to organic visibility through content and inbound efforts, hey, that\u2019s fantastic. Right? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. And is this\u2026? It seems like this is a place wherein a mixed\u2026kind of\u2026hopefully, everyone has lived in a somewhat mixed world where you\u2019re augmenting some of your inbound with some paid, paid media, PPC, whatever. But obviously you can produce, and test, and distribute your organic content, and whoever comes, sort of comes. And the people who are already on your site and who are already in your CRM who you\u2019re pushing this content\u2026 Like this webinar. We do this webinar series because it gets a lot of engagement with our existing customers, with our prospects, and drives new demand. And we see that because of the data. That makes it a lot easier for me, for example, to go decide to do paid media to attract even more people to these programs\u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Is that something that you\u2019ve found as well where you can kind of\u2026back and forth? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. So, the DNA of that idea for us is through search, because we started pretty much as a search agency many years ago. And so using paid media to do test campaigns, have hypothesis\u2019 about keyword segments and topics, and kinda throw that digital spaghetti against the wall, collect some data, and then use that to inform organic initiatives has proven to be something that is very translatable to lots of other types of media and content or channels, I should say. So, if a client has a popular blog or has a certain threshold of visitors to a blog, we can post content on that blog, and there\u2019s already a subscribed community that\u2019s paying attention. There are things that we can find out there organically that can actually reverse inform some of the paid media that we might do on social or other means to attract attention to that topic. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And do you find yourself using social at times in a similar manner where you\u2019re able to use that as the digital spaghetti as it were? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, it\u2019s so available. Of course. You\u2019ve got the firehose of Twitter data and the public data of a couple of other places, and that makes it very appealing because it\u2019s so available. And it may not represent the totality of the social web, but it\u2019s such a volume that you can tease out what\u2019s useful. So, yes, absolutely. Both organically publishing content on social and then using information from that experience to inform paid and vice versa. Yes, absolutely. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And I\u2019m going to jump for a second. I know you do some work obviously with B to B clients and thinking about the struggle, I think, that many B to B clients have with social media generally. How much do some of these content proof points, industry sort of benchmarks, etc.\u2026do they work equally well whether you\u2019re servicing a B to B client or a B to C client when it comes to the social media aspect particularly? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That\u2019s an interesting question. Because this generally\u2026 And this is a sweeping generalization of course. But B to C companies tend to be a little more hip to the social because they see what their competition is doing. They see\u2026the live it. In a consumer world, social, product evangelism, and promotion is a lot more rampant. Rampant is a negative word. It\u2019s a lot more present. And so they come to the table with a lot more feeling of credibility towards social and consequently, social statistics and that sort of thing to validate points of view than in B to B. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That\u2019s not to say that B to B isn\u2019t certainly warming up generally to social. It certainly has. But that would be a point of differentiation I guess is that you have these predisposed notions or experiences that are very different. And you still have people in B to B still playing the white paper game and the case study game, and things that are a little more traditional than, oh, something like we just published for Content Marketing Institute. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, we helped market the Content Marketing World Conference, and we just published a series of videos that were like Mario Brothers kind of animations including influencers. And it\u2019s like that\u2019s just not common. And so social\u2026the amplification of that, of course, occurred almost exclusively through social. Or for an accounting client, financial planning and accounting. You\u2019re not finding a lot of Candy Crush-themed microsites quizzing you and having all kinds of fun bells and whistles, and all the things that Candy Crush does for you. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That\u2019s another example that is primarily amplified through social. Those are B to B solutions, and they stand out because a lot of people aren\u2019t doing those sorts of things. So, it\u2019s like we\u2019re all consumers. So, while I said that B to C is predisposed to social, well, those people that work at B to B companies are humans, too. And they\u2019re on a personal level predisposed to social. And so what\u2019s interesting about doing interesting things through social for B to B is that it does really stand out. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, I think it gets back to understanding the persona, understanding\u2026if who you\u2019re trying to reach or who is your buyer actually is one a particular social channel. Probably not all of them but knowing where to be and then understanding that Candy Crush probably actually does resonate with the right demographic for financial planning, for example. Because everyone-ish plays Candy Crush, present company excluded. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Me, too. Same here. Don\u2019t invite me. Don\u2019t invite me to play Candy Crush. No, don\u2019t. Don\u2019t do it. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, look, if industry reports, and benchmarks, and things\u2026 This is at the high level. This is like there\u2019s no private data, maybe I don\u2019t even have this client, maybe I\u2019m pitching, or maybe I\u2019m working on an audit, but I\u2019m fighting with IT to get the data. That\u2019s up here. But at the other end of the spectrum, we\u2019re talking about GA, Omniture, Facebook, Facebook Insights, Ads accounts, Search Console. We have it all. Of course, there\u2019s less competitive. There\u2019s less context from a competitive perspective or from an industry perspective. But wow, man oh man, from top to bottom, we have all the data. I\u2019m assuming you\u2026IT problems aside, you\u2019re typically working with your clients, all their private data that you can get. True? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. Yeah. Yep, all your data\u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you are\u2026 Oh, go ahead. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No, I was just going to be silly and say all your data belongs to us. All right. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Funny story, I had that as a headline at some point on our website, and a former boss, VP of marketing, she said, \u201cI don\u2019t think you understand your audience because I don\u2019t get it.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Laughter] <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, I wrote a really nice blog post about not understanding your audience, and that blog post did really well. How \u2018bout that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There you go. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Marketer failures, all your base. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">[Laughter] <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When you get down to that level of data, where do you find particularly for a content, or social media, or kind of both engagement\u2026where do you find yourself spending the bulk of your sort of analytics time? And is it because of\u2026? Well, that\u2019s question A. Question B is is it because it\u2019s just hard to do the analysis, or is it because it\u2019s that important? Or both?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, it\u2019s dictated by the nature of the engagement. So, if the strategy calls for us to do\u2026 Well, we\u2019re almost doing it in content. So, it\u2019s content and then like an equalizer, we\u2019re doing a certain amount of effort with search, and social, and influencers, and some conversation rate optimization. Which those are our equalizer bars, basically. And then paid spend. Then we\u2019re going to look at the private, if you will, analytics for each one of those. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, their social advertising program, their paid search or Google AdWords program. Google Analytics is probably the most common source of data that we\u2019ll have access to or given access to that we can go in and find out what\u2019s the current situation, what\u2019s the truth in terms of what\u2019s actually happening and to the degree that we can discover why. And we can reconcile that against some of the goals that are outlined in the strategy. And that\u2019s what helps drive the go forward recommendations in terms of the tactical mix. So, if that helps answer your question. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It does. But the reason I\u2019m thinking is because so many of\u2026 I guarantee so many people in the audience and certainly, our customers are social media marketers, maybe just content marketers, maybe both. But we all flex and do lots of work. But I would say that in general that there is less comfortability, less familiarity with the richness of what you can learn beyond the basics from Google Analytics and how that actually can be so informative to both strategic as well as the execution of some of these things. Do you find that your agency being really sharp when it comes to understanding the impact of transforming web analytics into action is either a differentiator for you or a place where you\u2019re bringing a lot of value for the clients? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think it is. I really do. We have some phenomenal resources internally in terms of data analytics. And we actually have created our own dashboard that is based on a business intelligence platform. And so we\u2019re pulling in disparate data sources. So, including Google Analytics as well as some social and other CRM data to provide or create these custom dashboards for our clients. And some of it is public, some of it is just available to our account managers and the internal folks. But that is absolutely a differentiator. In fact, we\u2019ve had clients say, \u201cThis is great. I don\u2019t even have to look at GA anymore. I don\u2019t have to look at these five other things anymore. I can just go look at your thing, and this is so convenient for me.\u201d And it\u2019s actually convenient for us, too. So, yes. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I find personally that\u2026 Obviously, I love competitive benchmarking. I do love seeing how other people succeed in the market and using kind of competitive SEO tools, and looking at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.semrush.com\">SEMrush<\/a>, and <a href=\"https:\/\/moz.com\/\">Moz<\/a>, and some of the other tools that make that available as it pertains to content. But at the end of the day, knowing that there are certain pieces of content that just kill every time and that we can\u2019t do those pieces every month, but when we do, it\u2019s okay to invest because you see that the payoff has been there in the past and almost certainly will be there in the future. And that comes from GA. That comes from your funnels. That comes from chasing it down and saying, \u201cYep, dollars go in, dollars come out. And we all like dollars.\u201d Whatever your currency may be. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A question just came in. It\u2019s a little bit of a rewind, but I want to jump into it just because I think it does get to this analytics and persona question a little bit. Somebody asked, \u201cHow do you\u2026? What do you recommend as an approach when you really have either a broad array of personas or personas that are just very different in terms of what they\u2019re looking for from your company in terms of utility or purchasing?\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, I try to use outcomes at the prioritization schema. So, what is your best customer in terms of revenue opportunity? Or where is the white space customer? And by that, I mean the customer where they represent the greatest opportunity and the least competitiveness. That\u2019s what I mean and closing the gap there. Because ultimately, revenue answers all questions for you. The people you answer to will be very interested in whatever revenue outcomes, no matter what else is valuable and business valuable that you may communicate as a result of having worked with different personas and targeted customers. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But ultimately, it is revenue. So, who&#8217;re your best customers? Who represents your ideal customer relative to some of your primary business goals? Obviously leads, and sales, and revenue, and sales cycle\u2026shortening sales cycle, increasing order of volume, order of frequency, things like that are very, very motivating. So, if you can identify specifically which customer segment or two represent those opportunities, that\u2019s what I would focus on. That\u2019s how I would simplify and prioritize. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Got it. But to simplify just for\u2026 So, it\u2019s not water things down. It\u2019s not go after everyone. It is find where the dollars are coming from and focus? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes, your unicorn customer as <a href=\"https:\/\/medium.com\/@larrykim\">Larry Kim<\/a> would say. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Okay. There are always ways to get more of them. And lots of us serve different constituencies. But it\u2019s tempting to find the commonalities and try to market to the commonalities. And you can probably do okay, but I don\u2019t think you can kill it with your priority persona if you\u2019re doing that. And I\u2019m curious as\u00a0to your opinion. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, I think the idea is that you document your success and then duplicate, meaning get really focused and specific on that profitable opportunity customer and become successful serving them. And the things you learn about that apply to other customer segments or other personas that you\u2019re after. Because then now you\u2019ve got something behind it to justify the actions. You\u2019ve got data. And they\u2019re not the same person, of course. But some of the things that you do, the way you approached solving those information and content problems can be applied to those other customer segments in their own way. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, and I think it\u2019s funny because some of these things\u2026I think they feel obvious, but I don\u2019t know that they are obvious all the time. And it seems like it takes someone else stepping in and saying\u2026 And this is the role that you play probably in a lot of your engagement, which is like, \u201cI\u2019m going to kind of state this obvious, but we\u2019re going to help you take a step back, isolate what\u2019s working, figure out how to map it over here, and kind of do that until we make money.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Right. And you\u2019re right, that is a role that we play in that is to provide leadership and confidence for the direction to be taken. Because it\u2019s amazing how often, how frequent companies just need confidence. Or it\u2019s the people that are on\u2026their reputation, their position is on the line for making the right decision. And so they just need the confidence to make the right decision. And it\u2019s amazing how many optimization or marketing performance optimization opportunities exist simply by understanding and executing well the fundamentals. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do you find that\u2026? I find this a lot. People end up making these decisions\u2026they get the confidence, they do the thing, and then they get very excited about doing the thing and forget to go back and kind of measure up and check in. Is that something that you find in a lot of your engagements? Failure to go back and kind of check in with the data? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When they don\u2019t have an assigned account manager from an agency that is responsible for following up and managing the success of a program ongoing, yes, there is shiny object syndrome within brands, too. Because\u2026 And It\u2019s not always shiny objects in the sense that a marketing consultant will find a new technology or something, but it might be other responsibilities that\u2019s being added onto them, and so they get distracted, and they don\u2019t follow up. They don\u2019t follow through. Not because they don\u2019t want to sometimes, it\u2019s just because they\u2019re tasked with so many different things, and they don\u2019t have the resources to do the job. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do you all have a cadence to how you do these more kind of retrospective kind of both backward and forward-looking? Is this something you do with clients on a monthly basis, on a quarterly basis, less frequently than that? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sure. Well, at some level\u2026there\u2019s always opportunistic sorts of reflection or surfacing as it happens. But there are pretty larger reviews\u2026 There\u2019s a certain review that happens roughly on a monthly basis but definitely on a quarterly basis. And then about three months before a client renewal is coming up, we start to\u2026we have a sequence of activities that fit that category as well. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, there is the nugget of wisdom from Lee Odden right there, everybody. It\u2019s not the month before the renewal. It\u2019s not a week before the renewal. Three months before the renewal. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Because it turns out it\u2019s hard to cram that stuff in at the very end. I don\u2019t care what you\u2019re selling. We sell software. Doing the renewal a week out is not a good idea. It\u2019s not about data. I can tell you, it\u2019s about data. Don\u2019t do that. I\u2019ve seen what happens. Client level data obviously is the place where you know everything. You know what went in, you know what comes out. We started out talking about industry level benchmarks. But\u2026 Not even but. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And I know because of the business we\u2019re in and the customers we work with like your agency and so many other agencies and brands, there\u2019s a lot of value from competitive data as well, particularly when maybe your customer is on the more simplistic end, and you don\u2019t have a lot of those proof points. Can you share with us a few examples\u2026? I know you\u2019re a Rival IQ customer, so that\u2019s all I have to say about that. But how you use competitive data, whether it\u2019s again, social, SEO, some of the ways to either\u2026well, to drive your engagements and sort of what role it plays. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sure. Obviously generally we like\u2026we start with broad-based comparisons for things like\u2026to understand share of voice, overall footprints, share of topics, share of influence, and ads, and that sort of thing to really understand what we\u2019re up against, what the weaknesses and strengths are so we can identify opportunities. And that manifests in a couple of different ways for each of the channels that we work in. So, SEO obviously. We want to understand the share of search for a particular category and where the keyword opportunities or keyword\/topic opportunities are so that we can find an ideal ratio target. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, I think I mentioned something about this before where demand is high, but competition is low. An ideal ratio situation there\u2026 And we\u2019ll use competitive research. So, SEMrush is beautiful for a thing like that to identify some of those opportunities. Moz, I think, has a keyword difficulty tool that adds some insight around that as well. So, we\u2019ll look to understand who the competitors are in the first place according to keyword, and then we\u2019ll drill down from there from an SEO perspective. On the SEO side, competitive\u2026 This is what I love about your product, too, is the landscape. So, when thing spike, I get notifications.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And it\u2019s great to see what people are doing that\u2019s really standing out. And it\u2019s not just about, \u201cOh, I changed a title tag,\u201d or something like that. But it\u2019s like, \u201cOh, look, they\u2019re getting 5,000% more engagement.\u201d Then I go and look, and I see\u00a0they only post once a month. Okay, that\u2019s moot. It\u2019s a moot point. Most often, what it is is, \u201cHey, we\u2019ve got hundreds of percent higher engagement,\u201d and they did this really cool thing. And we see that pattern repeated very easily across a portfolio of competitors. I\u2019m just saying that this is why I\u2019ve been using the tool for so long. And it makes it super easy to see what\u2019s going on from a social perspective across this whole group of companies. And then you can see patterns. You can understand consistently what kinds of things are actually working with competing companies in your category. And you can learn from that. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And are you able to use those as proof\u2026? I\u2019ll give you a few examples, and you can\u2026 I know you do a lot of work with influencer marketing particularly. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I know that we just did our big benchmark study back in April. And last week, I just did a big follow on looking at a little bit of trends over time, and we dove into a few examples. And one of the things that popped out really strongly was user-generated content, particular Instagram, for midsized brands who maybe don\u2019t have the budget to produce that level of quality content, but they absolutely have the reach and the brand. And so sourcing from a community of influencers around them absolutely turns into what could be a mediocre Instagram profile into something that seems pretty epic. Do you find that taking proof points from a competitor or someone that maybe you admire, respect, we can show you how they\u2019re doing these techniques\u2026is this something you do either using our tool, using any of the tools to figure out how to convince them that, \u201cHey, this is working.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, yeah, of course. We\u2019re using the motion of pride to be persuasive. And maybe sometimes fear of loss as well, just saying, \u201cLook how the competition is kicking your butt. And here\u2019s evidence of how they\u2019re doing that exactly. There are things we can learn from this. In fact, we might even be able to do it better now that we see what they\u2019re actually doing.\u201d So, yeah. As a persuasion tool, yes. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Go ahead. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No, I was just going to be persuasive, showing those examples of what the competition is doing plays a very specific role in the argument. And in combination with other things, very, very powerful. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Are there particular strategies or techniques that you find using these kinds of proof points are super valuable? I\u2019m thinking about things like influencer, UGC, video, contests, just a range of activities. Do you find there are places where you\u2019re saying, \u201cWe need to be doing this,\u201d but it\u2019s a harder one? But then kind of the data comes back and helps? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, certainly it does happen where we something that\u2026 There are some things where the activity manifests through social channels, and so you think you know all that\u2019s going on because of what\u2019s visible, but there may be more going on than that. And I guess we\u2019re guilty of doing that sort of thing. So, where we have multilevel purpose content marketing programs, and it looks like we\u2019re just doing a simple influencer list, but we\u2019re doing five other things besides that, and there\u2019s no way you can tell, but we\u2019re generating the benefit from it. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, I think there are things that we have found that looked\u2026or there was a hypothesis that a certain direction would make sense, and there was pushback in that, \u201cThis would be too difficult,\u201d or maybe we don\u2019t expect it to return value proportional to the investment, and then finding an example of that, of a competitor actually doing that thing, has been helpful in making the argument. Without performance information, it\u2019s kind of hard. You can get obviously high level like top of funnel type of visibility, impressions, views, that sort of thing. But without ROI data, it\u2019s kind of hard to make the totality of an argument to go a particular way. But you can inspire more confidence. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. I will tell you, we produce a lot of data based reporting, like industry level or particular case studies, industries, but it all comes from we have data on hundreds of thousands of companies, and so why not use that data. But that wasn\u2019t necessarily always something we invested a lot of time in. And we stepped back, and we analyzed a bunch of our not even competitors. I don\u2019t consider Moz, and HubSpot, and BuzzSumo\u2026 These are not competitors, they\u2019re just awesome companies in the space. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But when you step back and study some of the things that they\u2019re doing that earn a lot of attention, particularly in channels like Twitter as you said are so measurable, it stood out that all of them were getting the most love for example in our space doing studies based on private data about their business or about\u2026 Take <a href=\"http:\/\/buzzsumo.com\/blog\/new-perspective-engaging-content-buzzsumos-reddit-data\/#gs.lKjo76E\">BuzzSumo, Steve Rayson<\/a>. He does these, \u201cWe have a billion posts. Let me tell you what we find when we aggregate data from our product.\u201d It\u2019s like they\u2019re the ones who can do that. So, that\u2019s kind of what we do with our data as well. Holy moly, that\u2019s where I learned it. You see how much that blows them up, and you realize, \u201cOh, maybe I should try that. I should have the confidence to try that.\u201d And then you\u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. Absolutely, yeah. And that\u2019s a great example. That is a great example. And you mentioned BuzzSumo. Actually, when Rand was with Moz and certainly with Steve, they also have very unique skills at making the most out of that kind of content. One thing that Steve shared with me is that he reached out to journalists and asked them, \u201cWhat kind of data would you like to see? Here, I have a hypothesis about doing this study. And I\u2019m wondering what kind of data you would like to see out of a study like that.\u201d And they gave him feedback. And of course, when the study was published, they were more than happy to write about the report. Brilliant guy, right? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So smart. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. And of course\u2026 I was trying to think of one of their most recent big pushes they did. I don\u2019t remember the <a href=\"http:\/\/buzzsumo.com\/blog\/most-shared-headlines-study\/#gs.FtW4qSA\">exact study<\/a>. But he did all of the things. He did the work. He got pre-feedback from folks probably like you, and <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MarketingProfs\">Ann Handley<\/a>, and Ian Cleary, and a bunch of people who are big kind of speakers in the space, and got pre got their feedback, so he could include that. And then he did a little paid, it took off. The got those people to amplify. And then the next week, he wrote a post of, \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/buzzsumo.com\/blog\/went-viral-lessons-promoting-content-influencers-ads-pr\/#gs.R6Y5omc\">How I crushed it.<\/a>\u201d And then that post crushed even more than the first post. And you\u2019re like, \u201cOkay, you know what you\u2019re doing. This is fantastic.\u201d But it\u2019s such a good learning for everybody in the space. I don\u2019t care what you do, you can learn from, frankly\u2026it feels like generosity, but really it\u2019s just good marketing from his perspective as well. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I think there\u2019s a lot to be said around collaboration and participation in marketing. And there\u2019s even a phrase I throw around once in a while \u2013 participating marketing. And I\u2019ve spoken about this recently more often in that it\u2019s a democratized approach to content creation. If you include the very community that you\u2019re trying to market to in the content creation process itself, that investment and effort in creating something for the greater good of the industry will motivate them in incredible ways to promote and help make that content successful. And when you have a genuine approach, meaning you have genuine interest in making the industry a better place, it\u2019s amazing how much that comes back to you in terms of good old-fashioned ROI. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, it\u2019s like life. You have to give a little bit. You might get, you might not. But you just have to do the right thing. And usually, goodness will come back to you. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, you have to be smart about, right? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, don\u2019t be wasteful. Don\u2019t be\u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Naive. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, that\u2019s the problem with naivety. You don\u2019t know when you\u2019re doing it. So, I have a couple more questions that came in, but there\u2019s a couple that kind of bundle up here around when you don\u2019t have that ROI data, how\u2026? One of the specific questions is how do you, Lee, or you with a client\u2026how do you decide how much to invest when you that confidence, but you don\u2019t have the data? How big do you go? How much of it is\u2026how much do you put into it before you feel like both in terms of time, dollars, energy, however you measure it\u2026how do you take that bite without feeling you\u2019re making a huge bet? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My ideal is\u2026well, for us, personally, we have a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.toprankblog.com\/\">fairly popular blog<\/a> and social network, if you will. So, we have a substantial organic audience to throw things out there. And there\u2019s really no cost to it because it\u2019s an on-demand sort of channel. So, for us to collect data confidence and then make decisions about investment. On the client\u2019s side of things, pilot\u2026doing a pilot is my favorite sort of thing because we can create a business case around further investment out of the data from the pilot. There are other metrics of course that you can try and correlate. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, if I\u2026 It\u2019s a bit fuzzy, right? But if you can create some equivalency between something that you don\u2019t have a lot of ROI data around and something that you do have some ROI data around, you can develop like I said some fuzzy hypothesis about, \u201cWell, you know, when we\u2019ve done email or when we\u2019ve done a paid search, we achieve these KPI\u2019s. And the result is this ROI. Maybe there\u2019s a little bit of correlation between that and social. And so let\u2019s do a pilot with that hypothesis in mind and prove it out or disprove it. And then we can make some choices about investment based on that.\u201d That would be how I would go about it. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, like all things, trying to find an adjacency, mapping it in. So, yeah, somebody just went and asked the questions, and Cassandra fed it through here. So, I\u2019m going to ask you. You can do with this what you will. But when it gets down to social specifically, how do you think about measuring ROI on social activities? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Well, I see\u2026 So, I can\u2019t imagine ever executing on a social only type of thing. Social is part of an overall type of marketing program. So, to the extent that social engagement\u2026social content discovery, consumption, and engagement matters to our particular target audience, we will leverage social for amplification of content. So, the ROI comes from the success of the content. The ROI of the\u2026 I don\u2019t know that there\u2019s an ROI of the social itself unless we have tracking URLs that actually show that discovery and action actually occurred all on a social channel. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And therefore, that investment in social was actually able to yield a transaction if that makes sense. So, it depends on how you go about it. And in my case, my experience is more around that idea that social is everywhere, and it plays a specific role as part of an integrated campaign. And so, therefore, the ROI is around the campaign, not about social itself. There are certain KPI\u2019s that indicate success or not, specifically social of course. But ultimate revenue ROI comes from the campaign. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, you get more granular. It has to be about a particular initiative, it\u2019s not about social generally. The thing that I always find funny\u2026 Tell me what you think about this. So, we\u2019re a B to B company. We maintain all of our social channels. But I think about our Instagram where we try to feature our team. It\u2019s a lot more about, \u201cHere\u2019s who we are as people, the human beings that are trying to make everyone else\u2019s life better. Here\u2019s what it looks like to be here.\u201d It might only serve for recruiting. I\u2019ve got somebody who wants to come work here, and they spin through our Instagram. Like, \u201cOh, you seem like nice people. That looks fun. I\u2019d like to do that.\u201d What\u2019s the ROI of that, of finding a person who\u2019s a good cultural fit in half the time? It\u2019s pretty high. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Exactly. Exactly. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Pretty high. But it\u2019s hard to measure. It\u2019s actually hard to measure. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is. I actually wrote about this in a book called <a href=\"http:\/\/optimizebook.com\/\">Optimize<\/a>\u00a0that I published, God, five, six years ago now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, I just wrote a book. And so what we talked about in calculating ROI is people search for a lot of different reasons. This applies to creating content. Companies create content for lots of reasons, including talent acquisition. So, when you look at the cost of hiring recruiters\u2026if you can create content that\u2019s really easily found either through search, or through social, or whatever, you can actually reduce costs or increase efficiencies on things that you\u2019re already investing in. Same thing for customer service, same thing\u2026content that can be easily found, or public relations and obviously marketing. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, I think that talent brand investment through Facebook and Instagram especially yields both the, \u201cWow, I might want to come work there,\u201d kind of outcome, but it\u2019s certainly prospective customers look at that stuff, too. They look at your culture for sure. In fact, there was an <a href=\"https:\/\/madewithmerit.com\/reports\/Millennial_B2B-Report-Merit.pdf\">interesting study about millennials<\/a>. So, that\u2019s what, up to 30 years old. These are decisions-makers.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The first thing that they\u2019re looking for on a B to B content website is the company\u2019s CSR activities, their corporate social responsibility, they\u2019re benevolent, they\u2019re altruistic types of endeavors. That\u2019s the first thing they\u2019re looking for. And so when you publish the fact that on Instagram or wherever the fact that your team is out building a house somewhere, that\u2019s actually not just showing what a good group of people you are and how fun the culture is from an employment standpoint, but it\u2019s also something that\u2019s extremely important to a very large group of decision-makers in both B to B and B to C. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, this is\u2026 I will tell you, we have a big website. The page where we organically get kudos is our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/about\/\">about page<\/a>. That\u2019s one of the most top visited pages on our site, because it turns out that people actually care who the people are behind an organization. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And Cassandra, one of our product marketing managers, she went around and interviewed all the founders in the leadership team recently and asked kind of, \u201cWhat do you hope people could know about the business?\u201d Because this is the storytelling that we do. And unanimously\u2026we did this separately\u2026we all answered the same thing. Like, \u201cWe just want our customers and our prospects to know that we\u2019re people. Just we\u2019re people working in an office here in Seattle to make good software to make their things better. And try really hard.\u201d But not everybody gets that, which is why I think we\u2026 Sometimes you get frustrated. So, if communicating that through social is the way that we get there, then we should invest. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. Absolutely. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We got time for about one more question, and then we\u2019re out of time. But this one has come\u2026 Okay, this is a little bit less about data, but we have you here, and you have a lot of experience sort of running an agency building teams to serve clients. And obviously, you\u2019ve been doing that for a very long time. So, how do you think about kind of developing your bench and bringing up staff? Because you got to find people who are analytically minded. You also have to find people who are good copyrights and good strategic thinkers. How do you do that and do that well over time? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, that\u2019s something I\u2019ve been practicing for 16 years. And I don\u2019t know if I\u2019ve found the perfect solution to that yet. Obviously, I have really talented people on my leadership team that are tasked with that specifically. We do make a very concentrated effort to create some clarity around what roles are, and how teams are structured, and what the career path, if you will, within different groups might be, and that sort of thing. So, we\u2019re still small in the scheme of things. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019re a boutique-sized agency at 30-some people. And I wish we had ten more. I wish we had 12 more because of the specialization that we\u2019re involved with. But I think having\u2026 So, one part of the answer is around clarity around specific what the job is, and what the role is, and how it interacts with other people. And so what are the resources an individual needs in order to be successful, and is there a feedback mechanism in order to give them the information they need to know where they\u2019re at? And there\u2019s that sort of individual level and also team level feedback. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">There are goals and feedback mechanisms to help that happen. And at the same time, there\u2019s a cultural aspect, meaning we just went through a purpose initiative in fourth quarter last year to identify what is our purpose. Outside of a business, what are we trying to achieve? And we\u2019re trying to leave a legacy of clever, courageous, and brave marketers. Something like that. That\u2019s horrible. I should not be pausing on that. Anyway, the idea is that there\u2019s something bigger than just driving of revenue and having successful clients. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It\u2019s like, \u201cWhat are we trying to actually create?\u201d And so that effort helps with recruiting obviously. It helps with the why \u2013 why am I here, what are we after, what gives my work meaning. You know what I mean? So, there\u2019s this very specific and tactical sort of thing. And then there\u2019s this sort of loftier aspirational element that helps develop the team. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And obviously investing in\u2026bringing in folks who maybe don\u2019t\u2026who are more junior\u2026maybe not necessarily junior but just don\u2019t have all of the experience or all of the depth in each of these sort of focused areas that you need to be successful in digital marketing today\u2026 When you\u2019re thinking about investing in these folks and bringing them up, do you get kind of granule and like, \u201cWe\u2019re going to work on your analytics skills,\u201d or, \u201cWe\u2019re going to work on your content mapping.\u201d Or is it more like project-based, and they\u2019re sort of leveling up across the board as they go? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It would be\u2026especially initially during their first year, it\u2019s going to be very specific. And so the role delineation has capabilities identifies very specifically. And so their upstream supervisor is going to work with them on those things. And so also we have a new VP who\u2019s really pretty much just focused on optimizing the way we do our work, and project management, and that sort of thing. And so sort of like a counseling sort of role. And so\u2026 And then as someone matures, of course, it gets a little more\u2026 Someone might see themselves moving into another role, or we might give more cross-functional training to that person. The bar is high. The bar is high because our clients expect that. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sure, you have to be the expert. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And the good news is that there\u2019s plenty of people who\u2019ve gone through that journey, that first year, second year, and the teamwork for bringing someone up isn\u2019t just\u2026it\u2019s not just up to their supervisor. It\u2019s a team effort. And so I\u2019m very happy how helpful my team is at supporting each other and being excellent, and knowing that we\u2019re in this together to win for our clients. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yeah, it sounds like\u2026again, it feels like we\u2019ve had a lot of like, \u201cHey, state the obvious, do the right thing by your people. Support them with a team.\u201d But again, if it\u2019s not top of mind, then it\u2019s not stated. And it\u2019s awesome that you took the time last year to actually set forth the purpose so that people can reflect back and make that be apart of your organizational culture. I\u2019m sure it\u2019s one of the big pillars of your success. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">So, Lee, we\u2019re out of time. I really, really appreciate you coming and sharing some of your wisdom with us. I know everyone who asked questions\u2026hopefully, we got you answers as we went along here. Anything that got unanswered we\u2019ll try to collect up some answers and make sure that we publish that long with us. But the recording will go out today or tomorrow. And Lee, where are you off to next? You\u2019re off to India soon? <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yes, I\u2019m off to Mumbai to go talk about how to create more influence for marketing in the boardroom. And I\u2019m excited about that, yeah. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I\u2019m jealous. A little travel. A little warm weather travel. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Lee<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019re looking to it. First time traveling there. And I really appreciate being on. You\u2019re a joy to talk to. And you know your stuff. And love the product. And so I hope everyone\u2026as you said\u2026has had their questions answered. If not, please fire them off, and I\u2019m sure we\u2019ll find a way to get them answered. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>Seth<\/strong>:<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Absolutely. Cool, Lee. Well, safe travels. Thanks so much. And we hope to see everybody here for the <a href=\"https:\/\/get.rivaliq.com\/webinar-slam-dunk-social-strategy-college-sports\">next Data-Driven Marketer<\/a>. Bye. <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Data fatigue is real. How do you know which data to use to make strategic marketing decisions? This question can be especially important for agencies, who are dealing with a barrage of data on behalf of each of their clients.\u00a0Our guest in this installment of The Data-Driven Marketer is Lee &#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":15702,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,61],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v22.4 (Yoast SEO v22.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy | Rival IQ<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you&#039;ll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you&#039;ll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Rival IQ\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/cssndrlnn\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-06-22T16:59:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2019-11-19T23:23:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032-social-share.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"628\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Cassandra Schwartz\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you&#039;ll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032-social-share.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@cssndrlnn\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Cassandra Schwartz\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"51 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/\",\"name\":\"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy | Rival IQ\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-06-22T16:59:41+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2019-11-19T23:23:50+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#\/schema\/person\/c574de66c82e8df1bd7bc9a54afa87f2\"},\"description\":\"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you'll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032.jpg\",\"width\":7360,\"height\":4912},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/\",\"name\":\"Rival IQ\",\"description\":\"Social Media Analytics\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#\/schema\/person\/c574de66c82e8df1bd7bc9a54afa87f2\",\"name\":\"Cassandra Schwartz\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f594894060bd8dd92ab99957da214cb1?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f594894060bd8dd92ab99957da214cb1?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Cassandra Schwartz\"},\"description\":\"Cassandra leads our product marketing, focusing on product, brand, and communications needs. Cassandra has worked in marketing and communications for nearly a decade helping businesses like Microsoft including Xbox and The Garage, Pike13, and many others connect with their audiences. Outside of work, Cassandra keeps extraordinarily active. An avid community builder, she leads the Seattle Lean In Circle, and co-founded SheHasDrive, as well as a peer-mentoring program based in Seattle. Since moving to Seattle from Kansas, Cassandra has adopted an outdoors lifestyle that includes hiking, skiing, and kayaking. Follow her on Twitter or Facebook.\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/www.cassandraleeanne.com\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/cssndrlnn\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/@cssndrlnn\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/author\/cassandras\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy | Rival IQ","description":"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you'll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy","og_description":"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you'll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/","og_site_name":"Rival IQ","article_author":"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/cssndrlnn","article_published_time":"2018-06-22T16:59:41+00:00","article_modified_time":"2019-11-19T23:23:50+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1200,"height":628,"url":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032-social-share.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Cassandra Schwartz","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy","twitter_description":"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you'll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.","twitter_image":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032-social-share.jpg","twitter_creator":"@cssndrlnn","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Cassandra Schwartz","Est. reading time":"51 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/","url":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/","name":"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy | Rival IQ","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032.jpg","datePublished":"2018-06-22T16:59:41+00:00","dateModified":"2019-11-19T23:23:50+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#\/schema\/person\/c574de66c82e8df1bd7bc9a54afa87f2"},"description":"Learn about leveraging data, from industry reports to competitive insight, to create compelling campaigns or initiate internal conversations. In this edition of The Data-Driven Marketer, you'll hear from Lee Odden of TopRank Marketing.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/iStock-881073032.jpg","width":7360,"height":4912},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/leveraging-data-transform-social-media-strategy\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Leveraging Data to Transform Your Social Media Strategy"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/","name":"Rival IQ","description":"Social Media Analytics","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#\/schema\/person\/c574de66c82e8df1bd7bc9a54afa87f2","name":"Cassandra Schwartz","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f594894060bd8dd92ab99957da214cb1?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/f594894060bd8dd92ab99957da214cb1?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Cassandra Schwartz"},"description":"Cassandra leads our product marketing, focusing on product, brand, and communications needs. Cassandra has worked in marketing and communications for nearly a decade helping businesses like Microsoft including Xbox and The Garage, Pike13, and many others connect with their audiences. Outside of work, Cassandra keeps extraordinarily active. An avid community builder, she leads the Seattle Lean In Circle, and co-founded SheHasDrive, as well as a peer-mentoring program based in Seattle. Since moving to Seattle from Kansas, Cassandra has adopted an outdoors lifestyle that includes hiking, skiing, and kayaking. Follow her on Twitter or Facebook.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.cassandraleeanne.com","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/cssndrlnn","https:\/\/twitter.com\/@cssndrlnn"],"url":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/blog\/author\/cassandras\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15665"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/57"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15665"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15665\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23544,"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15665\/revisions\/23544"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15665"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15665"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rivaliq.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15665"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}