Today, we live in a fast-paced world. We go in, get what we need, and get out. This also goes for the internet and social media. If we don’t see what we need, we move on. There are also those who linger. Using my example above, if a client came into the store just to linger or after purchasing an item, lingered, that client would not be serviced and therefore, the seller cannot receive any pay for that. The seller only gets paid if the client gets services. However, I am excluding the fact that the seller could be claiming pay if the client is actually looking at the seller’s products, which is a service. So, how can stats tell whether a consumer is actually getting services from a site or just lingering (such as being away from the computer and left the site up)?

Can you go in more detail with this please? Our ROI is based on time spent working with our consumers. Therefore, how do we know how much time consumers spent on our site? Sure, we can look at the stats, but as I said, what if one walked away from the computer and left the page open? They only used our page for maybe 5 minutes but when we look at the stats, they were on it for an hour. We wouldn’t be able to tell.

It’s a really good point. And your ratio of 6:1 for in-person to online time is a good observation, especially if you overlay on this relative costs of providing the information through both channels.

At a much higher level, I think you can probably say something that is simpler but still effective in terms of an ROI case study. You know the number of people who effectively resolve their problem online – be that getting the information they need or solving a problem they have. You also know the average cost of resolving a problem offline. With this information you can show the cost you would have incurred to solve all these problems, and the net saving if you deduct the cost of providing the online channel.

Of course this can be an exaggeration, because one benefit of online is not that you just help people to resolve their problems in a way that is more cost-effective for you, but that you can actually solve more problems. Including many you would never have been able to help with before.

But in both cases this kind of measure can give you a monetary value of the benefit that the online channel is bringing.

Obviously, it takes longer to type than to talk. Does 1 minute in person equal 1 minute on a page? How do we know the user is getting the same information online than they would in person? They could be away from the computer and left the page open. In person, the consumer is asking for resources from staff, who gets information from either online, over the phone, or other staff. Online, a user can find the information themselves; however, they may not know where to look or get the exact answer they are looking for. This is where social media comes in… Where users can get feedback. The problem still lies within the value of time. Using my example, if a user is on our housing page for 30 minutes, does that equal 30 minutes of “in-person” time?

There’s so many variables, such as if a consumer comes in and asks a housing question, the staff may ask a co-worker for advice (5 minutes), go online for research (15 minutes), and make a phone call for the consumer (10 minutes) to equal 30 minutes total. If the consumer went online themselves with social media, they could take maybe research 5 minutes online and make the 10 minute phone call to add up to 15 minutes total. Although this is just an example, using social media, we reduced the time in half. However, in person, our staff worked with the consumer for 30 minutes while online, the consumer would’ve used our resources for 5 minutes (excluding the phone call). Therefore, in this example, the ratio of “in-person” time to “online” time is 6:1. In other words, every minute online is equal to 6 minutes in real time. Do you agree? And any feedback on this?

I still haven’t covered comments, viewers, and followers.