By Alain Chuard

Given the consistent stream of stories about social media--from dogs with millions of fans to companies cashing in on viral video campaigns--in the mainstream and technology press, it’s no surprise that brands are looking for the best ways to harness the power of these vast networks. And as the social media marketing industry matures, businesses of all sizes are recognizing that, in order to succeed in social, they need more than just followers: they need to target and measure engagement with the audiences that matter most.

Recently, two social networking giants have unveiled major platform announcements: Facebook launched its new Insights analytics, whilst LinkedIn announced its Certified Developer Program. Both announcements are aimed at improving brands’ ability to reach and engage their target audiences.

Facebook and LinkedIn make major changes to improve engagement

Facebook’s new Insights allow companies to measure user engagement, by focusing on three new data points: 1) ‘Engaged Users,’ 2) ‘People Talking About This,’ and 3) ‘Friends of Fans.’ When a brand broadcasts content on Facebook, a portion of users who have liked the brand’s page will see that post in their news feeds. These users represent the brand’s ‘organic’ reach. A subset of those users will then respond actively by Liking it, commenting on it, consuming content (by watching a video or clicking on a link for example), or taking some other action. In doing so, these users are engaging with the post and Facebook now labels them as ‘Engaged Users,’ counting the number of unique users who interact in this way.

Of those ‘Engaged Users,’ some will take actions that cause others to see the brand’s name and content as well. For example, if a user comments on the post that has been broadcast, this will appear as a story in the news feeds of his or her friends. As a consequence, he or she is ‘talking about’ the content to a new audience for the brand, beyond the fans that have already liked the page. This is called ‘viral reach’ and such users appear as both ‘Engaged Users’ and ‘People Talking About This’ in the metrics.

Of course, the fact that some fans are ‘talking about’ a brand means that a post on Facebook could potentially reach many or all of their friends virally. Facebook has therefore introduced a new metric called ‘Friends of Fans’, which quantifies the number of unique users who are friends of a page’s fans, any of whom a brand could potentially reach with engaging content.

Each of these metrics is intended to give the marketer a better idea of how--and how many--users are responding to the messages it puts on Facebook. Understanding engagement is the key to developing high quality content and getting the most out of a brand’s social media efforts.

Similarly, the launch of LinkedIn’s Certified Developer Program allows brands to target professionals and other businesses as never before, allowing more effective engagement and more impact from each social media marketing spend.

LinkedIn’s changes allow Wildfire and other third party developers to build on its platform, and create new tools for marketers to reach the huge and growing LinkedIn membership. With Wildfire’s integration, brands can create and manage social promotions that integrate with LinkedIn’s viral channels, and will also be able to use Wildfire to publish messages, track the performance of their pages, and build followers and engagement on the network.

How Can Marketers Take Advantage of the Changes?

Both Facebook’s new Insights and LinkedIn’s Certified Developer Program aim to provide social media marketers with a more in-depth understanding of a brand’s true reach and allow them to engage with their target audience.

Using the new Insights as a guide, marketers should closely monitor their messages, crafting and adjusting their social media strategies to get precisely what they want out of them, whether that’s reaching new, wider audiences or engaging more deeply with existing fans. Similarly, with the opening of LinkedIn’s platform, marketers should evaluate their strategies for reaching professionals and businesses, and leverage tools like Wildfire’s to both create targeted campaigns and measure their success.

About the author

Alain Chuard is co-founder and Head of Product at Wildfire Interactive, Inc. Wildfire was involved with both announcements, as an advisor and partner during Facebook’s development of its new Insights, and as a charter member of LinkedIn’s partner program.

About Wildfire Interactive

Headquartered in Redwood City, Calif., Wildfire is the leader in social media marketing software and the only social media marketing company to have received an investment from Facebook’s fbFund. Its patent-pending technology allows large brands, small businesses and agencies to easily create their own attractive, branded social campaigns (e.g. sweepstakes, contests, giveaways, coupons and more), build and manage social pages, monitor and communicate with their social audience and measure the performance of their own and their competitors’ social media marketing. Wildfire serves tens of thousands of companies, including Facebook, Amazon, Ogilvy and Target, and has offices in Redwood City, Los Angeles, Chicago, New York and London.

http://www.wildfireapp.com/