Social Media Marketing Drives Purchase Intent and Brand Advocacy

Social media metrics are something always at the forefront of our minds here at Ignite Social Media.  That’s why a recent article by e-Marketer entitled, “Social Campaigns Give Long Term Boost to Brand Metrics” perked our ears up a bit, with emails circulated within the agency, and I had to arm wrestle to get the chance to write this blog post.  The following are quick highlights and the implications from this data that suggests that social media marketing campaigns increase sales indicators.


Social Media Drives Purchase Intent

The first nugget of insight is the potential long term effects social media marketing can have on purchase intent. A recent study conducted by BzzAgent studied consumer purchase intent before and even a full year after the campaigns ended.  The fact that 61% of survey respondents were more likely to make a purchase a full year after a social media campaign is a beautiful reminder that the work we do doesn’t just halt after the campaign has ended, but that it actually plays a long term role in purchase intent.  It also highlights a need for social media marketers to explore multi-touch measurement tools to sift out what purchases are truly influencing sales. We need to get better at tracing these back to social media marketing efforts.

Social Media Drives Brand Advocacy

One major benefit of social media marketing is that the campaigns and ongoing efforts often end up enabling others to share their advocacy.  But you may not have realized that just coming into contact with a social campaign could increase the rate at which these advocates are willing to recommend your product.  The following charts show us that over 61% of brand advocates would recommend a product after exposure to a CPG social media campaign, a 22 percentage point increase from before the campaign.

Overall, these insights show me that 2012 is going to be the year of social media insights. It’s insights like these that validate and prove that social media isn’t only about short-lived engagement, but that engagement has a long term effect on consumers in ways that many social marketers aren’t taking enough credit for.

What are your thoughts of these insights?  Please share in the comments below.



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