Social Media Metrics for Travel Marketers: Setting Goals

How to track results of social networking 

So, you’ve implemented your social media strategy. Your Facebook and Twitter pages are built and you’re off and running. Now what? I’m going to outline some strategies and tools in my next few posts to help you get the most out of your social media efforts.

Develop realistic goals for your social media activities

Let’s start at where every good marketing or media plan starts - with goals. This is where every media plan should start, whether is print, television or social media. 

Some examples of goals could be:

• increase web traffic to our destination website by 10% in the third quarter (versus the same time period the previous year)
• increase the number of email subscribers to our travel newsletter by 250 in the second half of the year
• increase bookings on our hotel website by 5% in the month of July

Make sure you outline your goals in a way that they are trackable, so use real and realistic numbers. You can use your website analytics to find out this number. Use the traffic sources tab in Google Analytics to see where your traffic is coming from - you may be surprised. Many destinations are seeing Facebook as a top referring site.

All of these goals are measurable, so it gives you something to track back against. If your website does not have Google Analytics or tracking installed, this is a must! It’s a free tool and incredibly invaluable.

And make sure your goals are in line with the overall goals for your destination. Review the goals in your strategic or marketing plan and assess which goals you might be able to leverage social media to achieve.

Remember, social media may be “free”, but it takes time to implement. Make sure your returns justify your investments of time and resources, and report your successes. My next post will focus on what to measure and some ways you can do it - stay tuned.

Related Content

If you're interested in further reading on the subject of social media and metrics, you might want to check out these links:

Tracking Online Destination Marketing

Social Media Marketing for Destinations