Analytics Is King

We interrupt your regularly scheduled analytics broadcast for another confession: I love social media. First it was LinkedIn, now it’s all social media. Everything that’s happened as a result of participating in social media over the last few years has been positive. Well, maybe not everything, but darn near close to everything

One of the greatest parts about the space is that you never know when it is going to present you with interesting opportunities. Social media helps you discover everything from speaking engagements to guest blog post opportunities to, gasp, job possibilities.

A few weeks ago, I received a message (through social media, of course) from David Armano asking if I would be willing to get together for a drink while we were all in New York (for different reasons). When I showed up, there was Rick Murray, who I’ve also followed and admired for a long-time online. After our discussion, I was so pumped up that I remember going through every last detail of it in the cab.

These guys were interested in having me join the team? I was incredibly excited.

After more conversations (you know how these things go and don’t need me boring you with the details), I received an offer from the folks at Edelman to come to Chicago and take on a role as Vice President, Digital Analytics. In case you didn’t gather from the context inherent in the first few paragraphs here, I’ve decided to accept their offer and join the team.

WAIT… Did I just say move to Chicago and join Edelman Digital? Does that mean I’m leaving Austin? What about Ogilvy? I need answers!  

Let me take a second and try to address some of the questions:

1. Yes, I am moving to Chicago. Before the initial conversation with David and Rick, I had no plans of returning to the Midwest anytime soon. Sure, I love Chicago. Yes, I absolutely love everything about Minneapolis. Of course I love going home to Cleveland. But, the winters! Opportunities to work with guys of this caliber are not presented everyday, especially to those of us who are numbers dorks
2. Yes, it also means that I’m leaving Austin. After moving here in February 2010, I felt like this would be home for a long time. I love everything about the city and its people. I’ve made some tremendous friends here, and be damn sure I’ll be making plenty of return trips (aside from SXSW, of course)
3. It does, in fact, mean I’m leaving Ogilvy. This was the most difficult decision of all. Even in a relatively short period of time, the “Ogilvy red” has made its way into my veins. I love the people. I love the culture. It has great clients. This move should in no way change your opinion of that firm. It’s TOP NOTCH.

To say I am excited to join the likes of Jill Knisley, Zena Weist, Dave Fleet, Michael Brito, Chris Lightner, David Almacy, Phil Gomes and of course David and Rick was just something I couldn’t miss out on. These people are incredibly talented, and I can’t wait to work with them!

A few quick things before I continue to plan….errrrrr…. panic about moving cross country for the second time in two years in just a few weeks:

1. Several people helped me with this decision along the way. To Kyle Flaherty, Bridget Jewell, Allan Schoenberg, Damion White, Lisa Grimm, Gina Gretchko, Katie Huntley and Sonny Gill…. I can’t thank you all enough. Difficult decision and your unwavering support made it a lot easier. Again, thanks!
2. I’m going to miss my friends in Austin, “like whoa!” That, “like whoa” is credited to Lauren Warthan, who I’d most definitely put in this category. It’s going to be tough to leave such a great group of people, but hopefully we can all hang out again soon!
3. Go Bulls! The, “anyone but Lebron” motto will continue in the Windy City…

SWEET HOME CHICAGO (apologies Robert Johnson)

Is the discussion around/practice of online influence actually regressing? Identifying and then activating influencers is an important topic that deserves informed debate and the implementation of only the best tools. I actually think we have quite a bit of the former, and the latter is the gigantic black hole that we're all getting sucked into.

David Armano wrote an excellent post examining Klout, followed by Rebecca Dennison writing her own review of some of Klout's new features. Rebecca also wrote a great post looking at mPACT that you should check out. I'm not being critical of Rebecca or David because both of their reviews are great, and obviously very helpful to the person that is coming to this space for the first time.

Before we launch into the meat of the post, lets debunk a few influencer misconceptions

1. The process can be automated - The extent of the possibilities around automation begin and end with identifying outlets and writers. The actual number crunching/qualitative analysis should not be eliminated. In my experience, clients feel better about the final output when it has been scrubbed by a human.
2. Influencers are bloggers - I can't tell you how many times I see examples of "influencer lists" that are comprised entirely of bloggers. As if the entire social web centered around blogs? Have we forgotten YouTube? Forum users? Twitter users? Mainstream press? Your influencer list needs to be all encompassing otherwise you have an incomplete list.
3. Because someone has written negatively about my brand they shouldn't be in my list - This one causes a bit of a headache for me. You can learn just as much from the negative comments as the positive ones. In fact, probably more. Why eliminate these people?
4. I have to reach out to everyone on my list - One of the things I advocate all of the time is trying to come up with a list that includes people you might only listen too. Another segment that you'd be reaching out to directly, and still another that might be receiving a mass pitch. A mass pitch?! In social media?! The horror! It can work. Trust me.

There are others, but I don't want to get bogged down in the misconceptions. Rather, I'd prefer to tell you what tools I'd use if I were starting to build an influencer list from scratch. And no, just to get it out of the way, the process would not involve Klout, PeerIndex, mPACT or any tool like it. So where do I begin?

1. Google - No duh, right? This is where the process usually begins and ends. I'll develop some sort of query (that involves my client's name, some industry keywords and competitors) to start identifying outlets. Ideally, I'll start with at least 6 months worth of results (though I'd prefer 12) and just start clicking through. Yeah, it's a manual process. Yeah, it's time consuming. Yeah, trust me, it'll be worth it in the end. Oh, don't forget running similar searches in Google Groups, and Blogs
2. Listorious/Twitter Search - Both of these are invaluable resources for Twitter users. Check them both out.
3. YouTube/Flickr searches - Self-explanatory, right? But you'd be surprised how few influencer lists actually involve video bloggers. There are ton of them out there with broad reach
4. Compete/Quantcast/Alexa - Several people, including my friend Dave Fleet, have written posts identifying issues with compete data. It's true. However, obtaining traffic data for sites you don't own is generally problematic. All you can do is attempt to verify the data on multiple platforms.
5. Yahoo! Site Explorer - An excellent tool for looking at a site's indexed pages and inbound links. Both excellent barometers of overall reach
6. Microsoft Excel - I'm assuming you have this on your computer, right? Ok, moving on...
7. Blogrolls - Pretty invaluable in identifying other bloggers stemming from your initial Google searches. Use them and use them well.

Anyway, those are the tools I use to start building my lists. Does this take more time? Sure. Are my results likely to be more accurate/relevant to the client? You bet your ass. Don't give in to easy. Conduct your due dilligence.