Universal Information Services

Ways to decipher consumer attitudes have drastically changed within the last decade since the social media explosion. The lack of land-line telephones and the unreliability of online surveys (if you make me answer a survey question before I can read the full article I’ll just click the first choice without even reading the question) means that gauging your social media impact is paramount – nay, absolutely critical – for effective PR campaigns.

As we kick off Measurement Week this Saturday, a global education effort sponsored by AMEC, it’s important to keep in mind just how crucial measurement is – its importance continues to grow. Think about it – For today’s public relations professional, failing to harness the power of social media for campaigns is considered unthinkable, almost irrational. Isn’t it equally irrational to use social media as a PR tool without knowing if and to what extent it is effective?

Keeping that in mind, we have two goals for Measurement Week. One, to determine what constitutes effective social media measurement, and two, to determine how best to construct such a strategy.

To aid in our quest, we have a very exciting lineup of events (schedule), both local and global, throughout the week: Saturday I’ll be speaking at the Omaha Press Club, and am fortunate to be joined by Claudia Bohn, Director of Public Relations at Methodist Health System, and Sarah Lake, VP of Community Engagement at Emspace, to discuss how they used social media measurement in their campaigns. Join us on Sunday at a book signing by the University of Nebraska at Omaha’s Professor Jeremy Lipschultz, who literally wrote the textbook on social media evaluation and utilization. Monday there are a host of AMEC events worldwide, and on Tuesday, Universal Information Services will be holding Twitter discussions on measurement throughout the day. Wednesday we are holding an online demonstration on how we can help you with your social media evaluation needs. Thursday we’ll be hosting the Future of Social Media panel in conjunction with the University of Nebraska at Omaha Social Media Lab featuring Professor Lipschultz as well as Grant Crowell, social media expert and media coach; Ashley Anderson, Creative Director for MaverickPR; and Austin Gaule, our Assistant Analysis Director. We’ll tweet a wrap-up of the entire week on Friday, sharing some interesting network maps over a few beers.

It is my belief and hope that you will find this week informative and engaging, and will come away with a few strategies for tackling your own social media measurement needs. I hope to engage with you next week and please leave any comments to help further the discussion.