Why E2.0 hasn't tipped - Part 3: Metrics

The impact of of social media cannot be quantified yet. Attempts have been made - see here, here, and here - but as with many forms of internal communication, some things are just immesureable.

E2.0 champions will have to be like George Bernhard Shaw's tailor: "The only man who behaved sensibly was my tailor; he took my measurement anew every time he saw me, while all the rest went on with their old measurements and expected them to fit me."

Does this mean that E2.0 will not be taken seriously by business until some return on investment is proven? Unlikely.

In traditional terms, the investment required to get a social media strategy off the ground is between slim and none. The tools are free. Time is required - which, of course, costs. And a strategy. So what about that return?

Well, if social media is about conversations, and making connections where there were no connections before, then for now we need to look at a different kind of ROI - return on influence. See here and here. Like all successful concepts - this is simple, relevant and understandable.

Extensions of this approach include measuring relative ROI and relationships. Also, some harder, technical metrics exist, such as here and here.

So you have soft and some emerging hard metrics. Yet Andrew McAfee, father of Enterprise2.0, cautioned at a conference against attempting to "justify the adoption of the tools solely in terms of ROI. Early estimates are likely to be contentious. He instead suggests that the focus should be on telling the story of what they do. This will appeal to decision makers who make their judgments on factors beyond ROI."

At the end of the day, the E2.0 champions know social media is about culture and not meausres at this stage. They also know, like the savvy tailor, that it just feels right.