Determine Facebook Fan Page $$$ Value

FINALLY!

(I’m adopting this post from an email I sent this morning to upper management, editors, and other co-workers)

Before I get too far, I’d like to thank @thePRguycom for posting a link to THIS ARTICLE.

When I saw the Tweet, I clicked the link because I’ve found the #1 barrier to entry/question/complaint when getting into social media from customers and coworkers is, “tell me how much $ I’m going to get in return.”  To which my usual reply has never had any hard $ figures.

Now, it seems a company – Vitrue – has developed a pretty neat Facebook page evaluator that at the very least provides consistent numbers.  They take into account the volume of recent posts because those matter over posts made months or years ago, the volume of responses from users recently because recent conversations matter more than old ones, and the gross number of people that follow/like the page.  They then put a # value on each one and do a little math to calculate a total value.  The actual #’s they use for each variable in their algorithm are irrelevant because they use them consistently – you’re comparing apples to apples – and it should be noted that their tool is not for individual pages but for group/fan pages.

http://evaluator.vitrue.com/

They’ve even built in some very helpful customization to the calculator – on the bottom left you can slide the Earned Media Value so you can use the $ amount you determine for a user.  For instance, the more narrow the target market, a higher the Earned Media Value should be used because of the increased value on the touch point to a specific audience.

I work for a publishing company and used 3 FB pages associated with 3 publications – in the interest of professional privacy, I’m not listing the publication names.  We’ll go with letters instead…

The values and metrics for each using the default $5 Media Value:

The article makes a great point, that you can literally increase the value of your FB page from a media value perspective by interacting and engaging an audience.  You can post more articles to add value while getting people to comment and leave messages adds value as well.  You can also overcome fewer fans than a competitor by simply engaging the audience more than the competition – if your audience is talking to you and theirs isn’t, there is greater value in the work you’re doing with your group of followers.

There are some customers that advertise across multiple publications where I doubt they’re sole focus is tying sales to a specific ad, they’re simply trying to brand their name and product to their audience which again has a very real value.  Now, with this tool, we can get a ballpark figure as to the value of the branding that occurs on a Facebook page, an arena where 500,000,000 people now frequent.  We can also see a tangible value of efforts, we can measure successes of campaigns, see the effect of popular posts, etc.

I’ll be using this tool as I roll out some new social media strategies in the coming weeks.  I think this really helps visualize the value of engaging an audience as well.

(…thus ends my edited email excerpts.)