For years now, social media has dominated the marketing conversation. Businesses of all sizes have flocked to platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, drawn by the promise of direct customer connection, viral reach, and seemingly limitless engagement potential. Investment in social media marketing (SMM) continues to grow, becoming a significant line item in many marketing budgets. Yet, despite the widespread adoption and enthusiasm, a critical question persists: Is this investment truly paying off in tangible business results?

Many marketers, eager to demonstrate success in this relatively new frontier, have focused on metrics readily provided by social media platforms: the number of Shares, Likes, Reach, Views, and Visits. These “SLRVVs,” as we might call them, offer easily digestible numbers that can paint a picture of popularity and activity. But as the social media landscape matures and the demand for demonstrable ROI intensifies, a growing chorus of voices in the marketing community and academic research is questioning whether these metrics are little more than digital window dressing – valuable for vanity, perhaps, but insufficient for proving real business impact.

This is the first in a series of articles that will critically examine the metrics we use in social media marketing. In this installment, we will explore why relying solely on SLRVVs can be a trap and why a deeper, more strategic approach to measurement is necessary to truly understand social media’s contribution to the marketing funnel and the bottom line, drawing on the research available to us at the dawn of 2018.

The Allure of the SLRVVs

It’s easy to see why Shares, Likes, Reach, Views, and Visits became the go-to metrics for early social media marketers. They are readily available within platform analytics, simple to understand, and often show impressive numbers, providing a sense of scale and audience attention.

  • Likes/Reactions: A quick, low-effort way for users to indicate approval or engagement with content. High like counts can create a sense of popularity and social proof¹.
  • Shares/Retweets: Indicate that content is resonating strongly enough for users to want to pass it along to their own networks, suggesting potential for viral spread².
  • Reach: The number of unique individuals who saw a piece of content, indicating the potential audience size of a message³.
  • Views: The number of times video content was watched, a key metric for video-centric platforms and campaigns⁴.
  • Visits: Traffic driven from social media platforms to a company’s website or other digital property, suggesting a handoff from social engagement to owned channels⁵.

These metrics are undoubtedly indicators of activity and can play a role in building brand awareness and generating initial interest – the top stages of a traditional marketing funnel⁶. However, the critique arises when these metrics are treated as ends in themselves, rather than as potential means to a more significant business outcome.

The Vanity Trap: Why SLRVVs Fall Short

The core argument against relying solely on SLRVVs is that they often fail to correlate directly with tangible business objectives like lead generation, customer acquisition, or revenue⁷. While a piece of content might garner thousands of likes and shares, this doesn’t automatically translate into increased sales or customer loyalty⁸.

  • Lack of Intent: A “Like” is a weak signal of purchase intent. Users might like content for a variety of reasons (e.g., they find it entertaining, they agree with the sentiment, they know the person who posted it) that have nothing to do with a desire to purchase a product or service⁹. Similarly, a “Share” indicates interest in the content itself, not necessarily interest in the brand’s offerings⁸.
  • Superficial Engagement: Many social media interactions, particularly likes and brief comments, require minimal effort and do not necessarily indicate deep engagement with the brand or its message¹⁰. A high volume of superficial interactions may provide a false sense of connection that doesn’t translate into meaningful customer relationships or future purchases⁸.
  • Reach vs. Impact: While high reach means a message was seen by many people, it doesn’t guarantee that the message was processed, understood, or acted upon³. The fleeting nature of social media feeds means users may scroll past content quickly, resulting in a view or impression without any real impact on their perception or behavior³.
  • Visits Without Conversion: Driving traffic from social media to a website (Visits) is a step further down the funnel, but if those visitors don’t take desired actions on the site (e.g., sign up for a newsletter, request a demo, make a purchase), the value of those visits is limited⁵. A high volume of visits with a low conversion rate suggests a disconnect between the social media engagement and the website experience or offering⁵.
  • Difficulty in Attribution: Accurately attributing sales or leads solely to social media activity based on these metrics is challenging¹¹. Customers often interact with multiple marketing touchpoints across various channels (search, email, direct, etc.) before converting, making it difficult to isolate social media’s precise contribution using simple SLRVV counts¹¹.

In essence, SLRVVs are often top-of-funnel metrics that measure awareness and initial engagement but provide limited insight into how social media activities influence consideration, conversion, and loyalty – the stages that directly impact revenue and customer lifetime value⁷. Relying on them exclusively can lead to a skewed understanding of SMM effectiveness, potentially resulting in misallocated budgets and an inability to demonstrate social media’s true value to the business¹⁵.

As we move forward in 2018, the challenge for marketers is to look beyond the easily accessible SLRVVs and embrace more sophisticated approaches to social media measurement that connect activities on social platforms to tangible business outcomes. Future articles in this series will explore frameworks and metrics that provide a more comprehensive view of social media’s contribution throughout the entire marketing funnel.

Endnotes

  1. Taylor, D. G., Lewin, D., & Strutton, A. (2011). Emotional engagement with online social advertisements: Effects on attitude and word-of-mouth intentions. Journal of Advertising Research, 51(Special Issue: Social Media), 75-94.
  2. Berger, J., & Milkman, K. L. (2012). What makes online content viral?. Journal of Marketing Research, 49(2), 192-205.
  3. Hoffman, D. L., & Fodor, M. (2010). Can you measure the ROI of your social media marketing?. MIT Sloan Management Review, 52(1), 41-49.
  4. Tuten, T. L., & Solomon, M. R. (2018). Social media marketing. SAGE Publications.
  5. Mangold, W. G., & Faulds, D. J. (2009). Social media: The new hybrid element of the promotion mix. Business Horizons, 52(4), 357-365.
  6. Lavidge, R. J., & Steiner, G. A. (1961). A model for predictive measurements of advertising effectiveness. Journal of Marketing, 25(6), 59-62.
  7. Trainor, K. J., Andzulis, J. M., Rapp, A., & Agnihotri, R. (2014). Social media technology usage and customer relationship performance: A capabilities-based examination. Journal of Marketing Channels, 21(3), 314-330.
  8. Culnan, M. J., McHugh, P. J., & Zubillaga, J. I. (2010). How large US companies can use Twitter and other social media to gain business value. MIS Quarterly Executive, 9(4), 243-259.
  9. Fournier, S. (1998). Consumers and their brands: Developing relationship theory in consumer research. Journal of Consumer Research, 24(4), 343-373.
  10. Hollebeek, L. D., Glynn, M. S., & Brodie, R. J. (2014). Consumer brand engagement in social media: Conceptualization, scale development and validation. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 28(2), 149-165.
  11. Marketing Attribution. (n.d.). Marketing attribution explained. Google. (Accessed prior to Jan 2018).
  12. Michaelidou, N., Siamagka, N. T., & Christodoulides, G. (2011). Usage, barriers and measurement of social media marketing: An exploratory investigation of small and medium B2B brands. Industrial Marketing Management, 40(5), 765-778.
  13. Saravanakumar, K., & SuganthaLakshmi, T. (2012). Social media marketing. Life Science Journal, 9(4), 4444-4451.
  14. Felix, R., Rauschnabel, P. A., & Hinsch, C. (2017). Elements of strategic social media marketing: A holistic framework. Journal of Business Research, 70, 118-126.