'Net Features : sotrender

Take Social Media Analysis a Step Further

Michael Garrity — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 18:00:00 GMT

Internet marketers are constantly trying to find the best ways to leverage social media platforms to get the most out of their time spent on these sites. And with all of the social networks out there, they can spend a lot of time on these sites.

One powerful weapon in their arsenal has been social media analytics platforms, which help make sense of the copious amount of data (both statistical and anecdotal) that marketers collect from social networks.

In order to expand upon the insights gleaned from social networks, particularly Facebook, social media analytics tool Sotrender recently enhanced its platform with new features for the advanced management of international fan pages, integration with Facebook Insights, more account administration options and the ability to process online payments.

Now, Sotrender users can more precisely analyze activities and engagement taking place on their international Facebook Pages using content targeted for different, specific countries. Thanks to a unique algorithm, Sotrender is able to provide its customers with data on the most engaged users and most attractive content for each selected country, allowing brands to post the most relevant content for their various international audiences.

And, because of direct integration with Facebook Insights, the social network’s in-house analytics program, users won’t have to leave the Sotrender platform to see Facebook statistics along with Sotrender’s data.

The enhancements also include administration upgrades that let users track the history of modifications to their accounts. In addition, they can add new Facebook pages to monitor, add users to the panel and grand defined permissions to users. This is ideal for larger companies or marketing agencies that may have separate teams following multiple campaigns.

Finally, through a partnership with online payment provider PayLane, Sotrender is now able to offer a convenient payment option with Visa, MasterCard and Maestro credit and debit cards. Of course, this comes with various security features that come standard with PayLane’s antifraud tools, such as identity verification mechanisms like an Address Verification System, GeoIP, Card Verification Value and Card Verification Code. Both verification and payment handling are part of a single service, so there is no redirection to third-party providers. This means that the entire payment process takes place on Sotrender’s website.

Tips for Facebook Success

Allison Howen — Sun, 03 Jun 2012 16:00:00 GMT

If you are using call-to-action words within your Facebook posts, you might not be creating the optimal engaging experience for your audience – at least according to a new study.

Social media measuring tool Sotrender studied 111 U.K. Facebook Pages from four different industries including clothes, food and beverages, cosmetics and hygiene, and cars, in order to analyze what type of posting patterns receive the highest amount of engagement.

Not surprisingly, the study proved that companies tend to use call-to-action expressions within their posts, including the words “watch”, “like”, “look” and “click”. However, these words don’t seem to increase engagement, which suggests that Facebook users become numb to constantly repeated phrases.

Another surprising statistic revealed that even “win” doesn’t create much buzz, with only fans of brands within the cosmetics & hygiene industry interacting more when there’s something to “win”, “get” or when something is “on sale”.

The study also proved that certain types of words enhance engagement levels differently for specific industries. For example, fans of food brands are often attracted to words that refer to emotions such as “like”, “love”, “good”, “favorite” and “happy”, while fans of clothing brands are attracted more to trend-oriented words such as “fashion”, “style” and “collection”.

Brands should also pay close attention to the links that they promote, because another unexpected result of the study shows posts that contain links actually bring fans’ engagement levels below average.

One way that a brand can increase engagement is with photos, which tend to get 57 percent more likes and more than seven times the comments than average posts. For example, Topshop, a brand from the study, attracts more than 28 thousand fans with photos – with only the brand’s 25th most popular post containing words.

Timeline Extends the Life of Facebook Posts

Michael Garrity — Tue, 22 May 2012 04:45:00 GMT

Facebook’s Timeline update has been available for brands long enough now that we’re finally able to gain some useful data about the effect they have on marketing efforts, and the initial information seems pretty positive.

Most notably is a recent report from social media analytics firm Sotrender, which says that Facebook posts now live longer on Timeline that that did before the format change. Before, half of the comments made on a brand’s Facebook post were made within the first hour of it being put up, but since the Timeline switch, that average has increased to 2.5 hours.

Unfortunately, the study was fairly limited. The London-based company only looked at 130 U.K.-based brands and about 5,000 Facebook posts, giving them a usable but ultimately limited sample.

Still, this is the first such study since the big move to Timeline, and it does present some very interesting information that could interest companies on the social network.

For instance, the report shows a 13-percent increase in the average number of users that interact with a post. Plus, about 80 percent of comments are now made within 8.5 hours of a posting, a two-hour extension over the previous average.

But the more things change, the more they stay the same. Timeline hasn’t contributed to a significant hike in a brand’s overall number of fans, nor did it improve the average number of “likes,” posts and comments per user or cross-page engagement.