360DigitalInfluence

With various types of social media (Facebook, Twitter, message boards, blogs, private social communities, Youtube and other social sites) taking up an increasing portion of consumer attention, we wanted to understand just how relevant social content exposure is to changes in sales and brand perception.

Much of the work to date has looked at direct channel impacts; for example, do direct clicks from a social media site result in sales? This study of restaurant consumers attempts to understand the more complex factors that lead to consumer purchase and perception changes.

We released our final report yesterday at Pivot Conference 2011 in New York.   We found that in the real world, social content exposure - by itself and more broadly when combined with other types of media exposure such as out-of-home, PR or TV ads - is linked with 2-7x higher likelihood of consumption and actual spend increases. And, social content exposure alone is associated with the largest impact on week-to-week brand perception changes.

The infographic below the fold provides a summary of the results.  Here’s the full study:

Results were only reported if statistically significant.  The study was conducted in staggered 1-week reporting intervals between January 6, 2011 and May 6, 2011.   The purpose of the study was to evaluate the link between short-term media touchpoint exposure and immediate shifts in sales and/or brand perception.