comScore Social launches Social Essentials

Social Essentials is designed to provide a range of insights that help brands evaluate their audiences across social media channels and how their behaviours may be affected by brand exposure and/or brand affinity. The first instalment of this service provides global reporting and analysis of audiences exposed to brand messages over Facebook, while subsequent releases will incorporate findings for additional social media channels, including Twitter.

"While understanding social media commands a considerable portion of marketers' attention today, many express frustration with the challenge of quantifying the marketing impact of this channel," said Linda Boland Abraham, comScore CMO and EVP of Global Product Development. "comScore Social Essentials offers an innovative solution to this problem by quantifying paid, earned and owned social media brand impressions so that brands can measure the audiences being reached and evaluate their attributes and resulting behaviours. This capability also enables brands to calculate social media reach, frequency and GRPs so they have the metrics they need to incorporate social media impressions into the marketing mix, and ultimately determine their social media ROI."

comScore Social Essentials includes the following insights and capabilities:

• The number of fans and friends of fans reached with paid, earned and owned social media brand impressions along with the total number of brand exposures.
  
• The ability to compute traditional media planning metrics such as reach, frequency and GRPs for social media brand impressions.
  
• The demographic composition of fans and friends exposed to social media brand impressions.
  
• The online behaviour and brand engagement of these fan and friend segments.
  
• Competitive intelligence on other brands' social media audiences, including demographic and behavioural comparisons and audience overlap.
  
• The behavioural impact of exposure to social media messages, marketing and advertising campaigns.

Understanding the value of fans and followers

Social media is one of the most complex marketing channels, with marketers needing ways to quantify the impact of their social media efforts and ultimately determine their return on investment. comScore Social Essentials represents a unique solution that enables marketers to tie brand exposure within social media channels to engagement with that brand. Brands can gain visibility into the value of users exposed to their messaging, measured by whether they are more likely to visit a branded website or conduct a trademark search, consume digital media content or make online or in-store purchases.

"Even as social media has forged a new paradigm in the way marketing messages travel through networks, the ability to quantify this activity and understand its impact has thus far proven difficult," said Lise Brende, director of Marketing Analytics for Bing & MSN of Microsoft. "comScore Social Essentials represents the first social marketing measurement capability we've seen that enables brands to understand social media impressions and the corresponding attributes and behaviours of those reached. This new service represents a significant breakthrough in social media measurement that will finally help marketers understand the value of their social media investment."

comScore releases social essentials white paper for prospective clients

In conjunction with this announcement, comScore and Facebook have also released a complimentary white paper demonstrating the various applications of the Social Essentials tool using Facebook Fan audience data for Starbucks, Southwest Airlines and Microsoft Bing. To download a copy of the white paper, please visit the following link: www.comscore.com/Like

comScore Social Essentials is optimally designed for brands with at least 500 000 Facebook fans. Brands interested in subscribing to Social Essentials can contact comScore at moc.erocsmoc@eromnrael.