The IT Payoff: Measuring the Business Value of Information Technology Investments Review

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The IT Payoff: Measuring the Business Value of Information Technology Investments ReviewThere is a plethora of books on the subject of wisely investing in information technology. If you immerse yourself in the literature you'll see that there are two distinct camps: the process-oriented, quantitative approach espoused by Dan Remenyi, and the holistic, 'there is no payoff' philosophy of Paul A. Strassmann. This book is in the Remenyi camp, although it does address many of the paradoxical observations set forth by Strassmann.
This book has 12 chapters that are presented as a process and the techniques and factors that are required to make the process work. It begins with an introduction that discusses investment factors. Chapter 2 discusses the productivity paradox that Strassmann is famous for exposing. Where the book picks up is from Chapter 3 onward, when strategic planning is introduced as the framework, and the discussion of failure analysis in Chapter 4. This is one of my favorite chapters because it not only restates the obvious (you need top management commitment to embark on any strategic endeavor), it also provides references to documented failures and why they occurred. Forearmed is forewarned. In Chapters 5 (A Process Perspective) and 6 (Technology Payoff Metrics-Balanced Multiple Objectives) the roadmap to the process of nailing down the value of investments in IT and how to perform ongoing measurements is introduced. The next chapter is almost a digression with the discussion of technology curves (the 'S' curve). While this material gave insights into factors such as disruptive technologies and their impact, I think the entire chapter would have been better placed in the introduction.
In many respects the heart of this book lies in Chapters 8 and 9. The survey of technology justification models discussed in Chapter 8 included three viable approaches: real options, economic value added and statistical approaches. Chapter 9 describes how to implement the IT payoff initiative to which the preceding chapters build by using a four phase approach: I -Exploration, II - Involvement, III - Analysis and IV - Communication. The final three chapters wrap up the book by examining the unique challenges imposed by eCommerce, a case study that dissects each of the four implementation phases, and an action plan for succeeding at IT payoff measurement. If you want a quantitative, by-the-numbers approach to investing in IT, it boils down to this book or Dan Remenyi's "The Effective Measurement and Management of It Costs and Benefits". Neither are mutually exclusive, and you may find that the approach that is provided in this book, and the wealth of checklists and compatible approach in Remenyi's book will result in a larger payoff than by choosing one of these excellent books over the other.The IT Payoff: Measuring the Business Value of Information Technology Investments Overview

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Social Media ROI: Managing and Measuring Social Media Efforts in Your Organization (Que Biz-Tech) Review

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Social Media ROI: Managing and Measuring Social Media Efforts in Your Organization (Que Biz-Tech) ReviewROI - Doesn't Mean Return on Ignorance - it means Social Media Marketing Return on Investment (ROI)
As someone who teach Social Media Marketing in San Francisco and online (Google 'Jason McDonald' or click on my Amazon profile to connect), I eagerly awaited the UPS man with her delivery of a book claiming to help us measure the Return on Investment of Social Media Marketing. I wondered, would the measurement by an increase in Twitter followers, Facebook likes, LinkedIn connections, YouTube views, or perhaps the Holy Grail of marketing - actual conversions to a sales action, like purchasing our product? Many are engaged in Social Media Marketing, I thought, but few are engaged in the actual measurement of their Social Media Marketing ROI.
Blanchard makes some great points throughout the book, beginning with the title. Even if measurement of ROI is difficult, that's no excuse not to set up basic measurements for a Social Media Marketing campaign. Before / after is an obvious split - do we have more Twitter followers today, or more tomorrow after we honestly and eagerly create a Twitter marketing plan? URL click thru's is another - if we Tweet a URL, blog it, post it to our Facebook page - do people actually click thru. Bit.ly is a great free service for quick URL tracking. And, finally, if our ultimate goal is to sell something or drive registrations for a free consultation, webinar, or download - is our Social Media Marketing driving those conversions? Blanchard touches on all these topics, but doesn't provide a great framework for setting up measurement.
Ultimately, the book - despite its title - isn't really about ROI. It's more about weaving Social Media Marketing into your organization. That's really pre-ROI, if you think about it. And that, dear reader, brings us to the year of our Ford.
Social Media Marketing in the Year of Our Ford
In Huxley's famous dystopian novel, Brave New World, the future society is organized around principles of mass production, modeled very much after Henry Ford and the factory metaphor. Ford is so worshiped in the future society, that people speak of "our Ford" much as people today speak of "our Lord" or say "Jesus" when they just missed a close call in an automobile.
Blanchard, like so many in Social Media Marketing, worships at the feet of our Ford. Many of his examples, connections, reviews come from major companies - companies such as Ford. For example, on page 23, Blanchard discusses the head of Ford's Social Media strategy (Scott Monty) and how Ford reacted to the negative PR about the auto industry bail-out's. Ford wasn't a recipient, yet its brand was damaged, so Monty went into social media overdrive to address brand damage during the financial crisis. Is this important? Yes? Is it relevant to a small business? Not so much. Few of us have a brand as big and powerful as Ford, and few of us are ever even close to receiving Tarp money.
Why is this relevant? The issue is that the examples drawn in this book, plus in many others, draw on high profile names and brands (names and brands that help authors sell books, give books credibility by name-dropping...) but ultimately are not very relevant to small businesses.
Small businesses need social media advice on issues such as how to respond to a negative review on Yelp, how to get to the page 1 of a Google search using Google Places, how to get your products into Google Merchant Center, or the tricks and tips to success of review marketing on Amazon.com. In this, the book disappoints because it worships at the feet of our Ford.
Furthermore, much of the book is really addressed to large companies, with large teams, and large brand issues. Many chapters read at a very high level, executive discussion - when most small businesses need hands-on, direct advice on how to implement social media marketing. Is this bad? Not particularly. But if you are a small business struggling with social media marketing, much of this book is clearly not written for you. It's written for executives at multinational corporations such as Ford, not the mom-and-pop watch shop in New York City that needs to encourage Yelp reviews.
Back to ROI Measurement
Leaving aside the middle chapters, focused on more abstract, big company issues, Blanchard returns to the topic that best propels his book to your attention: ROI, and the measurement of social media marketing ROI. His high-level advice is very good for companies, big and small -

* Keep an eye on objectives and targets
* Monitor, measure, report.
* Maintain a list of everything you can measure.
* Maintain a list of everything you must measure.
* Test, measure, learn, adapt, repeat.
The final measurement chapters have great food-for-thought examples, such as connecting changes in sales performance with social media mentions. They lack a clear list of tools for measurement (especially free social media marketing tools), as well as a clear "to do" list that connects abstract concepts to practical measurement. That said, the ROI discussion is one of the first I have seen in a book, and therefore this book will stay on my Social Media Marketing bookshelf - as a remember to a) not worship at the feet of Ford, and b) measure everything!Social Media ROI: Managing and Measuring Social Media Efforts in Your Organization (Que Biz-Tech) Overview

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ROI of Social Media: How to Improve the Return on Your Social Marketing Investment Review

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ROI of Social Media: How to Improve the Return on Your Social Marketing Investment ReviewI have been doing a lot of research on social media and how businesses can use it to sell more products and services. This book provides a reality check that is most helpful. Instead of dabbling with social media, this book provides the techniques to get serious about social media and where an organization is in its social media journey. There is so much out on the blogs and website articles about social media that it is overwhelming. I run into people constantly giving me their two cents about the trends and what is hot in social media and it is confusing. If you are at all confused or feel uncertain where to start with social media then I would start with this book.
The book provides techniques such as the media engagement framework. The MEF provides the context as to where to get your arms around using social media within your organization from the perspective of personas down to how to measure each persona (influencers, consumers, individuals) and the way to appropriately reach them with the best return instead of grabbing the coolest thing on the market.
The entire subject of ROI is often a half baked attempt to provide enough cause to do something. In other words, ROI is not real as it is based on possibilities or intangibles. Real ROI is based on hard dollars not soft dollars. I applaud the authors for taking the position of defining ROI specific to social media with how to approaches. As a marketer and not a finance person, I appreciate the business mechanics of generating the ROI rather than a lot of financial calculations that would leave me trying to figure out how to apply social media to the calculations. The book does a fantastic job of applying ROI as would be expected by the title and it lives up to that title.
Other aspects of the book are the web links to current articles and findings on the web. There are case studies, tools to use, and side bar definitions that make the book a very useful guide. I hope the authors keep the book up to date as tools and trends change, however, the frameworks and approaches will have a decent shelf-life that I would encourage anyone to read in 2011 and for the next several years.ROI of Social Media: How to Improve the Return on Your Social Marketing Investment Overview

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