Twitter Efficiency Index How To

Twitter Efficiency Index (TEI)

I noticed my friend Phl Buckley, @1918, has 3,313 followers. @Scenttrail has 2,234. Phil has tweeted 24,903 times (he loves Twitter). I’ve tweeted 7,187 times. Create an efficiency index by dividing followers by tweets:

@1918 followers 3,313
Tweets 24,903
Efficiency .13 (follower per tweet)

@Scenttrail Followers 2,234
Tweets 7,187
Efficiency .31 (follower per tweet)

Internet Marketing's Up Is Down Lesson

You might look at these numbers and think @Scenttrail is more efficient and that is good. Not so much as it turns out :). Internet marketers look at something like this Twitter Efficiency Index and think @Scenttrail needs to up his tweet frequency almost 2x. Phil and I compete for ATTENTION. The bigger @1918's net is the bigger his net can become.

Welcome to the fuzzy logic of Internet marketing where efficiency in the old sense of the term isn’t as important as mindshare. My good friend Phil's mindshare capture, a fancy word for attention,  is 40% greater at the moment. Here is the other rub about web metrics. Phil is likely to KEEP his advantage.

Advantage Creates Advantage, Up Is Down

Phil’s Twitter advantage will grow due to a concept outlined in the book Linked: How Everything Is Connected To Everything Else And What It Means by Barabasi. Barabasi is a network researcher at Notre Dame. He noticed how the rich, in Internet assets, tended to get richer. He called this concept “proprietary linking” leading to HUBS. Hubs are divots in the fabric of the network.

Bend the Internet’s fabric and links, the gold of Internet marketing, flow downhill to your website faster and faster. Phil’s divot is bigger and likely to get bigger as time goes on without some disruption, without @Scenttrial figuring out how to either Tweet mo better or getting adopted by power tweeters like @SmallRivers, Chris Dixon @CDixon or @CoachForYou.

Even @Scenttrail's chances for adoption are less. @1918 has the high ground because he is tweeting more and throwing a 40% larger net. Phil can, to mix metaphors, block my boat’s wind. Every one of the "power retweeters" mentioned above have shared ScentTrail Marketing content and oh what a bounty it brings when they do (TY, TY, TY, kiss, kiss, hug, hug LOL).

Content can be the great equalizer, but @Scenttrial better get his act together and tweet more. Social media marketing is like fishing, to toss in yet another metaphor (death by metaphors sorry :). You don't catch fish sitting on shore NOT casting. You catch fish BY CASTING and learning, learning and casting. Each cast tells you something. Each catch confirms something.

Here is the other funny part about Internet marketing. No one is equally good at all of the necessary parts. If you compete against a power Facebook company who doesn't get Google plus then you better get good at Google Plus BEFORE attacking the competitor's Facebook stronghold. Social media marketing is about developing strength faster and faster. Every #1 listing we achieve is meaningful despite the elimination of absolutes due to Google's float (too complicated to explain here).

Need to create a strategic plan? Discover what you are good at and if your skills are being appreciated by Google and the web. ONLY those skills confirmed by online research count. This is another TOUGH concept. I was on the phone with an arrogant "expert" the other day. They told me how famous and influential they were in their business vertical. As they were talking I was checking Google, Klout, LinkedIn and Twitter.

The person on the phone had NO social presence. I had the fun job of telling them they weren't as famous or influential as they thought at least as far as Google was concerned. Google is TRUTH or as close to it as we are likely to get (lol). We didn't get that job :), but you can improve your social media marketing by knowing your Twitter Efficiency Index and creating a plan to disrupt your competitors.