Monitoring & Metrics Basics
Tools
Google Alerts - Monitor what people are saying online—in news articles, videos, blogs and discussion forums—about your organization and interests. Get alerts by email or RSS feed. Quick, one-time setup. Saves time and effort that would be spent manually searching for keywords and phrases (and remembering to do it regularly).
Google Reader - Whenever a website or blog you care about publishes something new, you want to know about it, fast. Visiting sites one-by-one to see if there’s new content wastes time, especially when there are dozens, hundreds or even thousands of sites whose content you need to track. This free, online tool makes that possible. (Video)
Twitter Search - What are people tweeting about you and the issues you care about? Here’s a simple way to listen. Search results can be saved as an RSS feed so you don’t need to remember to manually do a search.
Tutorials
How to set up a Google Alert - Creating a Google Alert is simple. This guide includes not only the basic steps, but also offers advice on writing good queries, and explains advanced features such as choosing a delivery rate, filtering by a specific source, delivering to RSS feeds and exporting alerts to a CSV file.
Video: RSS in Plain English (Common Craft) - It’s important to know what Really Simple Syndication (RSS) is and how it works. This short, entertaining video explains how RSS can save you time and effort in monitoring online content that matters most to you.
Video: Google Reader in Plain English (Common Craft) - Google Reader is a free, Web-based RSS reader that makes keeping up with your favorite sites easy. This video introduces Google Reader’s features and explains how to get started.
A Beginner’s Guide to Facebook Insights (Mashable) - You might already know that Facebook can be an effective way to engage with your community of supporters and friends. By looking at many different types of traffic data, Facebook Insights can help you can learn about who your fans are and where they are; what sites are linking to your Facebook Page; and whether your strategies on Facebook are increasing engagement.
Articles & Resources
10 Social Media Metrics for Nonprofit Organizations (Nonprofit Tech 2.0) - How do you know if your nonprofit’s social media strategy is working? Get a better idea by keeping an eye on these 10 metrics, including: website and blog traffic, Twitter and Facebook mentions, e-newsletter subscriptions and online testimonials. Tracking this information can help you fine-tune your strategy for more effective results.
11 stats you need to measure on your Facebook page (Socialbrite) - There’s more to Facebook stats than just the number of fans you have. What are their demographics? How often are they actually visiting your page and interacting with your Wall? What types of multimedia (photos, audio and video) are they consuming? This guide is an introduction to these statistics and more.
The Big Dig – Online Research and Listening (The Buzz Bin) - Actively listening to others online is an essential part of a successful social media strategy. This thoughtful article makes a convincing case for why organizations need to listen online and gather insight from what they hear.
Wikipedia page on website traffic - A straightforward introduction to the subject, written and edited by the crowd.
