In this wonderfully small section of the world, we Rhode Island folk absolutely love our small business circle. Small businesses breath life into our community and bring us together with their warm services and great products. The only problem is that 8/10 businesses will fail within the first 18 months (Forbes, bseed.us/l/EHlQ2) of being open. Sure, the uniqueness and location matter heavily on small business success, but what a lot of people overlook is online marketing.

Whenever a new small business joins the BusySeed family, our social media manager organizes a strategy session to see how we can grow their online presence. A lot of the time we find that the best way for customers to increase online sales is to double down on measurable means of online marketing, and to consistently analyze how much of a return their marketing campaigns are getting.

There are tons of ways to measure ROI when marketing in RI; especially when you have amazing tools like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. More specifically there are metrics Facebook and other social media platforms provide that make this process easier.

#1 Facebook Check Ins

On Facebook, people can tag your business or check-in which means that they are currently, or were at your business. Not everybody will check-in or tag a business, but when they do you can almost be 100% sure they are spending money.

#2 Measuring Check Ins

In the image below we can see that 42 people this week have checked into our client’s restaurant. That means at least 42 people have entered the establishment and have made a purchase. Average ticket price for this business is about $12 so that means that:

42 people spent $12 each, which equals $504 for this week. Pretty cool right?

#3 How to Encourage More Check Ins

“How do I encourage more people to come in and check in?” you may ask. Simple, people want to feel loved and heard. The more you are actively posting on social media and responding to customers who have left feedback (reviews, comments, photos, etc.) the more they will feel compelled to come back and tell their friends.

Regardless of your marketing strategy, the goal is to make sure that all efforts are measurable. If your goal is to have consistent customer foot traffic, than check-ins are a great tool that will help your small Rhode Island business thrive, and not become another statistic.