Tracking Your Twitter Account

The Web and everything related to it seems to be 2.0 these days, but Google Analytics Evangelist Avinash Kaushik's 2.0 take on Web analytics deserves the version two status. Not only does he methodically outline a new approach to analyzing Web metrics, but he offers some advice on how to measure the success of social media tools.

So, for anyone who has ever wondered whether the hours you've logged on Twitter have made a difference at your organization, pay attention.

First, according to Kaushik, the purpose of Twitter shouldn't be to get more followers. So, measuring the success of a Twitter account in terms of number of followers wouldn't be a good measure of success. Instead, he said, you should pay attention to your message amplification -- or, in the language of Twitter, retweets.

Retweets will spread your message further than you ever could on your own. Kaushik told Nextgov, "On any given day, I have a chance of 14,000 people reading my messages, but if retweeted, I have the ability to reach 1.2 million people - that's the power of using and measuring social media."

Want to compare your retweets against other twitterers? Try retweetrank.

Want to know more? Order the book. Kaushik said he will donate all proceeds from the book to The Smile Train and The Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation.