What you see is what you get, people!

Let's talk about wanting to have your cake and eat it too...
By the way, in French, we say wanting the butter and the money to buy it with (big surprise, French people like butter... ;) )

In other words, let's talk about the ROI of social media.

Companies thanks to social media can now actually directly contact their customers and talk to them. What else do they need out of it? The conversation they can establish is in itself an achievement, and the value they give to this exchange is their return on investment for trying to establish it. When you try to open a dialogue and you succeed, that is to say, you receive answers and feedback from the persons you were trying to contact, THIS IS YOUR REWARD.
Again, What else do you want?
Now, I know, to convince your CEO or CFO to invest in social media, you need to show them statistics, graphs with trends that indicate profits raising and raising and raising...

But that is the old way. You can't apply this kind of thinking to measure the ROI of social media.
As stated in this video, it would be like trying to

"assign multiple choice scoring to an essay question".

If you want to experiment social media, you need to change your attitude. If you can't conceive not being able to put an accurate figure on the impact of an investment, maybe you are not ready for it and anyway you won't be able to appreciate whatever social media has to offer.

Establishing the dialogue and being part of a conversation with your customers is your ROI.

The rest, sales increase, new ideas to improve your products, revamping your brand image, developping your brand content... you name it... It all just depends on what you want to ask to your customers. Opportunities are endless. You're part of the conversation. You have a say. Listen and ask. And the rest is bonus.

Photo credits:
- http://vervenorthwest.com/blog/?p=12
- http://graywise.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/web20.jpg
- http://www.itv-midipyrenees.com/publications/fiches-pratiques/images/beurre.jpg
- http://cartooncurio.blogspot.com/2007/07/monkeying-around-with-metaphors.html
- http://www1.istockphoto.com/file_thumbview_approve/1973631/2/istockphoto_1973631-money-bag-the-cartoon-toolbox-series.jpg
- http://www.alwaysauditioning.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/adf-cartoon-money-bag1.jpg
- http://gdesplac.free.fr/images/art/ben-vautier-wysiwyg.jpg
- http://lewebpedagogique.com/support/files/conversation.jpg