Return on investment of social media campaigns was a big topic a few weeks ago at the Social Ad Summit in New York. As brand advertisers are venturing further into the space, the instinct to put an ROI on their six-figure marketing efforts is only natural. For brands, the value is in the impression, but how does this mindset shift to valuing friends and fans or other social media actions?

As the planning cycle renews itself, you should be aware of five key questions that have been known to pop up in discussion with CEOs/CFOs, often short-circuiting otherwise brilliant marketing careers.

Companies are more dependent on solid Web analytical data to drive increased revenue and improved efficiency than ever before. Yet, most companies underinvest in the people and technology needed to deliver optimal levels of analysis. In my discussions with colleagues at industry events, it is not uncommon to find one analyst or a very small team of fewer than three analysts responsible for everything related to Wweb analytics, from soup to nuts. And by that I mean all vendor relationships, systems administration and maintenance, tagging specification/verification/QA, AB and multivariate testing, data collection, report creation/interpretation, stakeholder communication, and all analysis activities.

In the pressure of the current business environment, humor isn't lost. Here are a few ideas for metrics and measurement tools I've come across in my travels recently that you might like to hear about...

I believe that social networking is an evolution, not a revolution. In fact, I was originally going to title this column "Enough Already With the Social Networking," but I realized that was more clever than fair. I don't mean to suggest social networking isn't the bee's knees, nor do I deny that all the kids seem to love the Facebook and the MySpace. Rather, I offer up two somewhat contrarian points of view for your consideration and refutation.The first: In the U.S., at least, Twitter's explosive growth appears to be slowing. The second: on Web 2.0, content isn't king.

A funny thing happened on the way to the CMO's office. Between the realization of an eye-opening, game-changing insight gleaned from advertising test results and Web behavior data, the report you were gleefully ferrying to the C-Suite wilted, turned brown at the edges and started to dribble a slimy substance with a conspicuous stench.

A fake memo shows the way. Sample: "We can offer customers a $10 bonus coupon to allow our sales associates to "help" them complete the survey before they leave the store, thus providing both convenience and value to our customers."

By now many Mediapost's readers know about the formation of the Council for Innovative Media Measurement. CIMM, comprised of fourteen companies and including major advertisers, agencies, and TV companies, has a mission to "promote innovation and explore new, high quality ways to measure audiences across traditional and new media." In particular, this innovation and quality would be with respect to cross-platform, "three screen" measurement; and, to the development of meaningful ROI metrics that bring video audience measurement beyond traditional ratings, which measure the "opportunity to see" an ad, to encompassing meaningful data on the impact and value of advertising.

The double-whammy of irrational consumers on top of a waning recession poses a new challenge for marketers as we enter the 2010 budget planning process. Indeed, among companies we polled earlier this summer, marketers are split on how their budgets will change next year. But regardless of whether you plan to ramp up or throttle back your marketing budgets, we are all faced with the same edict: cost-effectively matching post-recession marketing to consumers' new attitudes and purchase behaviors.

Anyone who has studied the question of increasing spend in a recession (and done so objectively) will tell you that the evidence supporting higher spending in recessions is weak at best. There are many anecdotes and some success stories, but not enough clear evidence to convince even a moderately smart CFO that the reward outweighs the risks. If you think I'm saying that spending more is NOT a good strategy, you're missing the point. Spending more MIGHT be the perfect strategy. Or it might be the last bad choice of your career. Success during recessionary (or slow recovery) times has …