How to Calculate the Value of a Like

While I'm all for measure ability on social media, this is again snake oil: oversimplification of how social media works and where it can actually benefit your business.

I think the biggest sin is the sin of omission: the only use case it caters to a direct transaction business, say, e-commerce. What about social activity for engaging with customers, say, what a local mom-pop store may want to do. What about building brand affinity, something larger brands want to do. What about giving users a forum to connect with the brand at multiple levels. How about a place where you can make accessible certain contact points, say, customer service, or simple stuff such as table bookings at a restaurant. And the above list is by no means exhaustive.

Even in the specific use case of e-commerce, it makes an over simplistic assumption of effectiveness = instant conversion. What about a guy who discovers something through the Facebook feed, does some comparison shopping, and then goes on to the site to finally buy that same product. Basically, the formula is an oversimplification of the buying process, even for the narrow scenario within which this works.