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Vicky Smithee is a public relations practitioner at Dallas-based C. Pharr and Co., a boutique agency specializing in public relations, marketing and social media. Follow her on Twitter at @VSmithee.

Social media strategists and community managers might be making their jobs harder for themselves when it comes to finding return on investment for their social media efforts, according to Nichole Kelly, CEO of Full Frontal ROI Consulting. During her “No Fluff Social Media Measurement” session at Explore Dallas, she explained that defining ROI for social media should utilize traditional metrics, rather than attempting to create special measurements exclusive to social media.

At a time when social media is a fixture in most business strategies but big budgets for it may not be, the bottom-line impacts of Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and more have to be clearly articulated for executives, business owners and clients. Advising social media experts to cut the “fluff,” Kelly recommends adopting traditional metrics already understood by the C-suite.

“I can tell you the value of a Facebook fan: zero freaking dollars,” she said. “If it doesn’t correlate to the bottom line, it doesn’t matter.” The value of a relationship, whether social or not, can be measured by aligning it with business goals that already assess the health of a company. The benefits of social media can’t be evaluated in a silo; their success is based on the impacts in other areas of the business.

By estimating the value of social media through its supportive functions in key sales areas like lead generation, brand awareness and client relations, social media managers should quantify its impacts to sales, revenue and cost to the company. By drawing on data extracted from social media networks, Facebook follower count, Twitter retweets or blog comments can be translated into their effects on traditional sales goals such as cost per impression, cost per site visitor or increases to e-mail subscribers.

Kelly provided five quick tips to building a social media strategy that enables numerical metrics and establishes a clear relationship to measurable results:

• Set up Google Analytics to see the search impacts of social media activity and benchmark successes.
• Consider purchasing a Hootsuite account (or a similar dashboard) to view link or campaign-specific results, in addition to increasing efficiency with content fulfillment.
• Measure success by looking at the hard numbers. Look for sales goals that can be impacted by social media leads and decide how to quantify its impacts. Consistently report these to executives to ensure the direct benefits of social media are understood.
• Optimize content based on the results you gather. Continue to adapt the type, frequency and method of social media engagement to ensure actionable results from an audience.
• Work smarter, not harder. Tweak reporting methods to perfect account management, and keep end-goals in mind when strategically planning. One more rule to substantiating the value of social media to executives: Avoid committing another disservice against your team by over-calculating social media-related expenses. Don’t add personnel costs to social media expenditures unless you’re doing so in other departments. It’s important to examine results-versus-cost on a fair playing field when comparing social media to other outreach efforts such as public relations or advertising.

To view Kelly’s presentation, visit http://ow.ly/98yYh. Explore Dallas was the first event of 2012 in a series of one-day, intensive seminars designed by Social Media Explorer to help professionals understand a deeper, more strategic approach to digital and social media marketing for their businesses.

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A Bisnow buddy snapped Caroline Williams, Cheryl Hayes, Leah Garner, Trevor Heaney, Bethany Peters, Jim Huang, and Stuart Williams at a recent gathering of The Melrose Society. The group was formed earlier this year to support Big Brothers Big Sisters program and raise awareness that children with a Big Brother or Big Sister in their lives are 52% less likely to skip school, 46% less likely to begin using illegal drugs, and 27% less likely to begin using alcohol, says C. Pharr & Associates’ Leah Ekmark, who tells us the group is still recruiting members.

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Andrea Kavanagh runs a small public relations agency with two interns, one employee and her mom as chief financial officer. She wants to grow her business, but doesn’t have grand plans to take over the PR industry.

“I do want to stay small,” said Kavanagh, who started Andrea Kavanagh & Associates in early May. “I enjoy being the face of my company.”

Kavanagh left her post as director of strategic marketing and public relations at the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University to pursue her dream of opening a boutique PR firm.

She isn’t the only one taking the leap. According to the Public Relations Society of America, the number of its members who consider themselves independent practitioners or agency owners has increased almost 3 percent in 2011 compared to 2010.

Arthur Yaan, spokesperson for PRSA said the organization expects the trend to continue as professionals turn to self-employment as a viable career option.

Cynthia Pharr, owner of Dallas-based C. Pharr & Company Ink, and a veteran in the PR industry, said she believes there is a larger number of boutique firms or firms with around nine employees or fewer.

“It’s not a matter of not being able to be big,” Pharr said. “It’s preferring not to be.” IBISWorld Inc., a market research company, reported that of the 7,219 firms in 2010, 6,294 consisted of nine employees or fewer. The growth in deliberately smaller firms comes as the PR industry is growing.

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The Texas Wall Street Women held its second annual philanthropy event, benefitting The Foundation for the Education of Young Women. Women in the field of finance spoke on the investment outlook and its impact during a panel. Pictured at the event, from left, are Cheryl Alston, executive director of Employees Retirement Fund of the City of Dallas; Linda Wertheimer Hart, vice-chairwoman, president and CEO of Hart Group Inc.; Cynthia Pharr Lee, board member of Behringer Harvard Op REIT II; Lucy Billingsley, partner at Billingsley Co.; Carol Nichols, vice president of market development of Virtual CFO; Caroline Cooley, partner and chief investment officer of Crestline.

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A Bisnow buddy snapped Billingsley Co partner Lucy Billingsley (like we have to tell you who she is) hamming it up between C. Pharr & Co owner Cynthia Pharr Lee and Behringer Harvard Op REIT II board member Christine Breck, also founder of the Texas Wall Street Women and Source Trading principal. The occasion was the second annual Texas Wall Street Women statewide charity event, benefiting the Foundation for the Education of Young Women, on May 5 in Dallas.

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"Texas Women Ventures Fund is preparing to raise $20 million — its biggest fund yet — to triple its size. The Richardson-based private equity fund will unveil the plan Wednesday at its annual investor meeting. Dallas businessman Ray Hunt’s company has already made the first commitment of $2 million as lead investor.

Texas Women Ventures also reached another milestone: Last month, its second of five investments repaid the fund early.

“We’ve tested the model, and it works,” said managing member Whitney Johns Martin. She co-founded the group with Valerie Freeman, Cynthia Pharr Lee and Carol Nichols.

Texas Women Ventures invests in women-led businesses by making mezzanine loans, which are subordinate to senior debt and act like equity without the company founders giving up control. It focuses on Old Economy companies that generate profit and annual revenue of $7 million to $70 million. It seeks repayment in three years to five years.

Texas Women Ventures needs more capital to invest in more companies."

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If I could ban one phrase from our lexicon, it would be not a problem. That rote response — usually from someone in the service business to a simple request — raises my hackles because it implies that something like a glass of water with my meal is beyond normal expectations.

We all have little words or phrases that annoy the heck out of us, even ones that might have seemed imaginative the first two dozen times we heard them.

Some are downright silly when you consider the alternative: What is the opposite of proactive? What is a meeting without minds? What is a killer app trying to kill? And if we have a new normal, what happened to the old one?

Attorney Wilson Chu, partner of K&L Gates, recently had lunch with a budding executive who was so eager to impress with his business speak that Chu couldn’t contain himself. “I congratulated him for being buzzword-compliant.”

I asked businesspeople around town: “If you were word czar, what word or phrase would you annihilate from the business world? What about it particularly annoys you — besides its being overused?”

The quick-triggered replies indicate that I struck a nerve.

“I literally hope this helps because I’m just trying to think outside the box,” quipped Jeff Crilley, principal of Real News PR. “After all, it’s not rocket science, but who knows? Maybe I’ve been drinking the Kool-Aid for so long that I can’t come up with an answer that’s not a cliche.”

Out of the box topped the trash heap.

Another least favorite: at the end of the day.

“If your sense is that something is the case at the end of the day, why is it not so at the beginning?” said Mark Annick of Androvett Legal Media & Marketing. “Do things somehow change that much?”

“At the end of my day,” said Laura Estrada, president of Garza Business Services Inc., “I’d like to clobber anyone that uses it!” She also wonders when people say to be totally honest with you, “does this mean you’re not honest with me all the time?”

A word that bugs Cynthia Pharr Lee, principal of C. Pharr & Co., is one I used. “Czars were not great fixers or leaders or visionaries in Russia,” she said. “They were abusive, wealth-mongering, power-hungry aristocrats. I’m not sure why Americans have adapted the word to be used as something of a compliment.”

Touche.

But in my defense, it would probably take the unilateral act of a despot to rid our world of these perturbing phrases.

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Women's business ownership made big strides in Texas and nationally from 2002 to 2007, growing at four times the rate of men's ownership, according to details released Tuesday by the U.S. Census Bureau.

However, men still controlled the bulk of businesses, payroll and sales.

Women owned 7.8 million businesses nationwide in 2007, up 20 percent from 2002, the last time the Census Bureau conducted its Survey of Business Owners. They accounted for 29 percent of private firms.

Texas ranked second nationally with 610,162 women-owned businesses, up 30 percent from 2002. They accounted for 28 percent of private businesses statewide. California had the most women-owned firms at 1 million.

Cynthia Pharr Lee, co-founder of Texas Women Ventures Fund, a Richardson firm that invests in women-led businesses, said the growth isn't surprising.

"We see more women entering fields they haven't been in before, becoming bolder about stepping out on their own," she said. "We definitely see more women-owned businesses in manufacturing, construction and food manufacturing."

Census Bureau Deputy Director Thomas Mesenbourg said women business owners in 2007 "had a major impact on the nation's economy," employing 7.6 million people.

But women-owned businesses lagged in sales generation: Producing $1.2 trillion, or 4 percent, compared with $8.5 trillion, or 28 percent, for businesses owned by men.

Most U.S. firms owned by women were small: Two percent had revenue topping $1 million and less than 1 percent employed 100 or more people. In Texas, businesses owned by women generated $96.3 billion in sales.

Dallas was No. 6 among U.S. cities, with 33,390 women-owned firms. Houston was No. 4 (63,435), San Antonio was No. 8 (30,642) and Austin was No. 13 (22,701). New York was first with 305,145. Dallas-Fort Worth ranked as the seventh metropolitan area in women-owned firms, with 169,863. Men in Texas owned nearly 1.1 million firms, or 50 percent. Nationally, men owned 51 percent of private businesses. About 390,000 businesses in Texas and 4.6 million nationally were equally owned by men and women.

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"We always thought real estate types hibernated in winter, dreaming of sugar plums and dogleg lefts. Our mistake. More than 80 CRE professionals from AIA Dallas, BOMA Dallas, CREW Dallas, NAIOP, NTCAR, TEXO and ULI North Texas recently helped The Salvation Army at the young professionals “Together We Give” event.

Here’s Pillar Commercial’s Nick Clark and C. Pharr’s Leah Ekmark at the Salvation Army Christmas and Disaster Center in Dallas. Leah, TREC Young Guns publicity chairwoman, says volunteering here was great for giving back and networking. Her day job has her promoting client McCarthy Building Cos in work on the new Dee and Charles Wyly Theatre and the HQ for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas.

Leah says TREC wants this project to serve as the catalyst for an annual event centered around volunteerism. The idea is to unite the young real estate community, while creating a better Dallas. This project lays the groundwork for connecting our groups more in 2010, she adds."

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DeSoto entrepreneur Gail Warrior-Lawrence is a poster child for investment in businesses led by women.

In 2007, the Texas Women Ventures Fund lent $1 million to the Warrior Group, the construction firm she co-founded and leads. She repaid the money in March and now is becoming an investor to help other female entrepreneurs.

"I'm always about paying it forward, if I can turn it around and do the same thing for someone else," Warrior-Lawrence said. She is investing an undisclosed amount in a $5 million sidecar fund being raised for use along with the Texas Women Ventures Fund's initial $5 million.

"It's on point with our mission to grow women-led businesses, to grow women business investors and to prove to the marketplace you can make money investing in women," said Cynthia Pharr Lee, co-founder of the Richardson-based investment firm along with Whitney Johns Martin, Valerie Freeman and Carol Nichols.

"We've completed the cycle with Gail and the Warrior group."

So far, $4 million has been committed to the sidecar fund, which requires investors to put up at least $60,000, said Johns Martin, managing member of the Texas Women Ventures Fund. She hopes to finish fundraising by November.

The Boone Family Foundation is the lead investor, with a $1 million commitment, said Jim Adams, vice president of the foundation started by Container Store founder and chairman emeritus Garrett Boone and his wife, Cecilia.

"We think they're good at what they do," Adams said of the Texas Women Ventures Fund. "And it's directly related to one of our three mission focuses – to advance gender equity for women and girls."

Johns Martin said the new capital will allow the fund to make more investments and write larger checks.

"It's designed to bring in some new investors and additional talent," she said. "The key to our fund is that we provide more than money – we provide advisory services and connections, not just to people but to expertise."

The group's assistance helped the Warrior Group hire key people to grow, Warrior-Lawrence said. She projects that the company will post $135 million in revenue this year, up from $42 million in 2007. It has 62 employees, vs. 25 in 2007.

"Our experience with the Texas Women Ventures Fund was great – from the due diligence to getting the loan done," Warrior-Lawrence said. "Now we're in a position to grow even more."

The Texas Women Ventures Fund makes loans to be repaid within three to five years. Venture capital firms, by contrast, typically invest in exchange for common stock or convertible preferred stock in a company.

Since 2006, the fund has invested about $4 million in four companies: Warrior Group; Karlee Inc., a Garland firm that provides custom manufacturing services such as sheet metal fabrication and cabling; Joy Foods Inc., a Dallas pizza maker; and Joy Products Corp., a related food service company.

A fifth, $2 million investment (half will come from the sidecar fund) is in the works, Johns Martin said.

New investors, mostly women, include Valerie Davisson, chief "peopleworks" officer at Brinker International Inc.; Wendy Lopez, vice president of URS Corp. and chairwoman of the National Association of Women Business Owners; and Joan Voeller, a partner at Hartman, Leito & Bolt. The Texas Women Ventures Fund has been able to raise money in a recession because it keeps its projects small and seeks investors who believe in its mission, Johns Martin said.

Performance helps, too.

"Our return has outperformed every other asset class investment over the past three years," Johns Martin said. The fund aims for a rate of return per investment in the high 20 percent to high 30 percent range, she said.

Next year, the firm plans to raise another fund, she said.

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Starting up a business in a down economy doesn't spell doom or suggest you're crazy. Cynthia Pharr Lee, president and owner of a Dallas-area public relations company, took the risk in similar times, in the 1980s, and succeeded. Today her business is thriving, and she's also co-founded the Texas Women Ventures Fund. Here's her story:

BUSINESS: C. Pharr & Co., Addison

DESCRIPTION: Business-oriented PR and marketing communications firm, handling marketing plans, reputation management, media strategy, brand management and strategic communications

PROBLEM FACED: After working in the public relations field for others, I was itching to start my own agency just as the mid-1980s downturn squashed commercial real estate and several other sectors I had specialized in.

I was determined not to poach clients from my employer. I wondered whether I should wait for a stronger economy before launching.

WHAT WAS AT STAKE: If I failed going out on my own, I would have lost an income stream and benefits my family counted on and most of my savings. I also risked giving up a hard-won position as a leader in the PR business and having to start at the bottom, scrapping to win small clients.

SOLUTION: Rather than starting a business from scratch, I networked with several outstanding senior PR agency owners just to see if anyone might be looking for a leadership transition. Especially, were they interested in a younger partner to buy them out?

After several unproductive discussions, I finally learned that one of my most respected mentors was in exactly that situation. We negotiated a buyout that gave her the financial and management exit she wanted in several years and provided me an outstanding platform from which to grow C. Pharr & Co.

I was excited about doing my own thing, and my team and I tripled the business in the first year. Fast growth continued for several years. So I was able to complete the purchase and restore my savings from the agency's earnings.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED: By starting with a few accounts, people, offices and computers, I was able to launch my agency from an established business rather than from scratch. That made us more competitive and ready to grow rapidly. Especially in the challenging environment, it was also a huge relief to be able to achieve financial stability fairly quickly.

To contact Cynthia Pharr Lee, call 972-931-7576, e-mail Cynthia@pharrpr.com or visit www.pharrpr.com.

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