SHARETHIS’ NEW “SQI” METRIC - SQI Is An Acronym For Social Quality Index

The information regarding the SQI [Social Quality Index] which follows appears courtesy of ShareThis, a provider of some wonderful social media sharing tools and analytics for publishers of blogs and websites. I use them on a great many of my blog sites.

Overview

What is SQI?

Social Quality Index, SQI,  measures the social quality of a website against the ShareThis Publisher Network. By favoring social interaction over broad reach, SQI puts the publisher's audience and content into the spotlight.

The SQI score measures social quality on a scale of 1 to 200, with 200 representing the highest social quality. This proprietary formula evaluates social metrics such as: outbound shares, inbound clickback traffic and page views to calculate the audience engagement of your site.

Social quality denotes a good match between the publisher's audience and the content and it is directly correlated with the number of times users return to the same page and the level of interaction with other media on the page, like ads.

Why did we do this?

At ShareThis, we have known for years that the act of sharing content provides powerful insights for both publishers and advertisers. We also have witnessed how content continues to be under-valued as part of the current digital media buying equation. Without a way to benchmark content's value, over-dependence from media buyers on traffic and reach would only continue to grow stronger.

We decided that this was a serious challenge for our publisher network, and one worth understanding better. So, we posed the problem to our team of renowned scientists, and they found a solution -- a score of social quality.

What does this mean for the ShareThis Publisher Network?

Your content has a value, and you should be rewarded for that value. Our goal for the SQI score is to help you drive better business decisions that result in greater returns, via audience engagement and earned media from it, and also advertising spends. As part of the ShareThis Publisher Network, you are better able to gauge how sociable both your content and audience are, and therefore make better decisions that help you achieve your business goals.

What's New

What are the new SQI features?

SQI, a universal measure of social value, was introduced in June 2012. To provide more actionable insights, ShareThis has added new features to SQI to help publishers evaluate their content.

• From January 2013 onward, ShareThis publishers' SQI scores will range from 1 to 200. SQI scores previously ranged from 1 to 10.

• In addition to monthly SQI scores. ShareThis publishers now have the ability to view their SQI scores on a daily and weekly basis. Note that daily scores are calculated for the previous day.

• Each of the 27 content categories, in addition to the overall domain, will now highlight the top 100 social URLs and top social keywords most relevant to that SQI category score. When clicking on a top keyword, the user will not only see their site's URLs that are associated with that keyword, but that of the ShareThis Publisher Network.

Why did you change the SQI scale?

We want to provide publishers more details to the daily changes of their SQI scores. Now with daily and weekly SQI scores, publishers can evaluate and optimize their content everyday. Thus, publishers have greater insight to their most relevant content to keep their most social audiences engaged.

Can ShareThis retroactively change my 2012 SQI scores to the new scale?

No. We cannot change SQI scores before January 2013 to reflect the new scale.

Why can't I see my daily and weekly SQI scores before January 2013?

Daily and weekly SQI scores are only available from January 2013 onward.

How are social keywords identified?

Top social keywords are identified using an algorithm that evaluates the relevancy of each keyword in a URL and the number of shares and social clicks that URL received.

Can I change the classification of a URL from one category to another?

No. By evaluating the URL keywords, ShareThis associates the URL to 3 of the most relevant 27 content categories.

General

How is the SQI score calculated?

ShareThis’ patent-pending algorithm evaluates the entire scope of social traffic, such as outbound shares, click-back traffic and page views, across multiple social networks and properties.

How can I take advantage of the new score?

As a ShareThis publisher, you can check your score in the ShareThis Publisher Analytics Dashboard. SQI will showcase your site's overall social score when benchmarked with other ShareThis publisher sites and will also include category SQI scores to provide you with greater details as to which content garners the most audience engagement. This can help you make better business decisions regarding editorial content and advertising.

How can I improve my SQI score?

Check out our Best Practices to improve the social quality of your site. Increasing the number of shares that take place on your website will directly impact your SQI score. For example, our most successful publishers have implemented the ShareThis widget in prominent locations on their websites to make it easier for users to share their content.

How is my SQI score impacted by changes in the ShareThis network?

SQI scores are calculated on a monthly basis. Since SQI is a measure of social engagement of your website compared to the ShareThis network, changes such as a large publisher joining the ShareThis network, may impact your SQI score.

How are my SQI scores calculated if I have multiple publisher keys?

The social activity on your website, including SQI, is tracked based on your Publisher Key. If you are using multiple publisher keys on your domain, the SQI score for each key will be computed. If you have multiple keys, you will see an "Multiple PUb Keys" alert. Upon clicking on it, a pop-up will display the number of publisher keys in your domain and your aggregated SQI score.

How often is my SQI score updated?

Your SQI scores are updated on a daily basis.

Why is my SQI score listed as NA (not available)?

When your score is displayed as N/A it means that ShareThis has insufficient data for your domain. For daily and weekly calculations, your website needs to have at least 1K page views and at least 15K for monthly calculations. .

Can I check other SQI scores for other websites?

Yes. You can view SQI scores for other websites at http://www.sharethis.com/sqi.

How can I get my SQI score for all my domains?

You can check the SQI score for each of your domains by choosing the domain in the "Change Domain" drop-down menu in Metrics Dashboard Summary view. You currently will not be able to see your aggregated SQI score for all your domains. If you want your aggregated SQI score for all your domains, please contact us at sqifeedback@sharethis.com.

Can I create a specific category to determine my SQI score?

Unfortunately at this time, publishers cannot create their own categories. ShareThis uses 27 predefined categories to benchmark your website's content against other websites in the ShareThis network.

How are my category SQI scores calculated?

Your website's content is matched against 27 predefined categories by searching your content for keywords and mapping your site to them. ShareThis then calculates your SQI score for each category compared to other ShareThis Network publishers in the same category.

What is SQI Lookup?

SQI Lookup is a portal for users to look up SQI scores and evaluate the social quality of ShareThis publishers. You can access it at http://www.sharethis.com/sqi If you want to hide your SQI score from SQI Lookup (Beta), please contact us at SQIscore@sharethis.com. 

As of the date of this writing, SQI (which unfortunately is also an acronym for a vast number of words and companies) SQI, started in 2011, has not become a fully-accepted system of measuring much of anything, although it does show promise if it wins acceptance among some major publishers who use various ShareThis social media sharing tools and analytics.

 It’s this author’s opinion that ShareThis social media sharing tools are far superior to the AddThis social media sharing tools -- the latter brand imposes its agenda of self-propagation upon any publisher of quality content who utilizes any of its tools.

Douglas E. Castle, for The Mad Marketing Tactics Blog and for CFI - CrowdFunding Incubator LLC

Labels, Tags, Keywords, Categories And Search Terms For This Article:

ShareThis, AddThis, SQI, Social Quality Index, rating services, blogging, website rankings, rating and ranking services, Q Value, marketing, social media sharing tools, blog promotion, business promotion and growth, CFI, The Mad Marketing Tactics Blog, CrowdFunding Incubator, Douglas E. Castle, marketing metrics, marketing ROI, social media ROI