Not long ago, eConsultancy developed a list of the top 10 things to measure in a social media campaign. It’s a brilliant list and we’d encourage those of you reading this to click through to the entire post on the eConsultancy site.

If you’re in a hurry and want the 60-second version, here’s a shortened list of the top 10 ways to measure a social media campaign:

1. Traffic in the form of unique visitors and repeat visitors
2. Interaction in the form of comments, ReTweets and participation
3. Sales generated from a landing page linked to your campaign
4. Leads generated from a form on your website
5. Search marketing as measured by social bookmarking sites such as Digg and Delicious
6. Brand metrics as measured by social media affinity tools
7. Public relations tied directly to your social media efforts
8. Customer engagement in the form of online and offline involvement with your brand
9. Customer retention as measure by your churn rate
10. Profits as measured by your P&L

The bottom line: Social media is measurable and has proven to be a valuable tool for marketers around the globe. If you’re a marketer and you’re interested in proving the value of your next social media campaign, then the tools outlined above are for you.

In yesterday’s blog post, we talked about companies that employ Black Hat techniques designed to game the social media system. The post, called “Can You or Should You Buy Facebook Friends and Twitter Followers?” pointed out that there are certain companies that will let you buy followers so that you or your brand look more popular.

If you’ve ever wondered how the heck someone you’ve never heard of got 54,254 followers on Twitter, there’s a chance that they used one of these techniques to buy followers. That’s a Black Hat technique that totally goes against what social media is all about.

(Quick aside: Chris Brogan has 95,000 followers and David Pogue has 923,000 followers, all of which are legit. Our point isn’t that all people with a high number of followers aren’t legitimate. Our point is that some people with a high number of followers aren’t legitimate.)

Which brings us to our key issue — there are tricky ways to bump up your followers on Facebook, Twitter, Digg and other social media tools. But inevitably, those tricks will backfire. After all, the whole idea behind social media is transparency. When you’re transparent about your intentions, the whole social media equation will take care of itself. When you’re not, well, that’ll take care of itself, too.

What’s all this have to do with Google wanting to see you naked?

Not long ago, we produced a 60 Second Video called “Google Wants to See You Naked.” The point of the short video was quite simple — there are ways to game the system and bump up your SEO rankings, but in the end, you’ll get caught and, possibly, get Blacklisted by Google or other companies.

Your best approach is to follow the rules. Just do what Google, Yahoo and Bing ask you to do — write relevant content that’s helpful to your followers and that people want to share with others. If you do that, the rest will take care of itself.

Honest. It will.

Monday’s Topic: “It’s Labor Day. Why Are You Still Working?”

In an excellent posting on AdAge, writer Michael Learmonth provides some insight into the Black Hat world of buying followers for social media sites. In his story, called “Want 5,000 More Facebook Friends? That’ll Be $654.30,” Mr. Learmonth puts the spotlight on uSocial, a company that provides a way to buy Twitter followers and Facebook friends.  (No, I didn’t provide a link to uSocial. Why? Because I don’t support the underhanded social media tactics that uSocial sells.)

As the AdAge article points out, other social media platforms have had their run-ins with uSocial. Digg tried to get the company to stop gaming the system by sending them a cease-and-desist order last spring. The CEO, located in Brisbane, Australia, apparently laughed-off the order, calling it a “scare tactic.”

All this brings up the point — as a marketing director, should you or should you not employ Black Hat tactics in order to appear more popular?

Should you buy Facebook friends so that your Fan Page looks more robust? Should you pay money for Twitter followers so that you look like you’re a big shot? Should you pay for Digg votes so that your content looks more relevant?

No. Absolutely not. Don’t do it.

There are three (and probably more) very good reasons why you shouldn’t employ these tactics.

1. Social media is about quality, not quantity. The goal of any social media campaign isn’t about the number of followers, it’s about the quality of the conversation. Think of it this way — if you went to a large party with 500 people at it, would you have a better time if you spoke to all 500 people or just to 10 people? My guess is that you’d have more fun having spoken to just 10.
2. Social media is about engagement. As Jonathan Salem Baskin points out in his excellent book Branding Only Works on Cattle, a brand isn’t about positioning or mindshare, it’s about how people engage with your product or service.
3. Social media is about transparency. One of the better aspects of social media is that it ultimately “outs” people who try to game the system. That’s why transparency is such a big deal. Just be honest and, if you’re doing it right, everything else will take care of itself.

So, thank you AdAge for drawing our attention to this emerging trend. It’s an unsettling one, but one that, in the end, will go away. After all, nobody wants to be part of the questionable tactics that uSocial  participates in.

Tomorrow: Why does Google want to see you naked? Be sure to tune in.