Social Media Metrics to Measure
News flash, follower growth isn’t everything when it comes to social media metrics. We often speak to businesses whose only goal is to increase their following online, and whilst this is one metric to monitor, it’s not the only piece of data, and doesn’t accurately reflect successful results.
The growing number of bots and fake accounts across all social media platforms means that follower count is no longer an accurate representation of growth on Instagram. Follower growth doesn’t equal more sales or increased revenue on the business side either, so it’s important to remember there are a variety of metrics to value.
This blog will outline specific metrics on Instagram specifically, with this being the most popular marketing platform amongst our clients.
The Importance of Data-Driven Insights
Why should you be tracking results on social media? Beyond the vanity metrics like follower count and likes, tracking metrics can give your marketing agency insights into how well your content is performing.
Analysing social media data can allow us to build or refresh your social media strategy, ensuring the content you are putting time and money into is going to be well-received and engage the right audience online.
If a piece of content isn’t performing as expected, your marketing agency can look into the metrics to find out why. Maybe the post isn’t reaching the right audience, the algorithm has changed and is prioritising a different content format, or maybe the call-to-action within your copy isn’t strong enough.
Metrics To Monitor
Adam Mosseri, the creator of Instagram, has repeatedly emphasised driving engagement, increasing reachability, and promoting shareability over merely chasing followers.
Engagement Rate - this measures how engaged your audience is and takes into account the actions users have taken with regards to your content (likes, comments, saves, shares and clicks). The more interactions your audience takes, the higher your engagement is. Each industry has an average engagement rate across the different social media platforms and it’s important to measure the engagement rate against these industry averages.
Views - The number of times your post was played or displayed across Instagram. Instagram now also give us the ability to look at ‘views over time’, which is the number of views a post has received since it was published, compared to the views a typical post receives.
Reach - The total number of unique times your post or story has been seen by users on Instagram. A high reach may indicate that your content is engaging, being shared to a wider audience or has been promoted (you’ve boosted the post, essentially turning it into paid content).
Shares - Simply put, this is the number of times your content has been shared between users on Instagram. This is a metric that Instagram, in particular, values as it shows your content is informative, engaging or interesting to audiences.
Saves - Similar to shares, this is the number of times your content has been saved on Instagram. Again, this is another metric that Instagram values as it shows that your content is highly engaging to your audience.
Importance of Good Reporting Platforms
We’re big believers in automating processes at Studio Blackardt, which is why we love a reporting platform like Agency Analytics or Sprout Social. There are several reporting platforms available for agency use at varying costs and with different automations.
The reporting platform we use allows us to set up automated weekly, monthly and quarterly reporting across organic and paid social media platforms, as well as integrating Google Analytics for website and local SEO metrics.
The Studio Blackardt Design Process
Studio Blackardt deliver professional social media services that drive impactful results. Working across a wide variety of platforms, our team build social media strategies that combine creative thinking and industry insights to help achieve results through both organic and paid social media campaigns.
Are you confused about what to track and how to interpret the data? Let us do the hard work. Reach out to us about our Social Media Management services.
