Social media is constantly changing. Marketing techniques and content formats that worked years or even months ago may be irrelevant now. Posting at the right time with several trendy hashtags won’t guarantee you a great engagement. New social media algorithms make it more challenging for brands to reach the same number of impressions they had in the past. By monitoring social media metrics you can understand how well your social strategy performs, and improve the online presence of your brand.
Here, we highlight the most basic metrics that every brand should pay attention to.
Brand Awareness shows the attention your brand gets — the overall number of mentions of your brand online per variable span of time.
Take a look at your @mentions, Impressions and Reach, Shares and Links across your social media platforms.
This rate measures how fast you gain new followers over a specific period.
To calculate Audience Growth Rate, divide the number of New Followers over the chosen reporting period (week, month, quarter) by your Total Followers. After that, multiply that by 100, and you get your Growth Rate Percentage.
This metric measures how many users your posts are reaching.
To track this metric, pay attention to Follower Growth, Individual Posts Reach, and Overall Campaign Reach in every social media platform.
This metric shows how visible your brand is on social media as opposed to your competitors.
Track direct and indirect Mentions of your brand over a specific period. Add your Brand Mentions to your Competitors’ Mentions to get the Total Mentions number. Divide Brand Mentions by Total, and multiply by 100, and you get your Social Share of Voice Percentage.
This rate shows how many people are interacting with your content. Individual engagement metrics are Likes, Shares, Comments, and Clicks.
To calculate ER, you will need to add up all individual metrics, a.k.a., interactions (reactions, comments, likes, shares, etc.), and divide it by either Impressions or Reach.
It shows how many times followers share your content through their networks.
Add up the number of Shares (the number of times your post was regrammed, retweeted, etc.) over a reporting period, and divide it by the Total Number of Followers. After that, multiply by 100.
Tracking this rate will show what percentage of users who see your post or ad is resonating with the content enough to share it in comparison to those who may like, comment, or not interact at all.
To calculate Virality Rate, divide the number of Shares by the number of Impressions. After that, multiply by 100.
CR shows the percentage of followers that take the desired action (Call-To-Action), and helps to determine how relevant your content is.
Take the number of Conversions (e.g., the number of clicks generated by the post) and divide it by Total Clicks. After that, multiply by 100.
*To measure CR, your CTA needs to be trackable.
CTR shows how many users click on your CTA links in ads or posts. A high CTR means effective content.
Track the Total Number of Clicks and Total Number of Impressions. Divide the Number of Clicks by the Number of Impressions, and multiply by 100.
CPC measures the amount you pay over a single click on your sponsored post.
Divide a Total Ad Spend by Total number of Clicks, and you get your CPC.
Nowadays, businesses focus on generating more leads and getting more conversions, which makes social media performance essential. You can’t solely rely on posting content anymore.
To achieve your marketing goals and enhance revenue, you should track actionable social media metrics. The collected data will give you insights on how your content resonates with your audience. Follow this principle to make smart data-driven decisions, get better ROI and grow your business.