There comes a time when a brand with massive social media following encounters a weird slump in website clicks and revenue somewhere along the way. You might have decent follower counts, but it doesn’t necessarily translate to a valuable return in terms of the results that you want for your brand’s website.
This happens because you’re only focusing on the follower count and not going deep within your metrics to use it to your advantage. I’d like to call this the “surface metrics.” Yes, followers matter, but what truly speaks volumes is the way that piece of content or campaign translates into favorable numbers—ultimately giving you the engagement that brings in the money.
Surface metrics have no tangible value to a brand that seeks to gain influence and earn more money online. That’s why it pays to lose yourself in the nooks and crannies of social media and website metrics. By doing this, you’re dissecting your campaign to see how you can tailor your content to generate real results. Focusing on the following metrics will help you understand what your audience usually respond to, how they turn into web traffic and the right measure of engagement that you can glean from your posts.
Here are the best social media metrics you should be paying attention to, according to Content Marketing Institute.
The Span of Your Reach
The best way to figure out your effectiveness online is by looking at your post and page reach. The higher the number goes, the higher the likelihood of people responding to these posts. It’s one of the top ways for you to figure out id what you’re doing is right or if it needs a little more push and oil. Your social media reach can tell you a lot in terms of attracting new people to your platform. Instagram and Facebook offer specific in-app tools that help you measure your reach. Your follower count won’t exactly matter here (you know, because of algorithms and shit), but it’s a good aspect for you to focus on so you can see how well you perform on a general perspective.
The Attention You Get
Once you figure out how you’re reaching a vast number of your organic followers, it’s time for you to think about what they feel and do when they see your content. Do they stick on the post and lead up to your website or not? This is called your Bounce Rate. You can easily find this tool on Google Analytics. The bounce rate tells you how your audience received your post. If it shows you a relatively high number, it means that people were disappointed with what your post delivered after seeing it on social media. You might have crafted a good image and text post, but weren’t able to compensate with a compelling blog post or website offer.
You have to lower this number if you want your audience to stick to what you post or offer. How can you lower your bounce rate, then? It sounds easy, but it’s no simple task. You have to figure out a way to connect your website content to your social media post. Make sure that you deliver what you promise. If you say they can learn a lot from this new course you’ve been working on, make sure that it’s filled with fresh, new ideas and not rehashed shit from other gurus.
Where Your Traffic Comes From
Another great tool that Google Analytics offers is referral traffic. This is where you can see where your audience comes from across different social media and/or search engine platforms. By monitoring your referral traffic, you can gauge how these platforms lead new people to your website. Again, your referrals are directly influenced by how well you promote and create your content.
How Your Audience Reacts
Follower engagement is very important in measuring your social media/web metrics. This shows you how people interacted with your content through likes, shares, comments, and general organic performance. This also helps you understand how well they react to your posts. Do they interact with your blog posts as if it’s the hottest album drop of the week? Or maybe videos do better than your image posts? If your engagement rate is high, it means you’re connecting well to your audience. You’re doing a great job, in this case.
But keep in mind that engagement is more than just your likes. Comments and shares matter significantly. Content Marketing Institute suggests that you analyze these three major engagement metrics:
Average engagement – basically the number of likes, shares, and comments.
Amplification rate – the number of shares vs. the number of people who actively interacted to your post.
Virality rate – the keyword here is “viral.” This is where shares go head to head with the number of views/reach multiplied by a hundred. This is what most people on Facebook and Twitter aim to achieve, even though they’re not brands or businesses (I personally had one viral tweet that went on a viral spree for four straight days).
Your Audience Demographics
Just like any research project or thesis, demographics matter in a lot of ways for brands and marketing. Consider the diversity that makes up your general demographic for your social media platform—gender, age, location, preferences, etc. You have to figure out how these general demographics can be converted into paying demographics. Facebook Insights and Instagram Insights offer comprehensive details about your demographics.
How You Gain Followers and Retain a Fan Base
If your followers grow every week, you’re on the right track. At the same time, if it doesn’t grow that much, it doesn’t mean you’re fucked. There’s a lot riding on the growth rate of your social media channel—how often you post, the shit you create, the value you offer, etc. Google Analytics, Facebook Insights, and Instagram Insights all offer a detailed look at your follower growth based on days, weeks, months, and years. By filtering these out, you can figure out how your growth depends on the stuff you post and the content that drives good engagement. It can also help you find out the frequency of your posts as well as the changes you might need to adapt based on the other metrics I’ve mentioned above.
Aside from the growth rate, it’s also very useful to pay attention to your devoted fan base. In a general store, these are what we call your regular customers. They’re the ones who anticipate every post, and those who make sure to share it on their own platforms too. If you don’t have them yet, you can always reverse-engineer your competitor’s performance online to see how you can gain those valuable fans. It’s also a surefire way to have a network of people who can easily promote your brand without necessarily contacting them for promotions. You’re not ripping them off, you’re recognizing their voluntary effort (just don’t forget to exchange their effort with something equally valuable if they turn out to be good influencers for your brand).
