Selecting, Setting, and Tracking KPIs to Meet Your Social Media Marketing Goals
Do you ever wonder if your brand’s social media strategy is actually helping you achieve your goals? Social media KPIs, or key performance indicators, allow you to measure and prove the success of your campaigns in a more definitive way.
KPIs are trackable metrics, such as engagement, comments, follower growth, etc. These measurable metrics are what provide proof that your strategies are working or not working to connect with your target audience, build brand awareness, and drive return on investment (ROI).
Let’s dive more into this topic.
Setting KPIs
Setting your KPIs starts with an overall goal. Ask yourself what your end game is. If it’s to build brand awareness, then follower growth is a good metric, or KPI, to track. If it’s to drive traffic to your website, you’ll want to track the number of clicks each social post gets.
Remember, no two brand’s objectives or goals are set in stone. As your goals change, so should the KPIs you set and track.
To set and track your KPI, first state the objective. Make it clear how tracking that particular metric will help your brand reach its ultimate goal. Think beyond the data and consider the larger picture.
Then, decide on the metric or metrics that will help you measure and track your progress. Adding a value can help you work more effectively to that goal. For example, if you have 300 followers on your YouTube account, your goal to increase brand awareness may be increasing your follower count to 1,000 in a year.
Finally, analyze the data or metric(s) you are measuring. You do not want to review this just at the end of the period or timeline you have given yourself, but you should review this regularly throughout that period. Set a cadence of when you check, such as weekly, monthly, bi-monthly, etc.
The whole point of KPIs is to rely on data to see what is working and what isn’t. So if what you are doing isn’t working, you can correct-course as soon as possible. This makes reaching your ultimate goal much more of a possibility!
Important KPIs You Should Consider
Here are some important KPIs you can track to help meet your overall brand goals.
Reach KPIs
- Impressions: the number of times a post was visible in someone’s feed; note this doesn’t mean a person actually viewed or read your post
- Follower Count: the number of followers your channel/account has at a set time
- Audience Growth Rate: the number of followers you have gained/lost over time
- Reach: how many people have seen a post since it went live; gives you an idea of what your audience finds valuable/interesting
- Potential Reach: the number of people who could see a post during a reporting period; can include shares of your post and the potential to reach a follower’s audience
- Social Share of Voice: how many people have mentioned your brand or your competitor’s brand; measures your relevance within your industry
- Website Traffic: tracks how many people have visited your website from your social platforms; requires Google Analytics
Social KPIs
- Likes: the number of times followers like a particular post
- Comments: the number of comments on a post; note that comments can have positive or negative sentiment
- Clicks: measures how many times users have clicked on the link in your post; use a link shortener such as Ow.ly or Bit.ly to help track this
- Shares: the number of times your post has been shared by other accounts/users or to another platform
- Mentions: indicates when your brand is tagged; means someone is actively showing support for your brand
- Applause Rate: includes likes, saves, retweets, favoriting, etc; tracks only positive interactions
- Average Engagement Rate: this metric divides all engagement a post receives by the total number of followers on your social channel; shows how engaging, on average, your content was
- Amplification Rate: the rate of your followers who are sharing your content with their own followers (shares, retweets, etc.); high amplification means followers want to be associated with your brand
Conversion KPIs
- Conversion Rate: the number of users who performed an action outlined in your CTA (click, purchase, etc.); a high rate proves your content is valuable
- Click-Through Rate (CTR): the percentage of people who viewed your post and clicked on the CTA (call to action); a high rate proves you are capturing their attention
- Bounce Rate: not everyone who clicks will follow through with reading the full article or completing a purchase; a bounce rate is the number of users who clicked but then quickly left the page without taking action; you want this number to be low
- Cost Per Click (CPC): the amount you pay a platform (sponsored post/ad) to show your post; this lets you know if your spending is a worthwhile investment
- Revenue: shows how much you’ve made through your social media platform via conversions
Customer Satisfaction KPIs
- Customer Testimonials: star ratings can provide a good snapshot of how customers feel about your brand
- Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT): shows how happy your followers are with your products/services; you can collect this data through a poll or survey
- Net Promoter Score (NPS): measures your brand loyalty; again you can collect this through a survey
- Customer Lifetime Value: refers to the total amount of money that a customer will spend on your products/services over their entire lifetime as a customer
How to Track KPIs
So how can you track all of these KPIs? There are a few different ways. The first is by using native solutions. These are the analytics tools that each platform provides. Native solutions are limited to tracking data only for that one platform.
Another option is an all-in-one tool. Social media management platforms that help you schedule to multiple platforms and track data and analytics from all of them in one place can help give you an overall picture across platforms.
Custom reports is another way to get this bigger picture, however, it requires you to compile data from multiple platforms into one document.
Have a Professional Social Media Marketer Help!
Hiring a professional social media marketer or agency can help you from start to finish. From setting goals, selecting KPIs, and measuring and tracking them, a professional makes it easier for you to get back to the daily grind of your business!
Tintero Creative can help your brand break through the noisy digital world! We create content marketing and social media strategies that help tell your brand’s story while using marketing best practices, helping you stand out from the crowd. Schedule your free consultation today!