Social media is something that businesses of all sizes should be using. Social channels make it possible to reach people who are interested in the products and services you offer. In addition to reaching them, the ongoing nature of social media means you can build the necessary level of trust that’s needed for someone to buy from your business.

As a social media agency, we help businesses with all kinds of issues related to social media. Since this gives me an opportunity to see how different businesses are approaching their social efforts, I’m able to notice trends across multiple industries and organization sizes. One issue I commonly see is businesses struggle to measure how well their social media efforts are performing.

Although it wasn’t that long ago when getting concrete data from social media platforms was quite hard to do, the good news is that’s no longer the case. These platforms understand the value that data can give businesses and are happy to provide it. However, just because data is available doesn’t mean that measuring social media marketing performance is a breeze.

Not only is there the issue of needing to measure results across multiple platforms, but there’s also the problem of trying to figure out which metrics are even meaningful. Without having a clear way to measure results, most businesses will struggle to find traction with their social media management. That’s why we want to cover the why and how of three social metrics worth measuring:

Likes and/or Shares

While social media can bring customers to your business, it’s important to remember that this channel generally sits at the top of the marketing funnel. That means most people will want to engage with your brand for a while before actually purchasing. You can measure that engagement through likes and/or shares. When these metrics are used as internal benchmarks, they go beyond vanity metrics and provide insight into what types of content best resonate with your audience.

Clicks

Once someone is familiar with your business, you want to get them on social media and on to your website. Clicks are an ideal metric to measure for this purpose. You can see general trends about how many people are clicking to your site on a daily basis, along with which specific efforts are best at driving clicks.

Average Time on Site

It’s important to remember that not all clicks are equal. That’s why you should also measure how much time people spend on your site after clicking. If you suddenly notice that a bunch of social media visitors stayed on your site much less than normal, it probably means you pitched something on social that didn’t actually line up with the experience those visitors had when they arrived on your site.

If you want to create a strong social media strategy that includes a clear strategy for measuring performance, contact us how we can help.

Michelle Hummel is CEO of Web Strategy Plus a full-service digital marketing agency. She was recently nominated for the Woman-Owned Business of the Year! She’s a passionate Social Media Trainer with 15+ years of successful online business development, sales, and marketing experience. She also holds a valuable Internet Marketing Degree however with the ever-changing world of web marketing she strives to learn something new every day. 

She travels Nationwide visiting her 22 Social Media Enthusiasts Chapters delivering in-depth social media training. She also provides Social Media Certifications through founding Web Media University. A current contributing editor to The Franchise Dictionary Magazine and she has written 3 books in her series called, “The Social Media Magnet: Everything You Need to Know to Attract Customers with Social Media”, where she shares her best-kept secrets to success. She also specializes in helping Franchisors and Franchisees develop an integrated web marketing program to drive leads. She’s available for interviews via email, telephone, Skype video, news segments on location and more. Just let her know how she can help!