As a social media marketer or business owner, tracking the right metrics is essential for understanding the impact of your social media efforts and optimizing your strategy for success. But with so many different data points available, it can be overwhelming to know which metrics actually matter and how to interpret them.
In this comprehensive guide, we‘ll break down the most important social media metrics you need to be tracking in 2024, why they matter, and how to use them to make data-driven decisions that drive real business results.
What are Social Media Metrics?
At their core, social media metrics are quantitative data points that indicate how your content is performing across your social channels. Rather than vanity metrics like follower counts or likes, which don‘t necessarily translate to meaningful outcomes, social media metrics provide deeper insights into how users are actually interacting with and responding to your brand on social media.
As Hootsuite CEO Tom Keiser puts it:
"Social media metrics are the key to unlocking the true value of your social media efforts. By tracking the right metrics and using them to inform your strategy, you can turn social media into a powerful growth engine for your business."
Why Tracking Social Media Metrics Matters
Monitoring social media metrics allows you to:
- Understand your audience and what resonates with them
- Identify top-performing content and optimize your strategy accordingly
- Measure the ROI of your social media investment
- Make data-driven decisions to improve performance over time
- Demonstrate the value of social media to stakeholders
Without tracking metrics, you‘re essentially flying blind in your social media marketing efforts. As the old adage goes, "You can‘t manage what you don‘t measure."
Top Social Media Metrics to Track in 2024
So which metrics should you be focusing on? Here are the key social media metrics every marketer needs to know:
1. Reach
Reach measures the total number of unique users who saw your post, indicating the size of the audience you were able to get your content in front of. A high reach means your content is being widely seen and distributed.
According to a study by Rival IQ, the average organic reach for a Facebook post is 5.2%, meaning for every 100 followers, only about 5 will see a given post in their News Feed. This highlights the importance of tracking reach to understand the true visibility of your content.
To calculate reach, most social media platforms have built-in analytics that will show you this number. Total reach can be influenced by factors like the size of your existing audience, how much engagement the post gets, and if you used any paid promotion.
2. Impressions
Impressions refer to the total number of times your content was displayed to users, counting multiple views by the same user. So if one person saw your post in their feed three times, that would count as three impressions.
While impressions don‘t necessarily indicate unique viewers, a high number of impressions means your content is appearing frequently in users‘ feeds. In fact, a study by Facebook found that 74% of total ad recall is achieved within just the first 10 seconds of a user scrolling past an ad for the first time, demonstrating the value of repeat exposure.
3. Engagement Rate
Engagement encompasses the total number of interactions your post receives, such as reactions, comments, shares, saves, and clicks. Tracking engagement indicates how well your content is resonating with your audience and motivating them to take action.
To calculate engagement rate, divide the total number of engagements by impressions or reach, and multiply by 100 to get a percentage. According to a report by RivalIQ, the average engagement rate across all industries is 1.42% for Facebook, 0.6% for Instagram, and 0.2% for Twitter. However, these benchmarks vary widely by industry, content type, and platform.
Here‘s a quick cheat sheet of average engagement rates by platform:
| Platform | Average Engagement Rate |
|---|---|
| 1.42% | |
| 0.6% | |
| 0.2% | |
| 0.54% |
4. Audience Growth Rate
Audience growth rate measures how quickly you are gaining new followers over a period of time. This metric helps you understand the overall health and trajectory of your social media presence.
To calculate audience growth rate, take your net new followers (new followers minus lost followers), divide by your total audience size, and multiply by 100 for a percentage. Most businesses aim for a steady audience growth rate of around 2-5% per month, according to Sprout Social.
5. Click-Through Rate (CTR)
If driving website traffic is a key goal for your social media strategy, click-through rate is an essential metric to track. CTR measures the percentage of users who clicked on a link in your post to visit your website or a specific landing page.
To calculate CTR, divide total link clicks by impressions and multiply by 100. While average CTR varies by platform and industry, a good rule of thumb is to aim for a CTR of 2% or higher.
6. Conversion Rate
Conversion rate takes CTR a step further to measure the percentage of users who completed a desired action after clicking through to your site from social media, such as making a purchase, filling out a form, or downloading a resource.
To calculate conversion rate, divide your total number of conversions by click-throughs and multiply by 100. According to WordStream, the average conversion rate for social media ads across industries is 9.21%.
7. Video Views & Completion Rate
With video content on the rise across all social platforms, tracking video metrics is increasingly important. In addition to measuring total video views, you‘ll also want to keep an eye on completion rate, which indicates the percentage of viewers who watched your video all the way through.
According to HubSpot, the average video completion rate across social platforms is around 40-45%. However, this can vary widely depending on the length and format of your video content.
8. Referral Traffic
Using Google Analytics, you can see what percentage of your total website traffic is coming from each of your social media channels. This helps you understand which platforms are driving the most valuable traffic and conversions for your business.
9. Cost-Per-Click (CPC) & Cost-Per-Thousand Impressions (CPM)
For marketers running paid social media ads, CPC and CPM are two essential metrics for measuring return on ad spend. CPC refers to the average cost you pay for each click on your ad, while CPM measures the average cost per 1,000 ad impressions.
According to AdStage, the average CPC across all social platforms is $1.72, while the average CPM is $5.12. However, these costs can vary widely depending on your industry, target audience, and ad format.
10. Brand Sentiment
In addition to hard metrics, it‘s important to track qualitative indicators of how people perceive and talk about your brand on social media. Brand sentiment can be measured through social listening tools that track mentions, comments, and customer feedback.
Some key brand sentiment metrics to track include:
- Ratio of positive to negative mentions
- Customer satisfaction score
- Net Promoter Score (NPS)
According to Sprout Social, 72% of consumers who have a positive experience with a brand on social media are likely to recommend that brand to others, underscoring the importance of monitoring and managing brand sentiment.
How to Measure Social Media Metrics
Now that you know which metrics to track, how do you actually measure them? Here are a few key ways to track your social media performance:
Native Analytics
Most social media platforms have built-in analytics dashboards that provide a wealth of data on your posts, audience, and overall performance. These native analytics are a great starting point for tracking key metrics like reach, impressions, engagement rate, and audience growth.
Third-Party Tools
To dive even deeper into your social media metrics and create custom reports, there are a variety of third-party social media analytics tools available. Some popular options include:
- Hootsuite Analytics
- Sprout Social
- Agorapulse
- Keyhole
- Iconosquare
- Snaplytics
Using these tools, you can track metrics across all of your social channels in one place, benchmark your performance against competitors, and create customized dashboards and reports to share with your team or stakeholders.
UTM Parameters
To track the specific impact of your social media efforts on website traffic and conversions, you can use UTM parameters. These are tags added to the end of a URL that allow you to track the source, medium, and campaign of your social media posts in Google Analytics.
By setting up UTM parameters for your social media campaigns, you can see exactly how much traffic and revenue each platform and post is driving, and make data-driven decisions to optimize your strategy.
Creating a Social Media Reporting Dashboard
To make tracking and reporting on social media metrics easier, consider creating a centralized dashboard that pulls in data from all of your social channels and third-party tools. This allows you to easily monitor your key metrics in one place and share progress with your team and stakeholders.
Your social media dashboard might include:
- Overview of key metrics like reach, engagement rate, and audience growth across all platforms
- Breakdown of performance by individual platform and post type
- Top-performing posts and campaigns
- Conversion and ROI data from Google Analytics
- Competitive benchmarking data
- Visual charts and graphs to highlight trends and insights
To create your dashboard, you can use a tool like Google Data Studio, Tableau, or Looker to pull in data from your various social media analytics tools and create custom visualizations.
Emerging Social Media Metrics & Trends to Watch
As social media continues to evolve, so too do the metrics and data points available to marketers. Here are a few emerging social media metrics and trends to keep an eye on in 2024 and beyond:
- Authenticity Metrics – With the rise of influencer marketing and sponsored content, metrics that measure the authenticity and credibility of your social media presence are becoming increasingly important. These might include metrics like sponsored post disclosure rate, influencer engagement rate, and user-generated content volume.
- Social Commerce Metrics – As more businesses use social media to drive direct sales, tracking metrics like product page views, add-to-cart rate, and purchase conversion rate will be critical for optimizing social commerce performance.
- Dark Social Metrics – Dark social refers to the shares and clicks that happen outside of traditional social media platforms, such as through messaging apps, email, and text. Tracking metrics like direct traffic and on-site engagement can help you understand the impact of dark social on your marketing efforts.
- Social Audio Metrics – With the rise of social audio platforms like Clubhouse and Twitter Spaces, new metrics like listener count, average listen time, and conversion rate will become important for measuring the impact of audio content.
The Power of Social Media Metrics
Social media metrics are a powerful tool for understanding your audience, optimizing your content strategy, and driving meaningful business results. By tracking the right metrics and using them to inform your decision-making, you can turn social media into a true growth engine for your brand.
Some key takeaways and action items to keep in mind:
- Focus on metrics that align with your specific business goals and objectives
- Use a combination of native analytics, third-party tools, and UTM parameters to get a comprehensive view of your social media performance
- Create a centralized reporting dashboard to easily monitor and share your progress
- Regularly review your metrics and use insights to optimize your strategy over time
- Stay on top of emerging social media metrics and trends to stay ahead of the curve
With the right approach to social media metrics, you can maximize the impact of your efforts and achieve real, measurable results for your business in 2024 and beyond.
