Social media has become an essential aspect of digital marketing. That said, it’s vital that your social media performance is maximized, and this can be done by knowing and understanding what’s currently working and what’s not, what’s encouraging people to engage, and what’s driving clicks.
This post aims to explain the steps of effective social media reporting, including the key metrics to measure and how to interpret your results.
Know who the stakeholders are
The first step to social media reporting is identifying who will receive your reports. This includes senior management, PR, marketing, sales, customer support, and demand gen. Once you’ve identified who they are, customize your reports according to the team’s guidelines.
Know what your goals are
Ask yourself: what is the goal of your reports? Is it to show how your business is doing? To know the performance of your business?
Reports can be done in three categories:
- 1. Research reports - Finding insights and data for a specific trend or topic by social listening
- 2. One-off reports - Perform analysis during a one-off event, campaign, or product launch, and find what’s effective and what’s not.
- 3. Regular reports - Look at key metrics to determine your progress on social media, such as SOV, positive feedback, and follower increase.
Use the SMART method.
You should be able to identify the questions that would benefit your company and have an answer for each. For example, your weekly report could address how many subscriptions have been gained per post or week. A question for a one-off campaign could be: how many people signed up for a free demo?
For the uninitiated, SMART means:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Achievable
- Relevant
- Time-limited
Remember these points when presenting your reports.
Select the types of metrics to track
You don’t have to report everything - only the necessary ones for your business. Your choices should depend on your marketing strategy, who will receive your reports, and which social networks you use.
Your metrics should tell you the information you need, significantly affecting your decisions regarding current and future campaigns.
Some metrics that you should use include:
- Volume
- Impressions and reach
- Leads
- Conversions
- Bounce and click-through rate
- Content
- Audience
- Engagement
- Lessons learned
- Share of voice
- Executive summary
Select social media reporting tools.
Your goals and priorities must be laid out before using social media reporting tools. Before choosing, ask the provider these questions:
- Is the vendor tied to a specific social network?
- What are the data sources used?
- How does data perform in terms of quality?
- What are their plans for the future?
- Do they have excellent customer support?
Set a time frame for your reports.
Metrics have different tracking frequencies -- some need to be monitored daily, while others you can do yearly, quarterly, monthly, or weekly.
Product launches, seasonal holidays, events, and one-off campaigns should always have social media reporting results.
Present your report effectively.
Detailed reports won’t be remembered or understood, and boring reports won’t receive your desired attention. To make your report effective, utilize charts, graphs, word clouds, and the like to make it more exciting and attractive to stakeholders.
You should also include examples of the posts you’ve been tracking, short descriptions, and highlights of the analysis and takeaways.
Why Social Media Reporting is Important
Presenting the results of your social media report can be pretty challenging because you’ll never know how the report will be received by the board and if they can really understand how metrics work. You cannot just assume that you will understand why you’re tracking social media activity and response regularly, so you should do your best to show proof of your labor.
With an excellent social media report, your goals will be identified more accessible, as well as your methods and the success of each report. You may notice some misses here and there, but your report will explain how they should be fixed.
