12 Key Performance Indicators for Social Media Marketing

We all have been preached to many times that social media can be a powerful tool for businesses. The fact is that many ideas have started and grown into global brands via such platforms.

It is one thing having a presence and another growing a loyal and engaging fan base. There are many articles out there giving advice and tips on social media, however maybe not enough like this one, that focuses on metrics and the key performance indicators you can use to measure and track your efforts. I was making several pages of notes regarding social media for a large UK brand and part of it was this — Four pillars (content, audience, brand story and Marketing ROI) each having three parts — that I thought I’d share and indeed ask for your comment and suggestions on too. I believe these to be simple enough for any size company to use. I’d also love to hear any KPI’s you use not mentioned here too.

Social KPI’s — Four pillars

Content

• Engagement Rate
• Owned Reach
• Theme Performance

Audience

• Growth Rate
• Engagement Rate Over Time
• Key Influencers

Brand Story

• See all tagged content
• Most influential content
• Earned (organic reach)

Marketing ROI

• Influencer ROI
• Native ad ROI
• Audience conversation

1. Engagement Rate — Interactions (likes, comments etc) divided by Total followers.
2. Owned Reach — Number of followers you can engage with or number of potential impressions.
3. Campaign/Theme Performance — Set end goals and micro targets for determining success. Track and optimize as you go.
4. Growth Rate — Followers added relative to base.
5. Average Engagement Rate — (total post engagements, divide by audience size, over time)
6. Key Followers — How influential is audience and influencers/brand-advocates
7. Tagged Content — #’s and mentions/Tags
8. Influential Content — Fan content that has the most reach
9. Earned/Organic Reach — Critical to Brand awareness and audience growth. Organic reach of number of people who sees content featuring brand.
10. Influencer ROI — Ambassadors/advocates, gifts, giveaways, paid posts. Must measure (ACTUAL) influence before + metrics (reach, engagement, referrals, new followers, etc) after.
11. Native Ad ROI — Impressions, Engagement, new followers, page views. All depends of what is trying to be achieved. Awareness? Or sales? Or brand page growth?
12. Audience conversation — CTR, Time on site, conversion, re-target segmentation.

I’d love to hear your comments — any suggestions, thoughts on the above?