Unlocking Hidden Content Opportunities
3 easy steps on how you could perform a content audit on social media
Social media auditing can sound daunting, but it is actually a lot simpler than it seems.
It is best to conduct one at regular intervals, perhaps monthly or quarterly, so that you are on top of the performance of your page and can quickly implement changes where needed.
Doing a content audit can help brands identify gaps in content and explore often overlooked opportunities for content. If you’re new to social media auditing, then here’s a good place to start.
1. Identify Key Metrics to Track
The first step to performing an audit is to first identify the key metrics that you want to track and use as a key measure of performance. Typically, this would be pegged to the KPI or objectives you want to achieve for your page.
For instance, if your primary focus is to build brand awareness and eyeballs for your page, then an important metric would be reach and impressions.
If content resonance is important for your page, then tracking engagement and engagement rate might be more salient.
You might to also consider tracking link clicks and click-through rate if you want to drive traffic from Facebook to your site.
When looking across the industry, the common practice is to track metrics such as:
- Followers
- Reach
- Impressions
- Engagement
- Engagement Rate
- View Rate
- Click-through Rate
Beyond these metrics, you could also look into format-specific metrics as well, which could help complement the metrics above and identify some overlooked areas.
For instance, Facebook video-specific metrics that are useful in understanding retention are Average Watch Time, 1-Minute Views and Drop-off Mark. These would be helpful in determining the ideal video length for your page and in identifying videos that are engaging to your audience.
Once narrowed down, a good practice is to compare your page performance to industry benchmarks to understand how your page has been faring. According to Rival IQ’s 2021 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report, the median Facebook Average Engagement Rate per Post across all industries is 0.08%, while for Instagram the median is 0.98%.
2. Analyse Top and Poor Performing Content
Once you have narrowed down the metrics to focus on, you could then rank them in decreasing order of performance either by Engagement, Engagement Rate or Reach.
You could then compare the posts which have performed well against those which have been performing poorly, and then identify trends and form hypotheses for their performance.
Another approach you could take is to sort them into their various formats such as static, video, album, carousel or poll posts, and compare across formats or within the format itself. This approach can help uncover formats which work best in engaging your audience and will also be helpful in informing your content mix and strategy.
Also, analysing the content performance based on the audience they’ve been targeted to, is another method that is useful in understanding how engaging and relatable the page is to the audience. For instance, some brands tailor their content by demographics while others might craft content based on psychographics or personas.
3. Look into Sentiment Received
Most importantly, delve into the comments section. While we might find that posts that resonate well with the audience draw high engagement and reach, sometimes this might not be always true.
At times, posts that churn the highest engagement, might not necessarily be those that generate the most positive responses. And this is where sentiment plays an important role in providing a clearer understanding of performance.
A post might go viral not because the content struck a chord with the audience, but perhaps because it touched on a topic of controversy or that it has a strong pool of detractors just as it has ardent advocates.
So, do be mindful in balancing engagement and sentiment received.
Aside to that, monitoring and tracking sentiment received are helpful in shaping your community guidelines, and in ensuring that there is healthy discourse on the page.
Positive comments and feedback are a good sign that content has resonated well with the audience, whereas negative comments might mean that a content overhaul might be what’s ahead.
Tracking questions and queries received in the comments as well as through direct messages is a great way to churn content ideas, especially since it provides an opportunity to answer commonly asked questions or dish out fun facts.
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Hopefully, these 3 simple steps can help you to easily dissect your page’s content performance and provide some ideas for your future content calendars.
Good luck! :)
