The Importance Of Engagement On Social Media and Measuring It
Social media engagement is basically any type of action people take once they are exposed to your content and the way they interact with it. This means that engagement is not necessarily one consolidated metric but instead is based on a number of different actions such as clicks, likes, shares, comments, replies, etc.
The size of your audience on social media doesn’t matter if no one is paying attention. In fact, we’ll go so far as to say that how many followers you have doesn’t really matter. Wouldn’t you rather have a small but real and relevant audience than a large one composed of random people not interested in engaging? You want to be followed by people who are interested in your posts, involved in the community you’re trying to reach and share compelling content of their own.
Impressions and engagement are considered most important when measuring social media. Both create brand awareness, trust and reach, which in turn converts users into consumers. The more relevant and real your followers are, the better the engagement from them will be. It’s this conversion that is critical.
Don’t measure social media just for the sake of having metrics. Instead, measure your social activities so that you can learn what’s successful, what isn’t and how you can improve. Before measuring every single tweet, photo and Facebook comment posted about your brand, first think about your goals with social media. Generate a list of what you’re trying to achieve from all your social media efforts. What are you trying to accomplish or gain through these social channels? And which channels are most relevant to those goals? Figure out what you can improve, make changes and then measure some more. Check back in with the goals you set initially and make sure your metrics actually help you address those goals.
So stop worrying about how many followers you have and start thinking about what really matters. How can you achieve more engagement with your social media posts? Spend some time getting to know the best times that work for your content and your audience to find when you’re likely to get the biggest response. It takes more than just a lot of followers.