Who is my audience?

Your audience is a two-way street. Your content should dictate what your audience is, and simultaneously, your audience should dictate your content. Your audience is made up of all of the accounts that you reach. However, reach is a very vague metric and doesn’t tell you specific details about the people who see your content. Demographic data is a great way to gain deeper insight on who your audience is. Age, gender, and location are the primary details that are offered.

Am I doing better than my competitors?

Likes, comments, and shares are a great indicator of how you are performing against your competitors. However, many external variables impact our understanding of this. You may be in direct competition with another account, but you could have different goals/strategies that you have deemed important for your mission. If a similar account is outperforming you, I would pay attention to their post-times and hashtags and try to replicate it to a degree.

What are people saying about my brand?

This is much more of a qualitative data point. Examining comment sections, direct messages, and shares will give some of the best insight into this. Of these, shares are the only quantifiable metric, however, it does not directly tell you what people are saying it indicates a level of social relevancy. Comment sections and DM’s will help you get the best understanding of what people are saying about your content and product. In some cases, even checking relevant hashtags could give you more insight to how people are talking about your brand.

When is the best time to publish?

Generally speaking, the best time to post is the time that the majority of your followers are active/online. Another thing to consider is the audience’s responsiveness. For example, you might have the most active followers in the morning, but they might not be responsive because they are preparing for their day. Driving engagement early will help ensure that the algorithm will place your post higher up on inactive followers’ timelines whenever they are active next. Engagement rate and click-through rates could also be compared across different post times to identify which times are best. 

Which content does my audience enjoy the most?

Like count is an obvious indicator of this. However, with the presence of the algorithm driving who sees it, if the post gains a high amount of likes, it could be for the simple fact that the algorithm showed it to more people. The best way to tell what content your audience enjoys the most is if they engage with the post on a deeper level. This could be as simple as watching or viewing the post multiple times. Comparing impressions vs. reach will indicate how much your audience is going back to your content. Also engagement rate and click-through rate is should be considered because more enjoyable content will create stronger reactions from your audience.

Which social media network is the best for my brand?

For this, you have to consider how your audience wants to consume your content and also what medium best communicates the message you are trying to push. All of the major social media platforms have evolved to consist of multiple different mediums, but the platform’s original purpose can help indicate what content types would be advantageous on them. For example, Instagram is image and video centric while twitter is more focussed on text. Deciding which platform is ultimately the best, should involve trying out different platforms and seeing your audiences response.

How can I have a better performance on social media?

In my opinion, the best way to perform better is to truly understand that social media is a place of constant change. You have to stay true to yourself and your brand while consistently trying new things. Without looking at any research or articles, I can give you a money-back-guarentee  that for any social media account what leads to success today, will NOT lead to success in a year from now. Closely analyizing all of the metrics that these platforms have to offer gives you the chance to understand if you are moving in the right direction. Identifying which metrics are the most important to your cause will help you create a more refined plan going into a future of uncertainty. Social media campaigns fail all the time. Your success and failures will expose what your audience truly desires.