So, you’ve snagged your first social media marketing account, or you’re running your company’s internal social media account, and you want to measure your impact.

Where to start with all the different metrics that Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Google give you?

How often do you need to update your clients or boss, what metrics should you use, and how do you explain to them the importance of these measurements?

Where to start with all the different metrics that Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Google give you?

Or maybe you are the business owner and you’re wondering what you should expect from your social media account manager. What metrics are most important to measure their success? 

You’ve come to the right place! We’ll go over the ins and outs and the dos and don’ts of researching and writing insightful monthly reports for your social media marketing strategy, which are vital to growing your online impact.

Without clear insights and reporting, you’re shooting in the dark.

Step One: Know The Target KPIs

Step One is to make sure that, as the account manager, you know what your client values most and how that translates into the different metrics available to you.

We suggest meeting with your client to understand their goals and what KPIs (key performance indicators) are most important to the success and growth of their business.

Pro Tip: A KPI, or key performance indicator, is a performance measurement. KPIs evaluate the success of an organization or of a particular activity in which it engages. 

On social media, KPIs could be new followers, reach, engagement, etc. On websites, they could be new bookings, contact-form submissions, or product sales. 

Knowing what KPIs are the most important to your client is crucial, as this will help you understand what kind of content to create and push.

It’s not going to look great if new followers are pouring in, but your client’s sales are down (if that is most important to them).

To combat this, we’ve already written a great guide on How to Create a Powerful Social Media Marketing Strategy. Be sure to check it out!

Knowing what KPIs are the most important to your client is crucial, as this will help you understand what kind of content to create and push.

Step Two: Understanding the Metrics

Now that we know what the client’s target is, you can create a strategy using focused content to meet those goals and then gather data on the outcome. You will want to collect not only social media metrics, but also website and app analytics.

They measure the performance of the campaigns and the ongoing content that is posted, the emails sent to subscribers, and the impact that the web content has on search traffic acquisition.

These metrics are crucial, as they will tell clients that the money they are investing in their social media marketing strategy is not only paying off, but has a good ROI. 

Pro Tip: ROI, or return on investment, is the ratio between net profit and investment cost. A high ROI means the investment’s gains compare favorably to its cost (this is what you are aiming for!)

Knowing what the different social media metrics are and what they mean is half the battle, so we’ve made an easy guide to understanding them. 

Knowing what the different social media metrics are and what they mean is half the battle, so we’ve made an easy guide to understanding them. 

Here are some different social media metrics and what they tell us:

Social media metrics: 

• Page Followers – how many people have followed the page
• Page Likes – how many people have liked the page 
• Impressions – how many times a post shows up in someone’s timeline
• Post Reach – how many people have seen a post since it was published
• Engagement Rate – the number of engagement actions (e.g. likes, shares, comments) a post receives relative to your total number of followers

Website metrics:

• Click-Through Rate (“CTR”) – how often people click on the call-to-action link in your post
• Cost-Per-Click (“CPC”) – the amount you pay per unique click on your sponsored social media post
• Revenue & Website Traffic – how much revenue your posts have made from links to your website

Note that all of the essential analytics tools are integrated into your website, social media site, or mobile app. In our free template below, we’ve included a cheat sheet of where to find these. 

Pro Tip: use these must-have metric tools: 

1. Google Analytics
2. Facebook Pixel
3. Conversion Tracking and Ecommerce Tracking

Pro Tip:  Be sure to use UTM tags to track impacts of the different sources, campaigns, and content. 

Once the social media metrics are decided on, you can begin retrieving the data and creating the monthly report. 

Step Three: Creating the Report

When writing up the monthly report for your client, you’ll want to keep a few things in mind: clarity, conciseness, and consistency.

Your report’s clarity is immensely important, as you are the social media expert, not your client (that’s why they hired you).

Write in clear, straightforward terms that they can understand. While you are gathering your data, make sure you are cross-checking the numbers – for example, between Buffer and Facebook or Twitter – so that you can give your client a well-rounded report. 

Write in clear, straightforward terms that they (your client) can understand.

Being concise is critical, because your client probably doesn’t have a ton of time to waste trying to decipher a technical dissertation. Write as transparently and poignantly as possible so that your client can easily and quickly grasp what you are trying to tell them and know that their platform is in good hands.

Being concise is critical, because your client probably doesn’t have a ton of time to waste trying to decipher a technical dissertation.

Each month’s numbers should be compared to the last month’s numbers so it’s easy to see an increase or decrease for that particular metric. After you record the data for them to see at the top of the report, write up a conclusion at the bottom summarizing what these numbers mean and the importance of them. 

Consistency is crucial as, over time, it will build a bond of trust between you and your client. Some simple ways to stay consistent are picking the metrics you will stick to following and reporting on, giving yourself a deadline to send the report each month, and using the same format for the report every time. 

Consistency is crucial as, over time, it will build a bond of trust between you and your client.

Here is our favorite format (download the free template to get in-depth examples):

1. Title
2. Intro
3. Section for each channel – Facebook, IG, Twitter
4. Conclusion with improvement and action points

We know it’s a lot to research and create. That’s why we’re sharing with you today our favorite metrics in our Social Media Report Template.

Get our Free Template here!

Need more help getting started on your social media platforms? We’d love to support you! Feel free to contact us, and we will get you on the right track in no time.