In today’s world of digital-first marketing, social media is king.
A report released at the start of 2022 showed that there are now 4.62 billion social media users — equivalent to 58% of the world’s population.
What’s more, over 80% of users said that social media significantly impacted their purchasing decisions. With people being stuck indoors due to the pandemic, more and more customers have turned to social media as their primary way of engaging with their favorite brands and products.
This presents an exciting opportunity for businesses to engage with their current customers, reach new ones, and market products and services. Given that nearly everyone has a mobile phone and over half of the world has a social media account, you’re missing a trick if social media advertising isn’t part of your marketing strategy.
But just throwing a bunch of marketing babble into the social media void isn’t going to cut it these days, you need to be tracking and optimizing your approach.
And that’s where social media KPIs come in.
What are social media KPIs?
You’ve probably heard of KPIs — or key performance indicators — before. They’re essentially a measure of how your business is performing in relation to specific goals. Things like the number of sales per month, number of new customers per quarter, or lead conversion %.
So, what does this have to do with social media? We’re glad you asked!
Social media KPIs are exactly what they sound like: they’re a set of metrics used to track how effective your social media marketing is.
If you know how to use them, social media KPIs can allow you to analyze your company’s presence across social media platforms — to see what works and what doesn’t.
Why track social media KPIs?
Honestly, there are loads of reasons why you should be tracking social media KPIs. But you’re in a rush, so here are the highlights.
- To measure progress
- To identify and analyze trends
- To evaluate and make adjustments to your marketing strategy
- To identify potential opportunities and leads
- To measure your company’s visibility and reach
- Because data is fun!
Okay, that last one may be a bit of a stretch. But the long and short of it is, the more you know about how your company is performing on social media, the better you can optimize and refine your approach to reach as many potential customers as possible.
What are the important social media KPIs for CPGs?
So, now you know what social media KPIs are and why it’s important to track them, the question becomes: which social media KPIs should I be tracking?
There are so many different KPIs that you can look at, all the way from high-level overview metrics down to the really granular ones. It can be overwhelming when trying to decide exactly what you’re going to track, so why not begin with the following?
Here are the top 5 social media KPIs every CPG brand should be tracking.
Reach
Reach is a measure of how many of your followers have seen your latest social media post since it went up. This will be affected by things like the time of day you post, what you post, and how engaging your content is.
By measuring your reach, you can get an idea of what kind of content interests and engages your audience.
Social share of voice
This measures the number of times your brand is mentioned on social media, compared with the number of times your competitors are mentioned. In short, it gives you a measure of how relevant your brand is in your market.
Tracking this KPI can give an indication of your market share and how people feel about your brand compared to your competitors.
Engagement
Engagement measures, well, the number of times your post has been interacted with! Kinda speaks for itself, doesn’t it? And yet, although this is a pretty basic metric, looking at the number of likes or favorites your posts are getting can give you a really good idea of what kind of content your audience enjoys.
It can also help you to figure out when the best time to post is. Get more likes when you post in the evening? Maybe you should focus on scheduling your content to drop after work. Or maybe you’ve got a lot of early birds in your audience who like to enjoy your content with their morning coffee. The number of likes can give you a good idea of when your audience is active.
It’s also worth noting that each platform has a different way of basically saying the same thing. Facebook has ‘Likes,’ Twitter has ‘Retweets,’ and so on. The same lessons apply.
Many platforms also have some kind of reaction system. Let’s say you get hundreds of reactions, but if they’re all angry faces, then perhaps you should steer clear of that type of content moving forward!
Amplification rate
This is how often your audience is sharing your content with their friends. If you’re putting out content that makes your audience think, “This is cool, I’ll share it with my friends,” then you know you’re onto a winner.
For one, a high amplification rate suggests that your content is reaching more people. And better still, potential customers are far more likely to trust recommendations from friends and family on social media than they are a brand-sponsored post.
This means more sales for you, which handily brings us onto our final social media KPI…
Conversion rate
… Or how often your social media content is doing its job, namely driving sales and promoting your business. This is basically a measure of how often your audience is doing what you’re asking them to do in your posts.
If you put out a post suggesting people buy your new product, how many of them are actually popping it into their baskets and then buying it? If you’re asking people to check out your blog, how many of them are taking a look for themselves?
Tracking your conversion rates gives you a really good idea of how engaging and effective your content is.
How can I track my CPG’s social media KPIs?
It’s all well and good knowing which KPIs you should be tracking, but how do you actually go about doing that?
There are two main ways to track your social media KPIs.
In-platform
Nearly all social media platforms offer a way of tracking how your content is performing on their site. These come in the form of things like Instagram Insights, Facebook Insights, Twitter Analytics, LinkedIn Analytics, YouTube Analytics, etc. They have different names and slightly different ways of working, but they more or less all do the same thing.
These services are free (although they can have paid aspects) and provide a great way to keep on top of tracking all of your important KPIs.
Third-party software
There are also a ton of third-party solutions for tracking your social media KPIs. These usually come with some kind of cost, but they can offer you the tools to really supercharge your business through social media.
Although definitely not a necessity, if you’re looking to take your social media game to the next level, maybe consider investing in some outside help.
Or, you could check out the Buffalo Market blog for loads more tips and tricks on how to grow your CPG business.
We specialize in good for you, good for the earth CPGs and distribution. And believe us, after so many years in the business, we’ve learned the methods that work. Come on over and take a look for all of your CPG marketing and growth needs. We’ll see you there!
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