Social media marketing only promises long-term success if you can measure and optimize your activities. There are also a variety of key performance indicators (KPIs) that support you in monitoring and reporting. You can find out which of the 21 most important social media KPIs are in this post.
Social Media KPI: What is a Key Performance Indicator?
A key performance indicator is a measurable value that can be used to determine a company’s performance. KPIs exist at different levels of the company. In social media, these are key performance indicators of individual processes in social media marketing. Marketers use them to evaluate campaigns and provide information on whether the business goals have been achieved or not.
The 21 most important social media metrics at a glance
Whether Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn – successful campaigns require proper reporting, and their basis is essential KPIs. Below we have listed the most relevant social media metrics for you.
Range
Contribution reach is the number of users who have seen a particular post. Our tip: Compare the reach and impressions of your posts. This allows you to see how many people you could reach in total and how many users the post was displayed more than once.
Number of shares/retweets
This KPI indicates how many times your posts have been shared. The higher this number, the better: By sharing posts, you benefit from the reach of your followers and increase your brand awareness.
Share of Voice (SoV)
The SoV calculates how often a brand is mentioned compared to the competition. Value serves as a measure of your brand’s visibility while enabling competitive analysis. The metric is usually expressed as a percentage.
The formula is SoV = sum of own mentions ÷ sum of words of all relevant competitors) x 100
Engagement Rate (ER)
The engagement rate, also known as the interaction rate, measures how many of your followers interact with your posts – for example, in the form of likes, shares, or comments. The larger it is, the more likely it is to achieve a high return on investment.
The interaction rate helps compare your performance on different social media platforms. In influencer marketing, ER is also a help in selecting suitable creators: A high value indicates a large “real” followership.
The formula is: ER = (number of engagements ÷ number of followers) x 100
Number of followers
Although the number of followers is no longer significant in times of purchased fakes, it is still considered a valuable indication of the awareness and reach of a profile. However, much more important than the number itself is its development within a certain period, i.e., how quickly or slowly your followers have grown.
Number of comments
Comments under posts can increase your reach and are a popular KPI. A high number of words is desired, but not everything: Because more than the quantity, it depends on the quality of the statements.
Tonality of comments
A KPI that should not be underestimated is the tonality with which comments or posts mentioning your company are written. It gives you valuable information on how your brand is perceived by users. Especially in branding or reputation management, this qualitative metric plays a significant role.
Number of likes
This KPI is used to measure emoji responses to a post. It’s a good idea to keep an eye on this number over time and across multiple positions, as this will help you gain important insights into the quality of your posts.
Number of video views
This metric is crucial if you want to produce and promote video content. It indicates how many times a video has been watched. In the respective social media channels guidelines, you can read when a video view is counted as such.
Social Media Return on Investment (SROI)
The SROI helps you plan social media campaigns and measure their success. It is calculated from the income generated and the amount invested.
The formula is: SROI = (Total Profit – Total Investment) ÷ Total Investment.
An example: You earned 1,000 euros with an ad and invested 500 euros in it. This results in a social ROI of 1 percent.
Return on Ad Spend (ROAS)
ROAS is a simple but important social media KPI for determining profit from advertisements. To do this, the entire profit of a specific channel is divided by the costs you have invested in that channel over the same period of time. This makes it relatively easy to determine whether ads on Channel X are lucrative for you or not.
The formula is ROAS = advertising profit ÷ advertising costs.
Click Through Rate (CTR)
Click-through rate, or CTR, is the number of clicks on an ad relative to total reach. For example, if an ad is displayed 100 times and clicked ten times, the click-through rate is 10 percent.
The formula is: CTR = clicks ÷ total reach x 100
Conversion rate
The conversion rate is an important indicator for the sales of social media measures. It indicates the percentage of visitors who make a conversion. Traditionally, it is used for the performance of websites, but it can also measure the success of social media campaigns, for example.
The formula is: Conversion Rate = (conversions ÷ interactions) x 100
Lead-to-Deal Conversion Rate
Not every conversion automatically leads to a deal. Therefore, in addition to the conversion rate, there is also the so-called lead-to-deal conversion rate. This KPI shows the conversion rate of leads into deals, i.e., into actual sales. The higher this rate, the better.
The formula is: Lead-to-Deal Conversion Rate = (Deals ÷ Leads) x 100
Cost per Click (CPC)
This metric calculates how much a click on an ad costs. This is especially helpful if you want to compare several ads with each other. With a high CPC, you should try to improve your conversion rate or adjust the ad.
The formula is: CPC = advertising costs ÷ clicks
Cost per Lead (CPL)
Similar to the CPC, this KPI measures the cost of your ads per lead. If this number is very high, you should either optimize the ad or turn it off.
The formula is: CPL = advertising costs ÷ leads
Cost per mille (CPM)
The cost-per-mille key figure is used for paid media and is referred to in German as the thousand-contact price (CPM). This indicates how expensive an ad is in order to reach exactly one thousand users. Basically, this KPI helps to compare platforms and ads and thus find out where you can reach the most users at the lowest cost.
The formula is: CPM = (advertising costs ÷ reach) x 1000
Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)
Building customer trust and brand loyalty are among the biggest challenges facing a company. An important metric in this area is customer lifetime value. It represents the average value that a customer has for a company over the entire duration of the customer relationship.
To put it more simply: Loyal customers who have been diligently shopping with you for years increase your sales and have a high CLV.
Frequency of Facebook Ads
This KPI calculates how often users have seen an ad on average. One could assume that a high frequency is positive, but this is not the case: If someone is shown the same ad over and over again, the ad may be blocked or reported as uninteresting.
Impressions
The number of impressions indicates how often a certain post was displayed to users in the newsfeed. To be distinguished from this is the reach, which indicates how many people have seen the post in total.
Net Promoter Score (NPS)
This metric is used to measure a company’s customer satisfaction. The NPS is conducted as part of an NPS survey in which customers are divided into three categories based on their answers: detractors (critics), indifferent, and promoters (promoters). The NPS value then results from the difference between promoters and detractors.
Conclusion: KPIs for social media is critical to success
Many companies have already firmly established social media marketing in the marketing mix. Accordingly, careful monitoring of activities by means of appropriate KPIs is important. Only by collecting relevant key figures can you assess whether specific marketing strategies have been successful and whether your business goals have been achieved. In addition, KPIs help to plan and control your future measures in social networks.
