One thing that is hard to do sometimes is to interpret what actions mean on social media. The fact is, not all actions even matter. It’s important to know what matters and what doesn’t. It’s also important to know what everything means or potentially means based on other factors and the goals you set. Below are some important questions to consider.
* Leads – How many new leads did you get from the action you performed? If you set up a freebie guide and marketed that, how many people signed up and downloaded it? If people downloaded a freebie, how many who did that took further action?
* Engagement – When you make a post, how many people respond in some way to the engagement? What was the point of the engagement? Did the audience do what you thought they’d do?
* Reach – How many people shared your post? How far did the post reach, meaning how many people laid eyes on it and shared it? If a lot of people shared it, you might consider adding more content like that.
* Impressions – When you boost a post on Facebook, how many impressions did it make versus how many people saw it, shared it, and engaged with it? What did they do afterwards?
* Funnels – With your analytics software you can set up a means to testing out your funnels to find out which type of funnel works best. This can help you identify holes in your plans to reach your goals.
* Unique Visits – It’s important to know how many unique visits you get each day, where they came from, and what they did after they got there. Did they convert? Did they sign up for anything? Did they download something? Did they search your site?
* Repeat Visits – Having a lot of repeat visitors is a sign of a healthy site with a lot of content for the audience to read and look at. What is the percentage of repeat visitors versus new traffic? If it’s low, what can you change? Are you targeting your audience correctly?
* Bounces – Are people coming to your website and then leaving before doing anything? If this rate is high, then that means something is wrong. Find out where the links are coming from and try to determine if the content is badly targeted or not.
* Exits – How and what page are people using to exit your website, and if they came from social media where did they come from? Can you pinpoint what is making them leave? What you can do to encourage them to stay or to convert them in some way, for example by using an exit pop-under?
* Time on Site – How long are your visitors staying on your page and what exactly are they doing while they are there? What do they read the most? What do they watch the most? What exactly are they doing that keeps them on the social media site? If they’re only there a short time, what did they do?
* Growth – How fast are the visitors to your social media page/platform improving each month? Is it going up or down? What actions affect growth? How can you do more of those things to keep growing your website and your influence?
* Response – When you create a post, how long does it take your audience to respond and what type of responses do you get? Are they commenting, liking, sharing, retweeting and so forth?
* Inbound Links – How many others are sharing your social networks and causing people to link to your social media networks? Who is sharing your platform more and why?
Finally, the only thing that really matters in the scheme of things is conversions. If you’re not meeting your conversion goals, then you need to readjust. Remember that conversions are what you determine that they are. You may be tracking email sign-ups, clicks or sales. It’s up to you what a conversion means.