Each social media platform has its own free suite of analytics tools, which reports a variety of data to discover meaningful patterns. This aggregation of data tells our quantitative story and helps to inform our content decisions, strengthen content strategy and create effective content for our campus community.
Algorithm – In the context of social media, an algorithm is the system each social platform uses to determine which content is displayed to its users at any given time. Maintaining high engagement increases the likelihood of the algorithm prioritizing your content.
Engagement – Engagement tracks any interactions your posts receive. Reactions, replies and shares are all forms of engagement.
Impressions – The total number of times your content was displayed in a social user’s feed
Insights – The key performance indicators that track how your content performs on each social platform
Listening – Comparing and contrasting your brands digital presence to competitors
Monitoring – Reviewing and assessing your brands digital presence
Reach – The total number of times your content was viewed and engaged with
Hashtag – tags are user-generated and feature a word or phrase preceded by a # sign. Hashtags help organize conversations centered on a particular topic, they are also a vehicle for promoting a campaign or cause.
Tag – Tags are also referred to as mentions. Anytime your account is mentioned, or you mention other accounts that are considered a tag or mention
Trending Topic – Conversations that are driving a lot of dialogue and engagement on social media.
Thread – A string of messages in response to one main post or tweet
As of July 1, 2021 Facebook retired Facebook Analytics to consolidate business tools. However, the platform does offer other measurement solutions for data review and analysis.
You can manage messages, posts and insights via Audience Insights.
Instagram is a part of Facebook’s portfolio, because of this you are able to review analytics natively or via Facebook, but your account must be a business or creator account.
Tap into your accounts’ performances or performance-by-post. Instagram Insights allows you to view comprehensive analytics up to the previous month, but you are able to filter by certain days within that time frame.
Pro tips
Certain features are prohibited depending on your account type. For example, users with a business account will not have access to the licensed music library.
While stories only last for 24 hours before expiring, you can view insights on past stories for up to seven days after they’re created.
Twitter generates monthly reports that provide key metrics including but not limited to top tweets and engagement.
Twitter activity is also viewable via the Twitter Analytics—and you have the capability to filter by date, performance and other variables.
Linkedin Page Analytics reports its data via three categories: visitor analytics, update analytics and follower analytics. Visitor analytics, Update analytics and Follower analytics.
Pro tip
For some metrics, there isn’t much flexibility for reviewing LinkedIn data beyond 30 days. For the most accurate and current data we recommend reviewing it in real time.