Over the last decade, social networks have evolved exponentially. They are no longer just a novelty or something that helps a company market a little bit; they are powerful tools that allow us to reach our target audience and grow our small businesses especially when social media analytics joined the party.
Additionally, social media can be used by businesses and brands of all sizes. Therefore, in this article, we will make recommendations to help you if you have a small business so that you can get the most out of analytics and statistics available on social networks.
The goal is to understand them thoroughly so that you can utilize the data to your advantage. It only makes sense that we make decisions more often based on data than intuition when these platforms offer so much and are capable of so many things.
It is true that most social media platforms offer detailed statistics and reports on how the content you post is being received by your audience, but how many small businesses actually use this information? Not many.
Because of this, we invite you to explore these five ways in which you can use social media analytics to enhance your business.
Here are 5 tips on how to make the most of your social media analytics.
1. Discover the statistics of your clients
You need to know that social media isn't just about making beautiful and engaging images or videos, writing well-written text, and posting it according to a content calendar or when you find a moment to do so.
There's also more to it than just looking to see how many likes, comments, and shares you get. Those aren't the only metrics you should use. The key is determining the right metrics for your audience and then using them to learn as much as you can about them.
An analysis of your Facebook or Twitter audience statistics, for example, will give you more insight into interests, behaviors, connections, and demographics. As a result, you can build more targeted marketing personas and create segments of your audience.
You can also use social media analytics to understand what your customers search for, how they respond to your products or services and decide when to launch new products.
Your pie chart will help you understand the gender split in your audience, and you can tailor your messages accordingly. For example, if in your network you have 50% females, you can consider new launches, colors, or any other changes that might be needed.
2. Identify the channels with the best results
You can advertise your business on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest, but being a small business may not be the best choice. You must take advantage of channels where your target audience and your competition are active.
Having a presence in multiple channels is ideal as long as it's manageable for you and that you can constantly contribute with quality content.
Identify which channels are performing well and create a strategy for them individually.
Of course, you should stick with the channels that produce the best results and discard those that do not.
3. Create relevant content
Your social media content must be relevant and impactful to your audience. It should not just be interesting, but also useful and original. This is another point with which social media analytics can help.
In the event that you obtain statistics, you will be able to determine what your audience consumes the most and how you can create content that is more similar and intelligent to what your audience consumes.
Consider looking at what kinds of content your audience consumes or what topics resonate with them and use this knowledge to optimize your social media marketing and generate posts that speak to them.
Furthermore, you can also apply these tips to your blog calendar (if you have one) when you're planning content. For instance, if a social media post was well received, why not expand on it and write a longer blog post?
4. Analyze the competition
Keeping an eye on competitors will allow you to continue growing. It may be that you have a very robust social media strategy, but it costs very little to see what our competitors are doing.
In either case, you can do a manual investigation of their social media accounts to get information about them. Make a list of four to five competitors that you want to monitor, and use a social media measurement tool to get information about them.
We need to know on which platforms they are active, what they post, how many people engage with them, and how they respond to comments.
In case you are manually doing this, it's recommended to use a data visualization tool that presents the information correctly and uses the data to improve your strategy.
5. Measure audience sentiment
Your brand, product, or service is associated with your audience's sentiment. How do your colors and logo tell them about you? How are your messages received and how do you sound to them? To know the answers you have to monitor the conversations on social media platforms.
You should measure customer sentiment because it will tell you what your customers think about you. Analyzing this will help you:
- Create content that customers want, then offer it to them.
- Reveal challenges or pain points that customers have and rectify them.
- Identify and prevent potential crises.
As a marketer, remember that everything is influenced by emotions. What do your followers feel about your brand? What emotions do you evoke in them? What do they want to do after seeing your posts? If you measure and you get exactly the reaction you wanted, you are on the right track; Otherwise, you need to make adjustments.
What can we conclude?
Creating a social media strategy based on intuition and guesswork is a waste of time and resources. To create content that creates engagement and leverages your social media presence in a way that allows your small business to grow, you need to make data an integral part of the planning process.
Even if you have a tight budget, you can opt for low-cost or free social media analytics tools that are helpful in tracking your progress and supporting analytics effectively.
No matter which path you choose, it's essential that you start incorporating analytics into your marketing strategy as soon as possible.
