Gain Insight with Facebook Analytics

Did you know that Facebook has – as of December 2014 – more than 890 million daily active users? This offers marketers even more opportunities than ever before in terms of engagement, which is exciting but also puts the pressure on you to not only harness this opportunity but to even more closely tailor your content to the demands of Facebook.

According to Simply Measured, this means taking three major steps:

• Plan it. Setting out specific goals for yourself, be they attracting an audience to your social-media offerings or fostering greater awareness of your online retail presence, is crucial if you’re looking to get Facebook results.
• Execute it. Innovation is extremely helpful here, but so is remaining true to your authentic brand voice. At the same time, make sure you don’t stay static so that you’ll stand out within your audience’s news feeds.
• Measure it. Here’s where you figure out whether what you’re trying is proving effective. From here you’ll also be able to tinker with your strategy in order to improve results going forward.

Measurement means understanding Facebook analytics. Simply Measured recommends gaining a holistic perspective by keeping abreast of the following:

• The number of Page Likes added
• The number of engagements, or actions taken
• How many unique people engaged with your brand during a given time period
• The number of click-throughs on your likes
• The number of times those people could have seen your posts
• Your engagement rate

Another crucial element is the Overview tab, which gives you insight into the number of people who engaged with your posts. You’ll be able to see if that figure has increased or decreased from the previous week and over time you’ll have the ability to judge the alignment of those results with your more overarching goals.

Now let’s talk about reach and impressions, which are both essential to your goals. When working with Facebook, your primary concern is the number of people who are seeing your content – particularly when you’re putting down cash to boost your posts. Here’s where reach enters the picture.

The two types of reach are organic and paid. In terms of organic reach, you’ll be concerned with the number of unique people who saw your content in their news feeds, tickers or on your Page. When it comes to paid reach, the major concern is the number of unique people who saw your paid content. It’s important to evaluate and monitor reach by type in order to narrow down what exactly is helping you draw eyes to your content.

Now let’s talk impressions. This is all about the frequency with which users are seeing your content. As with reach, impressions are calculated in both organic and paid ways. Organic impressions come from the number of times your content was shown in a user’s news feed, ticker, or on your Page. Paid impressions, on the other hand, are generated by the number of times your paid content is displayed.

So what’s the difference between reach and impressions? While reach monitors the number of unique people who were exposed to your content, impressions measure the number of times that that content is displayed. Both are critical elements of your engagement rate, and thus of your success.

Another metric you’ll want to monitor is your audience demographics. With Facebook Insights, you’re not only able to see the age, gender and location of people who like your page but also what time of day they are on Facebook. This is a great tool for determining when is the best time to post content.

When analyzing your Facebook numbers, remember there are several key factors that will have an affect: content, time of day, consistency, demographic of your audience and paid Facebook advertising.

Looking for even more Facebook tips? Check out How To Use Audience Insights on Facebook, 5 Facebook Business Page Must-Haves, and 10 Tips For Optimizing Facebook Ads.