How to Create a Social Media Report [Free Template]

Social media is an undeniably highly effective channel for advertising in 2020.

In actual fact, social networks are the greatest supply of inspiration for shopper purchases, with 37% of consumers finding purchase inspiration via social channels.

Nonetheless, for those who’re utilizing social media as a instrument for natural publicity and model consciousness, moderately than only a channel for paid adverts, it may be troublesome to trace the success of your efforts.

As any social media supervisor is aware of, profitable implementation of a social media technique is contingent on numerous elements — and all corporations prioritize totally different channels, metrics, and standards for fulfillment.

For instance, is paid extra necessary than natural to your enterprise, and in that case, to what extent?

Is extra significance positioned on viewers engagement, or viewers progress?

Has a posting cadence been immediately tied to income?

With so many areas of focus for social media entrepreneurs, it is essential to decide on, analyze, and report in your key social media metrics with a social media report.

A social media report can assist you clearly convey what elements your social media crew prioritizes, why these elements matter, and the way you are performing towards these objectives.

On this submit, we’ll spotlight the significance of a social media report, checklist the metrics it’s best to think about together with in a single, and stroll via a step-by-step course of for constructing a social media report your self.

For a fast and straightforward answer to your reporting woes, click on right here to obtain HubSpot’s Free Social Media Reporting Template.

Why Use a Social Media Report?

A social media report is one of the best ways to distill the important thing metrics your social media crew is monitoring on a every day, weekly, month-to-month, quarterly, and/or annual foundation.

Since social media encompasses a lot, gathering and reporting on the info and channels that you’ve got decided are most necessary for your enterprise supplies a lens of focus on your social media advertising crew, and delivers a essential high-level overview for management.

Social media does not simply have an effect on advertising. Prospects ask questions, prospects write critiques, and thought leaders observe you for firm information. As a result of social media coincides with almost each facet of your group, gathering and distributing the state of your social media channels is a transfer that exhibits transparency and encourages cross-company alignment.

You may as well use a social media report back to report on campaign-level analytics. In case your social media account is serving as a cog in a bigger firm initiative, this report exhibits to what extent social media contributed to the mission’s success.

Featured Useful resource: Free Social Media Report Template

HubSpot’s free social media report template has pre-made slides so that you can report on your whole predominant social media metrics. Obtain the template right now and easily plug in your individual metrics to customise a social media report on your group.

Social Media Metrics to Report On

Your small business possible values some metrics over others with regards to social media reporting. Possible, these metrics additionally fluctuate between your channels — since LinkedIn does not allow you to retweet, and Twitter does not allow you to click on a cry-face button.

Earlier than you begin reporting in your social media channels’ efficiency, learn via this checklist of choices of social media metrics so you possibly can decide which of them it’s best to embrace in your report.

1. Viewers Measurement and Development

This metric tells you ways massive your attain is and the way shortly that attain is rising. That is usually seen because the core social media metric, because it exhibits how massive of an viewers you possibly can leverage along with your posts and content material.

2. Cadence of Posts

A moderately self-explanatory instance, this metric represents what number of occasions you posted in a given time interval. This metric is normally in contrast alongside different metrics — equivalent to engagement charges — that can assist you decide the proper cadence on your viewers.

This metric must also be channel-specific, as a result of it is sensible to post more frequently on some channels than others.

3. Publish Engagement

Publish engagement measures how your followers and followers are reacting to your posts with likes, feedback, and shares. A wholesome submit engagement suggests you could have a loyal viewers — and that your content material is reaching them.

You may as well observe engagement as a share of your viewers to find out engagement price.

4. Mentions

One metric you could have rather less management over is mentions. You possibly can observe mentions from prospects, prospects, and even information shops to gauge notion of your enterprise and model on-line.

5. Clickthrough Charge

When a submit hyperlinks to a web page in your web site, you possibly can measure how many individuals and what number of your viewers clicked via to the web page. A robust clickthrough price exhibits you are sharing web site pages that your viewers finds related.

6. Conversions & New Contacts

Conversions comes into play for those who’re utilizing social media to generate leads, subscribers, and even prospects. If you wish to attribute contacts to your social media crew’s efforts, be sure you’re utilizing correct monitoring and setting affordable objectives, because it’s uncommon in some industries to go straight from social media to changing into a buyer.

7. ROI

Immediately tracing ROI (return-on-investment) to social media efforts might be difficult. Nonetheless, for those who decide it is price reporting on this metric, be sure you have correct expectations set and attribution fashions established.

8. CPM / CPC

This metric is crucial for monitoring the efficiency in your social media adverts. In case you’re solely reporting on natural social metrics, you possibly can ignore this one.

9. Competitor Metrics

To supply a benchmark, think about analyzing the aforementioned metrics on your rivals. Clearly, these metrics can fluctuate drastically primarily based on publicity, paid funds, and the dimensions of the corporate, however it’s nonetheless worthwhile to make the comparability.

Make a Social Media Report

Step 1: Select Your Presentation Technique

For consistency and readability, be sure you’re utilizing a social media report presentation, spreadsheet, or memo template. This fashion, every time you replace your metrics, you will merely want to repeat over your latest metrics onto that template moderately than reinventing the wheel each time.

We recommend utilizing a PowerPoint or Google Slide Deck template, as a result of you possibly can share it along with your crew through e mail, use it for an in-person assembly or presentation, or each.

Want a template to get began? Try this one.

Step 2: Decide the Metrics You may Be Reporting On

Like we have established, totally different corporations and totally different social media groups worth totally different social media metrics.

It is your job to decide on the metrics that matter most to your crew and your group.

Utilizing the checklist from the part above, slim down the important metrics you imagine are price presenting to your crew at massive. Bear in mind, you possibly can change which metrics you report on for every of your group’s social media platforms.

In case your social media report is campaign-specific, attain out to the mission stakeholders to see in the event that they’re hoping to see reporting on any sure metrics within the social media report.

Professional Tip: To your first few ongoing social media reporting shows, ask your friends which metrics they’d wish to see, or which of them they want clarification on. Making these modifications sooner moderately than later helps you retain your crew knowledgeable and engaged.

Step 3: Collect Your Knowledge

As soon as what you are reporting on and the way you are reporting it, it is time to begin accumulating information.

If you’re first establishing your social media experiences, create bookmarks on your information sources. Make a folder for the analytics web page for every social media channel you are analyzing and/or your social media reporting software for an all-encompassing view.

In case you’re monitoring click-throughs to your web site, be sure you’re analyzing from a single grasp location, equivalent to your monitoring URL builder or your site visitors monitoring instrument like HubSpot or Google Analytics.

Step 4: Add in Some Visuals

A chart of numbers on a slide deck is, effectively, fairly boring.

Whereas a numerical chart is necessary for sharing as a lot data as doable in an organized method, utilizing visuals is a greater technique to convey the expansion and success metrics of your social media efficiency. Strive incorporating one or all the following into your social media experiences:

• Linear graphs to indicate followers over time.
• Pie charts to indicate clicks to totally different pages of your web site (weblog pages vs. case research, for instance).
• Bar graphs to indicate variety of engagements on every platform.

These examples are extra eye-catching than numbers on a slide and additional illustrate what you need your crew to stroll away with. If information visualization is new to you, try our Guide on Data Visualization for Marketers.

Step 5: Consider Your Story

A operating social media report ought to at all times remind individuals about the place you got here from and the place you propose on going. That stated, be certain that your experiences make reference to how your numbers have modified because the final time frame on which you introduced, along with why numbers have modified.

Did follower progress as a % enhance drop final month? Perhaps that is as a result of certainly one of your posts from the month earlier than went viral and resulted in unprecedented progress that was inconceivable to match. Make that clear and add context to the numbers.

Moreover, every report ought to comprise clear motion objects about how you propose to repeatedly enhance your social media efficiency. Social media is consistently evolving, so your method and technique for it ought to, too.

Now that you just’re outfitted with the data to construct, design, and share your social media report, obtain your social media report template and get to work!