Creating a social media audit is a process (some will love or hate it) but a worthwhile one to benchmark your social media and see how some tweaks can be applied to help your platforms to grow.
So how do you go about it?
Here are some actions you can easily apply.
An audit will help you understand what is happening to your accounts on social media, to see what is working, what is not, whether some platforms are out of date, you get my drift.
So, what do you do first!
Create a table to note your findings. (Complete details below)
1. Record all of your social media accounts
It is easy to lose track of which platforms you are featured on, as they move so fast sometimes it hard to keep up!
Some might have been abandoned at some point.
Take some time to search the web – Google your company name and see what comes up. You might be surprised! And also check out the platforms directly and see what comes up.
Create a table and make a note of each of the platforms you find and highlight which accounts are live and active.
If accounts are there but unrequired or unknown add then to your table and take the necessary steps to remove your connectivity or gain access to them.
Keep an eye on this and make sure your update it regularly. This will also allow you to see which platforms you don’t have a presence on, which you might want to consider for future marketing opportunities.
2. Optimise profiles
Once, you have whittled down your chosen accounts make sure each of those accounts is optimised.
Check
- Profile and cover images
- Profile and bio text is correct and up to date
- Make your handle consistent across all platforms
- Make sure your links are correct and active
- If you have pinned posts, make sure they are up to date and time correct
3. Identify what works on your platforms
For each of your accounts, identify or record which posts have the most engagement.
Each of the social media platforms has their own analytics where you will be able to find out how your posts have performed and add to your audit! Need help to access them, then please let me know and I can share the details
From this can you identify any patterns
Do photo posts work well for you?
Does posting at a certain time gather more views?
How does video work for you? Better engagement?
In your table you have created – add a column to document your patterns.
Over time, you’ll refine your social strategy and learn how best to connect with your audience.
4. Evaluate channel performance
In this step, you’ll record overall channel performance, rather than looking at the performance of individual posts.
Here we are thinking of the overall performance of the channel, hopefully you will have considered some social media objectives and goals, if not, please do!
5. Track results over time
Since it’s hard to evaluate your social metrics in a vacuum, it’s a good idea to compare your results with the same time period last month, or last year. Over time, this will allow you to spot regular seasonal variations, which will also make it easier to spot any unusual changes in real-time.
6. Understand the audience for each network
It is important that you know which platforms are reaching your different audiences.
We cannot assume all of our customers are on ALL of the channels all of the time!
Use your insights/ analytics on your platforms to assess where and who you are audience is – Younger people might be on Snapchat for example. So use the free tools the platforms offer you.
This level of information is a great start to preparing your social media audit for your business.
7. Standardise your channel ownership
Ideally, each account should be owned by your /your business. Having the knowledge of the passwords, (access points information is vital for the business in case people leave!)
Rather than giving various team members the password to your social accounts, it’s important to centralize the passwords in one place. This means you don’t need to change the password every time someone leaves your team or moves to a new role. It is also a really good security consideration. This is where third-party tools can be a useful way to collate and keep your platforms safe and together.
As part of your audit, share who has access to the platforms, who can add content and who has reporting responsibilities.
Set up this in your table with centralised password control.
And finally,
This is not a one-off process, this is part of an ongoing social media process. it will help you to see easily show how your platforms are performing, how they can be improved and ways you can assess the accounts to make the changes.
Ideally, if this can be done every quarter you will start to build up an annual picture of your social media activities to help you plan strategically for the following year with your info at hand.
The best way to keep track of all the information you’ll uncover during your audit is to use a spreadsheet.
What you need to include at a glance for each account is:
Account details:
- your social handle (for example, @hootsuite)
- the link to your profile (for example, instagram.com/hootsuite)
- the bio text for the account
- any hashtags that appear in your bio or regularly appear in your posts
- the URL you link to from your bio
- whether your account is verified
- the internal person or team responsible for managing the account
- details of the current pinned post (if applicable)
- date of the most recent post (to help you identify underused/abandoned accounts)
Performance details:
- total number of posts published
- total engagement numbers, engagement rate, click-throughs, etc.
- change in engagement
- the top three posts in terms of engagement
- (optional) campaign ROI
Audience details:
- key demographic information
- total number of followers
- change in followers
Goals:
- 2-3 SMART goals you want to achieve by your next audit
- whether you met the goals you set for the current audit
You should also include a column for any relevant notes about the account.
The first one is the hardest, once these fields have been set up, the whole process will be much easier.
Give it a go.
If we can help with this process for you, we offer this service for £99.00 + VAT, get in touch today, call us on 07971 065941 or email [email protected]
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