The ever-changing social media environment calls for vigilant monitoring, testing, and adjustments to guarantee excellent performances of your various platforms. Having a clear strategy for managing channels on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter enhances your chances of retaining and acquiring customers and making more sales. However, your work does not end with implementing an efficient social media strategy; you also have to follow up on its progress to make sure everything works as intended. Therefore, it is fundamental to perform a social media audit.
The Definition of Social Media Audit
It refers to the steps that a company takes to assess and optimize their social media strategies and profiles. Social media audits and social media analytics involves finding out what works, what does not, and making the necessary adjustments. A successful review helps you to retain and improve your presence online. You may dread performing the audit because it involves the use of spreadsheets and attention to detail. However, with the right tools, the exercise will flow seamlessly. NetBaseQuid offers next-generation AI boosted, customizable, and accurate instruments to gauge your previous, present, and future performances.
How to Conduct the Audit
Begin your audit by identifying all social media channels, inclusive of official and unofficial ones. Search your brand name across all social media platforms to determine which accounts you do not have control over. Create a spreadsheet containing all your channels, KPIs, and critical metrics. Identify the unofficial accounts dedicated to praising your brand and those that slander your name. You can leave the former running as it can benefit your business, but make sure you regularly monitor it. However, be sure to inform the social network about the harmful accounts and request their deletion.
Assess the visual aspects of your official accounts, making sure that you use the same profile photo across all platforms; your company logo is a good picture to use. Additionally, check your URL to ensure it is the same everywhere. The critical metrics vary for different platforms; however, the common ones include engagement, customer service, reach, and content. To successfully analyze the outcomes of your social media audit, you must clearly define your goals for different channels. Once you do that, you can determine the best performing platforms in your business, the target demographic for every network, and evaluate your best posts to learn what made them stand out and how to replicate that success in the future.
Key Red Flags
To correct your mistakes, you must first identify them through a social media analysis and audit. Some of the mistakes you could be making include not performing social media listening. It is also an issue to generate excessively promotional and boring content, fail to understand your audience, and not give your audience a reason to care about your brand. It would be best if you always strived to comply with all social media regulations. Therefore, watch out for a rise in publishing volumes, configuration/profile changes, and using business accounts for personal reasons. Furthermore, keep an eye for content posted on your official channels through a different publishing platform and comments made by non-employees, and new features on particular platforms.
How to Utilize the Results Your Audit
Once you identify the changes you should make, go back to the statistics to come up with the best strategy. Use data from a period when the time an account was performing well as a benchmark for what you should do differently going forward. Also, set new goals for the future based on your current performances. A regular social media audit ensures that you do want company resources and time running unproductive campaigns. Therefore, plan to audit your social media accounts at least every six months.
