Are you using social media as part of your marketing efforts? Coming up with a defined plan for how you plan to use each social media channel is important for increasing chances of success with your social media strategy. The work doesn’t stop there though. You need to keep refining and tweaking your strategy.
Making sure that your social media efforts working effectively and is going according to your plan are important, and it’s crucial to conduct a social media audit as a result of it.
1 – Get Prepared
You can’t have a strategy without being prepared. Entering your social media audit without a plan of action can cause you wasted time and effort. You could miss out on some crucial information. The best way to prepare yourself is to create a spreadsheet with all of your social media findings. In your spreadsheet, you should include the following headers:
- Best-performing posts/updates
- Channel and link
- Demographic data
- Engagement metrics
- Follower count
There is even more data that you should include in your social media audit. Since you should monitor your data on more than one analytics tool, it’s likely that you’ll add that information to this list over time.
2 – Monitor All of Your Social Media Accounts
With your spreadsheet in mind, you can now monitor your social media accounts so you can get a complete overview of your social activity. This is the most important step of your social media audit. You must monitor each of your social media accounts, even if the ones you rarely use. By knowing which accounts perform, you’ll notice gaps in your social media strategy and determine potential channels that could be beneficial.
During this step, you can also be on the lookout for social media accounts that use your company’s branding or name without your approval. This encourages you to create official social media accounts on platforms you aren’t currently using. You’ll be able to purchase, reserve, or use the the handle you want in case your social media strategy changes.
3 – Maintain Consistency Across All Platforms
Now that you have all of your social media affairs in order, it’s time to maintain your branding. This makes it easier for potential customers to find you. Make sure that your information is up-to-date and accurate. You also want your branding to be consistent with your logo, profile, and cover images. This stage can make you feel more confident about your social media efforts.
4 – Track Your Social Media Performance
Now it’s time to find out what’s working and what’s not working. That’s the main goal of your social media audit. This stage allows you to identify patterns and find the type of the content that performs best on that social media channel. This helps you tailor your social media strategy.
What kind of posts get the most likes and shares? Is it the ones with high-quality images? Or, does your audience respond better to content that’s written on a certain topic? The answers to these questions can help you tweak your social media strategy so you can achieve success.
Keep in mind that what’s working on one social media channel may not work on another. For example, video content may perform well on Facebook but it may not have the same response on Instagram. Every social media channel is different, and it’s important for you to know that. This means you’ll have to come up with a separate strategy for each social media account.
5 – Focus on Your Key Networks
You should have created a spreadsheet with valuable information to improve your social media strategy. If not, then go back to step one. You also should know which of your social media platforms are the ones you should be focusing on, and which ones are a waste of time. Now it’s time to choose key networks that should be the core of your social media strategy.
Maybe you’ve been spending more time in Facebook groups and less time on Twitter. But in your findings, you’ve noticed that your Twitter audience is more engaging. You should reshift your focus, so you can focus on building a platform on Twitter. By noticing with platforms are worth your time and effort, you won’t waste time on building an online presence that your audience won’t use.
Your social media audit may seem like a challenging task, but it’s better to handle it now rather than later. It’s an important factor when it comes to improving your branding and social media presence.
