Staying on top of social media trends as a marketing agency is absolutely essential to our clients’ success, and that doesn’t just mean the audience-facing trends. Yes, of course, we’re considering whether Brat Summer needs to make its way into any of our clients’ campaigns, but that’s not the point here.
We also try to stay on top of trends that happen behind the scenes, the kinds our clients notice when they see certain numbers rise and fall on their metrics reports. For instance, in summer 2024, engagement rate is just plain down across the board for almost every brand out there. However, that doesn’t mean brands aren’t finding success on social media. Rather, it means hot metrics come and go as often as trending audios.
A key part of our work at our marketing agency is helping clients understand the numbers. After noticing engagement rate dropping internally and externally, we asked our in-house social media team to put together some language around why. Why is engagement down? What has changed? Is it a problem? Why are many brands still seeing success in lots of other measures? And — most importantly — how do we explain this to clients and continue to evolve to bring the best results?
We attended a fantastic webinar in May called “The Social Media Benchmarks That Matter Today,” by AdWeek and Dash Hudson. Ultimately, we came to a few conclusions, and we decided to sum them up in a handy downloadable one-sheet.
Social Media Metrics, Summer 2024 – DOWNLOAD OUR HANDY GUIDE
If you’re in a client-facing role at an agency and want the TL;DR version, here you go:
Follower numbers and engagement rates are down, but that’s OK. This is mostly due to shifts in social media features and algorithms. For instance, Instagram now favors video, organically serving it to both followers and non-followers. Many people engage with video simply by watching it, not by “engaging” in the traditional sense (liking, following, commenting). Naturally, both follower numbers and engagement rates (likes and comments divided by followers) are down. But other metrics can swap in.
Brands should consider saves, reach and video views to get a fuller picture. There are lots of other handy insights in there, too, from our thoughts on the balance of organic vs. paid content to posting cadence to which platforms show the most future promise. But you have to click download for all that.
In the meantime, to learn more about social media metrics, agency communications and content marketing, reach out to Mary Verdin at [email protected].