What metrics should you track for Instagram Stories?

Besides just the views, I also check for these things Profile Visits: Track how many people visit your profile after watching your stories. It shows if your content is intriguing enough for viewers to learn more about you. Forward Taps: If your story has multiple slides, monitor how many users tap forward to the next one. It indicates interest in what you’re sharing. Exit Rate: Check where viewers are dropping off in your stories. Understanding when people lose interest helps you refine your content.

With Reach, Impressions, Exits, Forward Taps, Backward Taps, and Engagement Rate metrics you can track Instagram Stories quite conveniently. You can also tailor your content strategy for better engagement and impact.

- Impressions: how many times was the Story viewed? High Impr. indicate good visibility. - Reach: Shows the number of UUs who viewed the Story - Tap-Forward Rate: Indicates how many users skipped to next Story. Lower rate = engaging content. - Tap-Back Rate: How many users went back to view previous Story? High rate = strong interest. - Engagement: Measuring Stickers, Polls, & Questions etc. Higher engagement = involvement. - Exit Rate: When viewers leave the Story before it's over. High rate = disinterest. - Completion Rate: How many viewers watched the entire Story? High rate = engaging content. - Follower Growth: Do Story views correlate to Followers increase? - Conversions: what users do after viewing a Story, eg. buying or signing up.

Impressions - Times your Story is seen. Reach indicator. Reach - Number of unique accounts that viewed Story. Audience size. Exits - When viewers leave before the Story ends. Signals low interest. Replies - Viewer responses to the Story. Engagement metric. Shares - Times Story is shared. Measures virality. Link clicks - Gauges interest in CTAs/links. Completion rate - % who watched Full Story. Engaging content signal. Screenshots - Viewers screenshotting Story. Share-worthy content. Swipe ups - How often viewers access more content. Traffic to website/profiles - Track clicks. Conversions from links or swipe-ups.

Impressions and reach are two basic metrics that tell you how many people have seen your Stories. Impressions are the total number of views, while reach is the number of unique accounts that have viewed your Stories.

A fluctuating completion rate might also be indicative of the story's length. Sometimes, even engaging content might be skipped if the story sequence is too long. It's essential to find a balance between telling a complete story and ensuring it's concise enough to retain attention.

Keep an eye out for the completion rate. Usually, people skip the stories if they don't find them engaging enough or if your stories don't relate to them. Always post stories that are engaging, and relevant to your audience. Use the elements, stickers, links, mentions and those bright arrows to drive more engagement, and views people will stick to the end and your profile will be the first in their their feed.

I share stories and links to opportunities. I have even shared polls and posted links for people to engage with. People just don’t engage with it. They look and think but I don’t get enough people participating. Hopefully thst will change after posting this.

If the completion rate of stories is low, I found that it is due to most people watching not being interested or are too overwhelmed with the content. Stories are a little above the attention span of a person. So with-in 3 seconds you have to be able to grab their attention again. A minor arrow or a word can go a long way in getting people to finish the story.

In my experience, using story stickers in creative ways gives a very good insights on audience, behaviour patterns, current trends. For our client campaigns, we have always used this strategy to announce and create the buzz of the new launch.

Taps Forward: This is the count of times a viewer has tapped on the right side of the screen to skip to the next segment of your story. ? Implications: ? High taps forward could indicate that a particular segment of your story isn’t resonating or capturing interest, prompting viewers to move on quickly. ? If your story consistently receives a high number of taps forward, it might suggest that the content isn’t engaging, is too lengthy, or isn’t meeting viewer expectations.

Analyzing the content where most taps occur can offer insights into content preferences. For instance, if viewers frequently tap backward on user testimonials, it may signify they find such content compelling and worth revisiting.

I like to use this to determine if my 'story' was or wasn't engaging. If viewers tapped out, something didn't appeal, but a high tap back rate often indicates that the content was engaging or needed a second viewing to capture details.

Side note: Countdown stickers are one of the most underutilized options. Leverage to-the-minute countdowns to remind your most dedicated audience members of new product or content releases, sales and social events, store openings, thrilling announcements, and more. This can work for retailers, brands, influencers, blogs, channels - anyone, really. With the right call-to-action, viewers will be encouraged to share the countdown, giving it huge potential for current and future engagement. Your insights will tell you who's opted in for the reminder, giving you an opportunity to go even deeper. Think outside the (countdown) box. Follow up with them directly with relevant resources or exclusive offers, to further build those bonds.

The nature of replies can offer invaluable qualitative data. Are viewers asking questions, providing feedback, or simply expressing appreciation? Also, which stickers are most engaged with? For instance, if the poll sticker garners a lot of attention, it might be worth incorporating more interactive polls in future Stories.

Your audience wants to engage with you, If you make engaging content. Bringing your followers into the conversation with replies and stickers gives them a more personal way to connect with your account. Users know you are far more likely to actually respond to replies and stickers in stories, and this is one of the reasons why stories are so beneficial for community building with your audience.

Response rate has been the number one way to get a boost by the algorithm when it comes to the account as a whole. Response rate on stories prompts conversation which is the number one way to keep users engage in a platform. Due to this, platforms get what they want which keeping users in the app. As the brand/creator posting you also get to have the 1-on-1 time with an individual that found value in your content which helps nurture your relationship with them. One way to actually get started with this is to entertain first, educate second and then engagement will follow. However, the key is consistency since you will need to keep up a rhythm in order to get the engagement started. Hope this helps!

Instagram Stories offer a unique way to engage audiences in a more interactive way. Track how many viewers engage with these to understand their effectiveness. Using the results of this metric can provide valuable information that can help solve your audience pain-points and even determine future campaigns!

When viewers share your Stories, it's an endorsement of your content. Pay attention to the type of content that gets shared the most. Is it humorous content, insightful tips, or user testimonials? Similarly, content that's saved often might be evergreen in nature, which you could consider repurposing or revisiting in future campaigns.

Saves and shares are important metrics because it shows retention. When people save your posts,they’re most likely doing that so they can come back to reference it or just to rewatch your content.

The use of social networks has not decreased, however the posts that people definetely have. Content continues to be consumed and even shared outside of the platforms where it was originally generated. Following these metrics allows us to evaluate the cultural impact of what brands want to communicate.

One of the most underrated metrics on Instagram is link clicks. If a creator or brand's CTAs lead to frequent clicks on Instagram, that means they know what it takes to get people to buy through social. Link clicks for influencers will often take viewers to an Amazon storefront or a LTK page that enables conversions.

One important metric I always advise business owners to keep an eye on is the swipe-up rate, especially when directing visitors to their website. However, it's crucial to remember the significance of having a well-crafted landing page. Don't forget to double-check that the link to the landing page is not broken. That way, you can ensure more people are seamlessly viewing your post.

If you have a business profile with over 10,000 followers, you have the swipe-up feature. If your swipe-up rate is lower than expected, consider revisiting the call-to-action text or the visual cues you're using. Perhaps they aren't clear or compelling enough. Additionally, ensure that the linked content aligns seamlessly with the story's content.

The importance of CTA can't be understated in this metric. You can't say "click here to learn more" and call it a day. You have to have a call to action that resonated with the message you are sending with the story. If you are suffering with a low swipe up rate, try changing your CTA and ensuring the story with the link is clear and concise.

Most of my past clients had an instinct to compare their number of likes against their competition. This is the biggest mistake when tracking Instagram metrics. The main mistake here is that the number of likes depends on how many people have seen the post, and you never have that data about the competitor's post. It varies a lot for your posts, too. So, if you want to understand how engaging your post it, the main metrics you need are the total number of engagements (Likes+Comments+Saves+Shares) and Reach. Dividing the former to the latter will give you the real Engagement Rate. Compare your posts with this variable. Competitors? You need to ignore them, because you don't have a healthy data on them. Focus on improving your own posts.

The date and time of your story posts will also be saved under insights in your professional dashboard. Consider testing and comparing results between similarly-styled stories posted at different dates and times, to determine the optimal posting schedule/cadence for your overall objectives. You may find that one schedule serves your followers best, whereas another lends itself better to reaching and converting new audiences. Use this to maximize your story engagement and reach potential, cater your content, and strategize accordingly!

Before any content for Instagram stories is made, you should always define your goal for it. Is your goal to show up more to your audience? Then impressions would be your north star metric for that post. If your goal is to get more conversions, your sticker taps (clicks to link) would be what you want to measure. However, you should be documenting all of these metrics monthly at the very minimum so you can accurately report your impact.

Remember to regularly review these metrics. Over time, they can guide your content strategy, ensuring that your Stories are continually resonating with and engaging your audience.

The reason for measuring the metrics will determine what metrics I measure. But the metrics I’d consider measuring includes the number of views, shares, saves, and replies.