The Step-by-Step Guide to an Effective Social Media Audit (With a Free Checklist)
Let’s talk social media, shall we? If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you know how much I love social media.
As an entrepreneur, marketing professional, or someone who’s active online, you most likely know a ton about social media too. You know what kind of content to share on each platform, at what time, how to engage with your tribe.
But is your social media strategy working for your business? How do you assess your work so far?
What if you’re just starting out? What’s the first thing you should do?
I’m glad you asked because today I want to share with you my step-by-step guide to an effective social media audit. I’ve included a free checklist to help you put it into practice.
But first…
What Is a Social Media Audit?
The process of reviewing what’s working and what not, what can be improved and what you should let go of across your social media channels is called social media audit.
I know, I know. No one likes audits. They are time-consuming and a lot of work.
But with the process I am going to share with you today and the free checklist I included in this post, every time you’ll be auditing your social channels it will be a piece of cake.
Download your Social Media Audit Made Simple Checklist.
How Often Should You Perform a Social Media Audit?
First of all, it depends on your social media strategy and how it ties in with your business goals.
If social media plays a huge role in your business, I recommend a monthly social media audit of your channels. It will give you a clear image of what’s working and what not, and where to adjust your strategy.
But if you are not that active in the online world, a social media audit every quarter works well.
Let’s dive right in.
Six-Step Social Media Audit Checklist
Step #1. Review All Your Social Media Profiles and Pages
Whether you’ve been “playing” with social media for a while or you’re just starting out, the first thing you should do when performing a social media audit is to review all your social media profiles and pages. That means every Facebook profile and page, LinkedIn profile and page, Instagram, Twitter, SnapChat, YouTube, Pinterest accounts, etc.
Start with the bio. Your bio should be the same on all your social channels, without exception. It shows brand consistency, care for your own social channels, and it creates trust with your audience.
Your bio should be accompanied by the same URL and profile photo on all your channels. Link to your website or blog, or if you have a new project, link to your latest offering.
With your bio complete, let’s move to your cover photo. The cover photo on your social channels is a great opportunity to showcase who you are, what is it that you do, or your latest offerings. Be creative here.
Here is how Kim Garst does it.
Next comes securing your accounts. When was the last time you changed the passwords on your social channels? Make sure to change them at least once a month and keep them in a secure place.
Check all the apps that you allowed access to your channels. Remove those that you don’t use anymore.
You can do that by going to the “Settings” feature for each of your social channels and then click on the “Apps” tab.
Continue by checking the privacy settings you have for each channel. Make sure they are up to date.
Now that you are at it, take a moment and verify the settings for email notifications. Are they up to date?
Step #2. Review the Performance of Each Social Media Channel
For this step, you will need a spreadsheet. You can use a good ol’ Excel or create a Google sheet you can access at any time and from any device you have.
Create columns as follows:
- Social media channel – list each social media channel you currently have
- Followers/fans – include the number of followers/fans you have for each platform
- Publishing schedule you currently use
- Engagement – include the engagement you currently have on each channel. That means, likes, RTs, shares, direct messages, reshares, +1s, comments.
Before going forward you need to know the performance of each channel. It’s a bit of work, especially if you have several channels. But doing an effective social media audit means you have to have all the data.
Plus, it’s hard only the first time. For the next social media audit, you’ll have everything in place and it will be just a matter of how fast you’ll fill everything in.
Let’s look now at your audience.
Step #3. Audience Analysis
For this step, you can use the sheet you created above or, create a new one called “Audience” in the same spreadsheet.
Before recording any data about your audience, please make sure you cleaned up your channels of fake followers.
You want the data you collect to be as accurate as possible.
Here are some apps you can use to clean up your channels of fake followers.
- Instagram: Cleaner for IG
- Twitter: Status People, TwitterAudit, Botomer
- Facebook: Follow Facebook’s instructions here.
With your social channels cleaned up of fake followers, it’s time to gather the demographic data of your audience.
In the “Audience” sheet of the spreadsheet above, add the following fields: gender, age, location, industry, language.
To find this information go to:
- Facebook page – Insights – People – People Reached
- Twitter – Profile – Analytics – Audiences
- Pinterest (business account) – Analytics – Overview – People You Reach
- Instagram app (business account) – Insights – Audience
- YouTube – Creator Studio – Analytics – Subscribers
- LinkedIn page – Analytics – Followers
Once you’ve done this for each of your channels, look at the data gathered. Where is the bulk of your audience located? What language do they speak? What industry do they work in?
Highlight this info in the spreadsheet or write it down on a different page.
Further, let’s look at the content you share.
Hidden Content
Step #4. Content Analysis
In the same spreadsheet create another sheet and record the following:
- Type of content – What content performed best? Is it links, photos, videos, questions, infographics, audio? Record everything.
- Top content – Categorize the content that performed best. Categories can be motivational content, industry-specific, marketing content, behind-the-scenes, educational, etc.
- Voice – Are you using the same voice on all your social media channels? I go back to being consistent: use your brand’s voice on all your channels.
Let’s take a break and see what we have so far.
We reviewed and updated the information on all your social media channels, recorded the performance of each channel. Next, we analyzed who is following you and your best performing content.
You now know the type of content your audience prefers, the type of content you should be sharing tailored for each channel, as well as the voice you should be using.
We have two more steps to go through in your social media audit.
Step #5. Referral Traffic
The above data is useless if it’s not complemented by Google Analytics.
Your social media efforts are not complete without learning where the majority of your traffic comes from. Which channel brought the most traffic to your website and blog? What pages did the viewers visit? How long did they stay on each page?
You can find this information by going to your Google Analytics account - Acquisition - All Traffic - Channels - Social.
This report tells you how many visitors you had from each social media channel, how much time they spent on your site and how many pages they visited.
Next, you want to know which pages they visited, specifically for each channel.
In the Acquisition tab go to Social - Network Referrals and click on each channel. It will look like this.
Where did the people visiting your site spend the most time? Record this information in your spreadsheet along with the social networks that drove the most traffic.
You can analyze this data for one month, several months, or one year. It depends on how deep you want to go.
Step #6. Set Goals for the Following Year
Congratulations! You made your first social media audit.
But a social media audit wouldn’t be complete without setting goals for the following year.
Where do you see your social channels go in the following year? How would success on social media look like for you?
Set those goals and then work backwards and break them down into quarterly and monthly goals.
This way, when you audit your social channels each month you’ll be able to compare the results against your goals and adjust your social media strategy going forward.
Got a question? Something to add? Let’s chat in the comments section down below!
Don’t forget to grab your Social Media Audit Made Simple Checklist.
This article was first published on NutsPR.