Learn More About Your Social Media Audience with These Simple Steps

Most people treat social media as a bulletin board or TV ad. But social media is much more… Specifically, social media platforms are filled with rich information about your audience. That information is a veritable gold mine. It will allow you to produce more effective content. In turn, you will attract even more of the right kinds of potential customers.

These steps will get you there:

1) Check out the available demographics for each platform. For example, if your company or brand has a Facebook page, go to the Meta Business Manager and hit the insights tab on the left menu. Here you can find demographic information about your visitors. It will also give you information about your potential audience and the other pages they like.

For LinkedIn, head to your company’s page and choose the Analytics tab. It will have a visitor demographics section with a drop-down menu where you can choose to view your visitors’ location, job function, seniority, industry, and company size.

Most platforms have similar information, and it’s worth the time to learn where to find it.

2) Start creating and testing content. Every company and brand makes mistakes at first. But you won’t know what works until you start posting. Start with the content you have and repurpose it for different social media platforms. Supplement that with comments, questions, and conversation starters. Your content does not have to be complicated—in fact, short and engaging content is better. 

3) Once you have your data, look at interaction metrics. This is more than just counting likes and shares. Which posts are actually eliciting comments? Longer comments and replies are great! Which posts spark discussion?

4) Take stock regularly. Once you are in the habit of looking at your metrics, take stock on a regular schedule. Ask yourself: Are there any topics that tend to get more attention? Are there certain questions that generate more discussion? Note that the answer might be different for different platforms, so answer separately and create a different social media strategy for each.

Be aware: You might be in for some rude shocks. It’s rough finding out that none of your followers care about your corporate news, your product highlights, or how helpful your account managers are. Your job is to roll with it and see what really gets your social media audience talking.