A Guide to Auditing Your Social Media
Social media is one of the most powerful tools available to businesses today. It allows them to reach billions of potential customers and build a loyal following of engaged and enthusiastic fans. However, due to the constantly changing nature of social media, it is essential to regularly audit your strategies to ensure that they stay up-to-date and ultimately deliver maximum impact.
This guide will provide you with all the information you need to audit your social media strategies effectively and ensure that your business is taking full advantage of the potential of social media. Learn about the key elements to consider when auditing your strategies, the best practices for monitoring and tracking performance, and the most effective tactics for improving the impact of your social media campaigns.
What is a Social Media Audit?
An audit is the process of examining a specific aspect of your business to determine how effective it is, what needs improvement, and how it compares to industry standards. It is an essential part of effective management and can help you make better business decisions, improve efficiency, and understand your strengths and weaknesses.
In the context of social media, an audit is a process of examining your social media strategies to determine how effective they are, what needs improvement, and how they compare to industry standards. It is essential to audit your strategies regularly to ensure they stay up-to-date and are optimised for maximum impact.
Key Elements to Consider
- Purpose - What is the goal of your social media? What is the desired outcome that you are hoping to achieve? The first and most important step in any audit is to determine the purpose of your social media campaigns. This will help you create social media strategies targeted toward achieving that specific goal and to ensure your existing strategy is hitting the mark or not.
- Objectives - What are your business’s key objectives? What are your specific goals for social media? Once you have determined the purpose of your social media campaigns, you need to identify your business’s key objectives. These will likely be aligned with the purpose of your social media strategies, but they need to be specific and measurable to be effective.
- Channel Strategy - How do your social media channel strategies align with your overall strategy? What is the purpose of each channel? One of the most important aspects of an audit is to determine how your social media channel strategies align with your overall strategy and the purpose of each channel. You also need to determine how effective your channel strategies are and how they compare to industry standards—keeping in mind that sometimes the outcome of an audit may be to stop publishing to channels that aren't performing or to change your content approach completely.
Channel Algorithms - What has changed in this space, do you need to adjust the content and channels you are publishing to? The fast rise of TikTok is a testament to the need to maintain an agile approach to the channels we publish to.
- Key Metrics - What are your key metrics? Are you hitting them? What are the most important metrics that you should be tracking? One of the most important aspects of an audit is identifying your key metrics. Has the content you've been publishing resonated with your audience?
With the ever-shifting landscape of social media, I recommend regular audits or, even better, regular reviews of your content, which have the most impact. Then equipped with the knowledge of what content works best, push more into it. This could be as simple as switching from photos to videos.
As social media changes, we, as brand guardians and content producers, must also adjust, change and adapt.
