Social Media Reporting Tools

What Are Social Media Reporting Tools?

Finding a social media reporting tool for your company may seem simple, but finding the right reporting tool for your team’s unique needs will save you time, money and enable you to make better decisions, faster. 

The right reporting tools should remove the need for manual calculations, potential human error and tedious administrative tasks, giving your team the space they need for creative and strategic thinking. Understanding how your team makes decisions and finding a tool to support that is key. What metrics are most important to your team and your goals? Is a visual representation of data the most important? Is comparing time periods the best way to understand movement towards a goal? Identifying those must-haves is the first step to selecting the right solution.

Why You Need Social Media Reporting Tools

Over the past few years, marketing teams have been trading in their manually populated spreadsheets for social reporting tools. Not only are spreadsheets an outdated reporting method with an increased risk of human error, but having a social media reporting tool in place will ensure your entire team is spending their time where it matters, on strategic and creative thinking and agile decision-making. Used correctly, the right social media reporting tool will improve productivity, efficiency, help you understand and measure your social campaigns and empower your team to quickly and easily pull clear and insightful reports to share across your team and organization.

How Often Should I Use Reporting Tools?

Reporting cadences should reflect the unique nature of each social channel and be flexible enough to move with shifting priorities. A medium like Facebook, which has a longer trend cycle, may only need monthly reports. In contrast, faster-moving channels like Instagram or TikTok might warrant a weekly or even daily report. Reporting tools should also be tailored to support not only weekly, monthly and quarterly reporting, but the campaign and customized time periods as well. In 2024, the need for reporting to be comprehensive and flexible is everything. Companies that are able to pivot their regular reporting practices quickly have a more comprehensive view of the situation and set themselves up to make better-informed decisions in an unpredictable period.

Finding the Right Social Media Reporting Tool for Your Team

The best social media reporting tool for your team will pull in accurate data you can trust and deliver it in a format that works for your team. For example, the data could be represented visually in a report or dashboard, or fed into a more comprehensive business intelligence tool through an API for a more holistic view of all marketing channels. A visual representation of data, with graphs and top-performing content, may be required for a social or e-commerce team. Simultaneously, a CMO or senior marketer may want to pull in that same data to their business intelligence tool via an API to compare data sets and multiple sources in one dashboard. A reporting tool that can accommodate both those needs will empower all levels to make smarter decisions faster.

Social Media Analytics Tools by Platform

One of the easiest ways to take advantage of social media reporting tools is using what’s available (and usually free) in the native platform. Depending on the social channel, you may or may not require a business account to access certain analytics and insights, which is usually best practice for businesses looking to further their social presence anyways. Let’s dive into each platform’s capabilities: 

Instagram: If you already have an Instagram business account or Instagram creator account, you already have access to a plethora of free and informative insights. You will be able to thoroughly analyze your posts, stories, general activity and audience’s demographics. You will even be able to see what time your followers are online and what your best posting times are through the Audience tab.

TikTok: TikTok makes understanding your audience and analytics very easy with the Creator Portal. Within the portal, insights are neatly organized by Overview, Content and Followers. Overview provides the creator with a general idea of how their account is performing, while Content and Followers go more in depth on individual posts and audience insights. 

Pinterest: Pinterest provides some of the most in-depth analytics you can get on their platform. After securing your business account, you will access a range of dashboards featuring insights on your impressions, followers, audience statistics and overall website engagement. If you’re looking for more Pinterest insights, you can click on each dashboard to get more information on individual boards, posts and Pins. 

Facebook: Facebook business account admins have access to a full range of Facebook insights. These insights include full post statistics as well as additional information about your fans and reach. These insights make it really easy to know exactly how each individual post is performing with your audience and beyond. Navigate to the Insights tab on your Facebook page to see how your posts are performing now.

Twitter: Follower growth, impressions, mentions and profile visits are all analytics you can gain through Twitter insights. When it comes to individual tweets, you can track exactly how much engagement you’re getting through retweets, likes, clicks and mentions. If you need to report on this data for your team, there is an easy option that allows you to compile, export and store your monthly data.

YouTube: Video is the way forward on almost all social channels, so it’s no surprise YouTube is already armed with a pretty impressive set of analytics to back it up. Within YouTube Analytics, account owners will be able to see how long viewers are watching their videos, gain insight into ad performance, overall audience retention and even earnings.

LinkedIn: You may be surprised to see LinkedIn on this list, particularly for consumer marketing, but it is one of the most important platforms for the businesses who are looking to grow from the inside out and grow their team. That is why they supply company and organization page owners with insights and statistics surrounding your posts, followers and page visitors. Take your page to the next level by upgrading to LinkedIn Career, where you can access talent brand statistics as well.

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Social Media Reporting With Dash Hudson

Dash Hudson allows brands to quickly understand their performance without the need for manual calculations. All the most important metrics for each marketing channel are at your fingertips, with the timeframe of your choosing. These reports cover your traditional metrics and metrics unique to Dash Hudson, which quickly become a fan favorite of forward-thinking marketers. Work with our customer success team for custom reporting, or tap into our powerful API to leverage our data alongside your team’s internal resources. Dash Hudson’s reporting abilities have the flexibility you crave, the intuitive visuals you need to stay agile and the data integrity for confident decision-making.

Use Social Media Analytics Tools To Grow Your Business

Utilizing social media, reporting tools and even a social media report template are some of the most beneficial things you can do to progress your business. Many users use social as a way to research, plan and make a purchase, so ensuring you are able to analyze and gain insights from the right reporting tools for every step of that process is imperative to helping your brand and business grow.

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