Analyzing the Vanity Metrics of Social Media
By: Kimberly Grant
When it comes to social media, most influencers measure success by likes, comments, and shares. Many influencers have seemingly built their social media brand on these things. Jobs have been landed. Appearance fees have increased. And, mention fees are on the rise. Now that may be fine and well for an influencer. But, it’s not good for a company or brand. In fact, a high amount of likes and comments for a social media page is considered a vanity metric.
Being Vain
Sure, the word “vanity” is typically used to describe someone who is good-looking on the surface. It’s also the best friend of “narcissism”. In terms of marketing, vanity metrics are measures of likes, comments, and shares of a social media page that have no real correlation to actual value (read: qualified results in revenue generation). This can be attributed to things like bot pages and low-level follower interest. Basically, all of those likes can be just people who like a profile picture, but not the brand that’s being marketed.
The best way to gauge whether or not a social media page is successful is to use metrics (quantitative numbers used to measure goals) that are aligned with something called KPIs.
Keys to the Real
KPIs (or key performance indicators) are actions that help a marketer measure their progress, success, and failure within a campaign. Examples of KPIs is conversions (micro and macro) and revenue per subscriber. All phrases that mean the actions are contributing to generating dollars for a brand or company.
If thousands of likes, shares, and comments aren’t leading to consumers buying into your brand or product, then they’re just false metrics. In fact, using likes as a metric for success is a fallacy that can quickly lead to disappointment.
Before You Celebrate
Vanity metrics may be a boost to the ego, but they shouldn’t be used to measure any real success. To truly know the worth of your social media page, set a SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, timely) goal. Then, generate a short list of actions that will signal your brand’s success in terms of generation of conversions or profits. Otherwise, you will end up with a brand that’s pretty on the outside and sad on the inside.
Has vanity made you feel like a novice? No worries. You can read more content on marketing, by viewing my last post here.
