February 3, 2020

The Beginners Guide to Instagram Analytics

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Michael Jenkins
Michael Jenkins

CEO - Shout Agency
[email protected]

Humans are visual creatures for whom pictures speak louder than words. This is why Instagram is showered with a colossal quantity of engagement. Research shows that 1 billion people use Instagram every month, and 200 million Instagrammers visit a business related profile daily. What’s more? 62% Insta users state that seeing a product or brand on Instagram stories makes them more hyped about it.

With the insane popularity of this social media channel, it comes as no surprise that most businesses already have an Instagram account. But to attain maximum ROI from this super-engaging channel, you must proactively work on growing your following. Yes, posting frequently is great, but it what’s more imperative is to get yourself familiar with Instagram analytics.

What are Instagram analytics?

Instagram analytics, or Instagram Insights, help business dominate Instagram with the power of data. Using metrics such as engagement rate, reach, website clicks, audience demographics, and follower growth, you can discover the performance of your posts), content-follower interactions, efficacy of youhttps://www.shoutdigital.com.au/blog/introduction-to-content-personalisationr ads, and relevancy of your audience to your business. 

Instagram provides useful analytics on different levels– Account analytics, audience analytics, and content performance analytics. Please note that Instagram Insights is available exclusively for business accounts. 

Instagram Account Insights

The analytics in the section gives you an overview of the performance of your Instagram profile through the following metrics:

  • Impressions- This number refers to the amount of times your post or story was viewed by a user. If your impressions are high, it means your users are viewing your posts multiple times. 
  • Reach- The number of unique Instagram users who happened to see your post or story in any day. Chances are that not every one of your followers will see each of your Instagram post. This is why looking at your Instagram reach is important. It tells you exactly how many users have received your content. Increasing your Instagram reach is key to growing  brand awareness.
  • Website clicks– Shows the number of people who clicked your website link on your profile page. If you are using Instagram to drive traffic to your website, then tracking this specific metric is very important. 
  • Profile visits– The amount of times your profile has been viewed.
  • Call/emails/Get Directions clicks– The number of people who have clicked call or email section on your profile, or have requested directions if you have an address for your business listed on your profile.

 

Audience Insights

Does your business’ target audience match the demographic of your Instagram followers? With Audience Insights you can gain valuable information about what your followers are like and when they are the most active on Instagram.  Here are the metrics in this section:

  • Top locations– Shows the top cities and countries where most of your followers reside.
  • Gender- Displays what percentage of your followers are men and women. 
  • Age Range– Gives an age breakdown of your followers.
  • Followers- A very important metric that shows which hours and days your followers are the most active.

 

Content Performance Insights

The content analytics reflects the performance of your posts, stories and ads. Analyzing the performance of your content on an individual post level gives you enough data to really see if your current posting strategy is resonating with your user base. These insights go beyond just telling you whether or not a post is receiving activity. Here are the metrics available in this section:

  • Interaction– This number tells you how many times are a user tapped on your profile, link or post. For example, if you have high interactions and a low reach, it points to a small but very loyal and engaged fan base.
  • Discovery- This metric is broken down into impressions and reach. It highlights where your post was discovered and by how many accounts that weren’t already following you. The first part of discovery metric is that it shows the location within Instagram where your post was discovered. These could be from within the user’s home feed, from the explore tab, your profile, location tag, or a hashtag.
  • Follows- The number of new followers you have received from a specific post. If you see that a certain type of post is bringing you the most follows, you can then structure your content to do more of those.
  • Saves- Reflects the number of unique accounts that saved or bookmarked your post.
  • Comments- Shows the number of comments that your posts received.

Instagram Stories Insights

Instagram Stories are brimming with conversion potential for brands and businesses. If you are already using stories as part of your Instagram marketing campaign, then this section will give you a goldmine of powerful data about whether or not your efforts are working. You can customize the metrics based on interaction type and time frame.

Here are the metrics available in this section:

  • Story Impressions- The number of times a user loaded your story.
  • Story Reach- The number of times unique users viewed your story.
  • Story Exits- Reflects the number of times user exited your story before viewing it all. To add on this, an exit rate is the ratio of exits to the number of impressions. If your exit rate is high, you might want to make your stories more engaging to not risk alienating your followers.
  • Tap Forward- Reflects the number of people who tapped forward while viewing your story. This happens if the story isn’t resonating with the user, or if they don’t find it engaging.
  • Tap Back- Shows the number of times a user clicked your story and then tapped back to go to the previous page.
  • Next Story- Shows the number of times a user skipped the story they are viewing and moved on to your next story.
  • Replies- The number of DMs you received from a story. A high engaging, or controversial story will bring you a lot of replies.

Instagram analytics are an indispensable tool for owners who use this platform to grow their business. Using the metrics provided by this tool, you can expand your reach, increase engagement, optimize stories, discover the best time and the type of content to post, and drive targeted traffic to your business.

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        As Founder and Director of Shout Web Strategy, Michael Jenkins is at the forefront of digital marketing. Since it’s inception in 2009, Shout has built a strong reputation as one of Australia’s leading strategic SEO agencies, assisting online businesses to formulate, implement and track successful marketing strategies. Michael is a respected thought leader and digital strategist, specialising in online strategy, corporate SEO, Google retargeting, email and conversion rate optimisation, and online reputation management. Follow Michael on Google+, connect with him through LinkedIn or visit the Shout Web Strategy website.

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