While it may be cool to create a viral video that ends up on everyone’s FYP, generating consistently high engagement rates for your brand is the ultimate goal. With the right TikTok engagement strategies, you can reach the right audience, amplify reach, and increase brand awareness.

Below, we’ll cover what counts as a good engagement rate on TikTok, how to calculate your TikTok engagement rate, and effective ways to increase your brand’s engagement on the platform.

What is a Good Engagement Rate on TikTok?

The median engagement rate by follower is 1.73%, according to our 2025 Social Media Benchmark Report. This rate is nearly five times more engaging than the next most engaging channel, Instagram.

And since TikTok is a video channel, it’s also worth noting what the median engagement rate by view is. Counting the number of times a viewer liked, commented, or shared and dividing it by the overall number of views measures just how compelling your content was. On TikTok, the median engagement rate by view is 3.4%.

When it comes to posting frequency, the average brand publishes about 1.97 videos per week or about eight per month. The most active brands, those in the top 25%, published videos at least four times per week on average.

How to Calculate Engagement Rate on TikTok

At Rival IQ, we define engagement as measurable interaction on organic and paid social media posts. On TikTok, this includes likes, comments, and shares.

TikTok engagement rate is calculated based on all of these interactions divided by total follower count. Here’s the formula to calculate your brand’s TikTok engagement rate:

TikTok engagement rate = [engagement total] / [total number of followers]

There are a few different ways to calculate engagement rate, but we find that dividing by the number of followers paints a more accurate picture of how your brand’s engagement rate compares to similar brands in your industry — regardless of audience size.

Top 5 Industries on TikTok

While brands of all industries and sizes are finding success on TikTok, there are a few industries that are doing especially well on the platform.

The top five industries on TikTok, as ranked by engagement rate by follower, are:

• Higher Ed (7.36%)
• Nonprofits (3.04%)
• Travel (2.73%)
• Sports Teams (2.68%)
• Food and Beverage (2.04%)

Schools and nonprofits stand out as the two industries with the highest engagement rates on TikTok. To put it into perspective, Higher Ed’s median engagement rate of 7.36% is more than 4x the all-industry median, while nonprofits’ 3.04% engagement rate is nearly double.

So what are these industries doing to generate impressive engagement rates like these? Let’s take a look at a couple of ways these top-performing industries are tapping into TikTok’s influential reach.

Top Industry on TikTok: Higher Ed

Schools and universities dominate across social channels year after year, and their performance on TikTok is no different.

As we mentioned, the median engagement rate by follower for schools is 7.36%, nearly four times the average engagement rate across industries. Even more impressive is that the top-performing schools (those in the top 25%) earn more than double that rate at a little over 19%. When it comes to posting frequency, schools and universities post 1.59 times per week on average. This comes out to around six to seven posts per month (which is about a third of how often they post on Instagram).

All that to say, Higher Ed has found a sweet spot for themselves on TikTok that many brands would hope to emulate — fewer posts with major impact. So, what exactly are schools doing differently to earn such impressive engagement rates on TikTok?

For starters, school pride is unmatched. Schools often tap into that school spirit by sharing things that current and past students alike can relate to. While on Instagram this often means sharing celebratory carousel posts, on TikTok, this spirit shows up in the form of informal, short videos — moments from a game, glimpses of a school tradition, or even user-generated content that shares an insider’s perspective.

This TikTok by the University of Tennessee, Knoxville is a great example. Their TikTok showing a beloved mascot reveal — when a graduating student finally gets to share that they were the mascot all along — hit a jaw-dropping 90.7% engagement rate by follower. That’s more than 12x the median rate for higher ed.

The University of South Carolina, Columbia, posted a similar mascot reveal and also saw incredible results: a 74% engagement rate by follower, or about 10x the higher ed median. Both schools tapped into the same trend, using #mascotreveal to boost visibility and connect with audiences who already love this type of content.

These examples highlight how powerful it can be to lean into authentic, shareable traditions that spark pride and support. They also show the value of tracking hashtags your industry peers are using. By keeping an eye on popular hashtags, your brand can spot rising trends early and join the conversation in ways that feel timely and relevant.

Top Industry on TikTok: Nonprofits

Nonprofits thrive by tapping into passion and purpose — whether it’s showcasing the impact of their work, spotlighting their community, or giving fans and supporters a special look at something they can’t get anywhere else.

The video below from Boston Ballet highlights a breathtaking moment from Swan Lake, showing a dancer completing the iconic 32 fouetté turns. Paired with a short, expressive caption and a handful of strategic hashtags, the video drew nearly 90K engagements and an astounding 682% engagement rate by follower. That’s 224x greater than the median engagement rate for nonprofits (3.04%).

Nonprofits make an impact in the world — and that extends online. By sharing moments that are visually striking, inspiring, or mission-driven, nonprofits turn casual scrollers into engaged supporters. Whether it’s a powerful performance, a heartwarming story, or a behind-the-scenes glimpse, short-form video offers the perfect format to inspire, educate, and garner support.

8 Ways to Increase TikTok Engagement

Whether you’re just getting started on TikTok or want to shake up your approach, here are eight ways to navigate the algorithm and increase TikTok engagement in 2025.

1. Mention other brands

When you mention another brand, especially if that brand is a big TikTok account with a lot of reach, the tagged account may engage with it, share it, and ultimately help get your video and brand in front of its audience.

The median brand on TikTok includes a mention in about 11.2% of its videos. However, it seems that using mentions in moderation is the most strategic approach. We found that brands that include mentions in 10% of their videos or fewer receive the highest engagement rates by view, with effectiveness dropping off when that percentage goes over 30%.

Now, that’s not to say that you should abandon mentions altogether. In fact, brands that included no mentions at all had notably less engagement than those that used mentions in moderation (or less than 30% of their TikToks). So, let’s take a quick look at exactly how mentions can impact your performance on TikTok.

When Coach mentioned The Summer I Turned Pretty, Amazon, Lola Tung, and Prime Video in the video below, it saw great results. The video received over 2M views and generated a 27.1% engagement rate by follower, which is more than 21x higher than the average for retail brands on TikTok (1.28%).

Note how the mentions were relevant and appropriate, with the brand simply tagging the appropriate accounts when discussing its collaboration rather than mentioning accounts just for the sake of it. The result was a TikTok that appealed to diverse audiences, from fans of the Prime Video show to Amazon shoppers.

All in all, mentions matter. If you’re ever talking about another brand or product, be sure to mention them if they’re on TikTok. It’s also wise to tap into social media listening so you can get involved in relevant conversations in your industry and mention other brands when it makes sense.

While it’s not a good idea to mention accounts simply for the sake of reach and exposure (you don’t want to risk coming across as spammy), keep mentions in mind for about 10% of the videos you post, and you’ll be primed to generate more views and engagement.

2. Engage in the comment section

You’ve invested time and effort into creating content, so get the most out of it by staying engaged with your followers and other users. Being active in the comment section is a simple yet effective way to generate higher engagement rates on TikTok. This includes the comment section under your own videos as well as other users’ videos.

Replying to your followers’ comments and questions, commenting on other users’ videos, and mentioning brands in your comments all help amplify your account’s reach by getting it in front of a larger audience.

The interaction in the comments section of this video by Fenty Beauty, one of the top beauty brands on TikTok, is a great example of how to engage thoughtfully. Fenty Beauty consistently interacts with its followers in the comments of its TikToks. For instance, when a user commented on the satisfying appearance of the brand’s new primers, Fenty Beauty took the opportunity to shed a little more light on what made the new release special.

Actively monitoring your comments section ensures you never miss an opportunity to share more details with your followers, loop in other brand accounts, and effectively increase engagement.

3. Leverage hashtags

Want to increase your chance of landing on someone’s FYP? Use hashtags. Niche hashtags and hashtag challenges are a great opportunity to join in on a relevant trend or conversation.

Like other social channels, TikTok uses hashtags to curate content and help users discover videos they could be interested in. Hashtags can also help boost your brand’s searchability on TikTok, which is especially important when you consider how many people use TikTok as a search engine, especially among younger generations.

When using hashtags on TikTok, less is more. According to our report, the median number of hashtags used by brands across all industries is four per video, with 16% of the brands we analyzed including one or fewer hashtags in their videos. The takeaway here is to be intentional when choosing which hashtags to include. Focus on using just a few that have the most potential to increase your video’s number of views and engagement.

For instance, if we take a look at Rival IQ’s hashtag analysis for top-performing airlines, we can see which hashtags were most used, how many airlines on TikTok were using them, and what the engagement rate is for each one.

If you were a marketer for an airline, you could use this to determine which hashtags are worth using in your videos to increase your engagement. You could also use this as an opportunity to tap into a lesser-used hashtag that still performs well in order to stand out above your competitors.

4. Reply with videos

In the same vein as mentions, replies are one of the best ways to increase your engagement by amplifying your video’s reach. By re-engaging a follower who previously commented, you’re creating an opportunity to grab their attention and get back on their radar again.

Creating content as a reply is also a great way to give followers the content they want to see and let them know you’re taking their comments, questions, and feedback into consideration, making them active participants.

Use video replies to answer FAQs or fulfill audience demands like Laneige frequently does. The beauty brand makes it a point to give the audience exactly what they want, like the comeback of a popular product that fans have been asking for in the comments.

Garnering 689K views and earning 25.4K engagements, the TikTok below scored an engagement rate by follower of 2.58%, or more than 3x the median for health and beauty brands on Instagram (0.85%). Talk about a successful way to announce and promote the return of a product!

5. Find the posting frequency that works for you

As we mentioned earlier, the median posting frequency across all brands on TikTok is about 1.97 videos per week or about eight per month. While posting frequency on TikTok is growing over time, brands are still posting less here than on other channels.

This could be because creating video content requires more planning and resources than creating carousels or graphics on Instagram. Or it could be because brands are still figuring out the right cadence. Either way, it’s important to experiment with what works for your brand.

Take a look at your industry posting rates and, more specifically, your competitors to figure out how often you should be posting. Start by experimenting with one post per week, then increase or decrease your posting frequency depending on the engagement rates you generate.

6. Use a hook (and get straight to the point)

Short-form video is still TikTok’s bread and butter, but longer content is gaining traction. In fact, one study found that videos between three and ten minutes earned the most views, with clips longer than three minutes generating more than double the views of super-short videos (six to ten seconds).

Still, just because longer videos are performing well doesn’t mean you can take your time getting to the point. No matter how long the video is, the first few seconds still matter the most. According to the research by TikTok, over 63% of all videos with the highest click-through rate highlight their key message or product within the first three seconds. If it’s not immediately clear what your video is about, or there’s nothing visually appealing about it, then users will quickly scroll past it.

A common way to introduce the topic of a video is to use text overlay in the first frame. This can also be used as your cover photo, which helps your video stand out in the thumbnails on your page. After your hook, either a) deliver value quickly or b) promise a reveal. Let’s look at a video from Southern Connecticut State University for an example of this in action.

In the video below, the first frame uses text to introduce the focus of the TikTok: first day of college fits at SCSU. Immediately, the video starts spotlighting friendly faces across campus and their first day outfits. In other words, the TikTok uses a hook that’s instantly attention-grabbing and then delivers on that promise.

With a 25.6% engagement rate by follower, the video saw triple the median engagement for Higher Ed brands on TikTok, while the comments were filled with fellow students pointing out people they recognized.

7. Tap into audio

Trending audio was the main feature that propelled TikTok into popularity, so it’s no surprise that it continues to be a major engagement tool on the platform.

Not only does using trending TikTok sounds help increase your video’s discoverability, but it also makes it more memorable. 68% of TikTok users say they remember a brand better when they use a popular song in one of their videos.

Of course, this goes beyond songs to include any kind of trending audio. For instance, JetBlue joined in on a viral meme that’s centered around an edited audio of the song “So Mi Like It” by Jamaican dancehall artist Spice. The sound is paired with jokes about being “islanders” and, in this case, involved the airline pointing out how JFK airport, one of their main hubs, is on an island.

The video was a fun way to incorporate a viral trend while also creating something its followers will remember. The metrics also prove that the video resonated with followers. With a whopping 491% engagement rate by follower, the brand generated a rate that’s 180x greater than the median rate for travel brands (2.73%) by getting creative and leveraging a popular sound.

8. Track your analytics

At the end of the day, what works for other businesses on TikTok may or may not work for yours. The only way to figure out where to focus your TikTok marketing efforts is to track your analytics.

Compare your metrics to the average all-industry rates or the engagement rates in your specific industry, whether that’s Food and Beverage, Beauty, or Higher Ed. To get the most accurate picture of your performance, it’s best to track your analytics with similar brands.

Tap into live benchmarks for your industry to get real-time insights into top-performing posts and trending conversations. You can also use Rival IQ to create a landscape of competitors in your industry. Within the landscape, you can see which videos are generating the most engagement by view or by follower, and how your videos stack up. You can also see which topics and hashtags are being talked about the most within your industry.

Once you’ve tapped into what your competitors are doing, create, analyze, and measure your videos against this data to really understand what’s working and what’s not.

Wrapping it up

TikTok continues to dominate the social media landscape, proving to be a must-have channel for brands across all industries. While average engagement rates on TikTok have dropped since last year, they remain well above Instagram, Facebook, and X (Twitter), thanks to the platform’s massive reach and highly active user base.

To harness TikTok’s engaged audience for your brand, experiment with the proven engagement methods that the top-performing brands are using. Stay tapped into what other businesses in your industry are doing to drive engagement, but don’t hesitate to try something different to stand out above the pack. Just be sure to regularly track and analyze your performance. That way, you can refine your TikTok strategy and consistently drive higher engagement over time.

This post was originally published in June 2023 and has since been updated.

The post What is a Good Engagement Rate on TikTok? appeared first on Rival IQ.

For marketers, this means that staying on top of what constitutes a good engagement rate on Instagram can feel like a moving target. To ensure you’re in the know about the latest metrics and best practices, we’re looking at how to measure Instagram engagement accurately and what the current benchmark is for a good engagement rate across various industries.

We’ll also spotlight a few standout brands excelling on the platform, providing you with actionable insights to boost your own Instagram engagement rate.

How to measure Instagram engagement

At Rival IQ, we define engagement as measurable interaction on organic and paid social media posts. Instagram metrics include likes, comments, shares, and reactions.

Instagram engagement rate is calculated based on all of these interactions divided by total follower count. Here’s the formula to calculate your brand’s Instagram engagement rate:

Instagram engagement rate = [engagement total] / [total number of followers]

While there are a few different ways to calculate engagement rate, we find that dividing by the number of followers paints a more accurate picture of how your brand’s engagement rate stacks up against similar brands in your industry — regardless of audience size.

What is a good engagement rate on Instagram in 2025?

According to our 2025 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report, the overall median engagement rate on Instagram is 0.36%. This median rate applies to all industries, from food and beverage brands to sports teams and nonprofits.

When it comes to how often you should be posting, we found that, on average, brands across all industries post a little over four times per week.

For top-performing brands, their engagement rates on Instagram are even higher. Our report found that the overall median engagement rate on Instagram for brands in the top 25% is 1.05%. These brands also post at the same frequency at around 4.7 times per week.

So while 0.43% is the overall median engagement rate, 1.02% or higher is considered a good engagement rate on Instagram for brands that want to aim higher.

Overall rate across industries:

• Median engagement rate: 0.36%
• Median posting frequency: 4.5 posts per week

Overall rate for brands in the top 25%:

• Median engagement rate: 1.02%
• Median posting frequency: 4.2 posts per week

Instagram engagement rate by industry

While the median Instagram engagement rate is a great starting point to benchmark your own data, every industry is a little different.

Let’s take a look at some of the industries performing at an above-average rate and see what they’re doing right so you can take note of a few ways to boost your brand’s own Instagram engagement rates.

Higher Education

• Higher Education Median Engagement Rate: 2.1%
• Higher Education Median Posting Frequency: 4.07 posts per week

Schools and universities consistently outperform every industry on social media (check out our latest report if you’re interested in detailed insights on Higher Ed benchmarks).

Higher Ed has the highest Instagram engagement rate across all industries at 2.1%. This rate is 5.8x the all-industry median and nearly twice as high as the second-highest-performing industry, which is Sports Teams at 1.3%.

While this number is impressive, it also means that schools have to get creative if they want to stand out above their fellow educational establishments on Instagram. And one of the most effective formats they’re using? Carousels.

Not only are carousels the most popular post type among Higher Ed brands, they’re also the most engaging. Their photo-album style makes them a perfect way to celebrate milestones and spotlight students. Plus, from an algorithm standpoint, each frame of a carousel can be served to users until they interact with it, making it a powerful driver of engagement.

A great example of an Instagram post with high engagement comes from Pepperdine University, one of the notable Higher Ed brands in our benchmark report.

This carousel post celebrating “college hard launch day” — a UGC-style roundup of real students announcing they were headed to Pepperdine — earned nearly 71K impressions and an engagement rate of 7.06%, or 3.4x higher than the median rate for the higher education industry on Instagram. By leaning into user-generated content, Pepperdine not only tapped into a student trend but also made its content instantly relatable and shareable.

North Dakota State University also made it to our list of notable Higher Ed brands, thanks in part to stellar carousels like this one celebrating the NDSU Class of 2025. The post earned a 6.48% engagement rate by follower, which is more than 3x the average Higher Ed rate for the year.

Similar to Pepperdine’s UGC approach, this post centered on real students, but with professional grad photos. Celebration posts like these drive engagement because they spotlight people directly connected to the community. Not only do the featured students engage, but so do their families, friends, and classmates, amplifying reach and interaction.

Both of these examples display how schools and universities consistently secure a good engagement rate on Instagram by highlighting real people and authentic moments. Whether through UGC or official campus photography, posts that celebrate student life and milestones create a sense of pride and connection — the kind of content that followers can’t help but like, comment on, and share.

Sports Teams

• Sports Teams Median Engagement Rate: 1.3%
• Sports Teams Median Posting Frequency: 19.78 posts per week

Sports teams tend to perform well on Instagram with a median engagement rate of 1.3%. Sports teams also post the most often out of all industries, which makes sense given that the content typically includes real-time game highlights and frequent team updates during the playing season.

Videos are a winning strategy for most Sports Teams on Instagram. Reels and other video formats are the perfect way to relive big plays and give fans a front-row seat to the action. If you want to earn top engagement, we’ve found that videos bring in higher engagement rates than any other post types for Sports Teams, with carousels close behind.

Take the Wallabies, the Australian men’s national rugby union team. A Reel capturing Suaalii’s first Wallabies try earned a whopping 10.5% engagement rate — more than 8x the Sports Teams average — along with 906K impressions and plenty of encouraging comments. Capturing a milestone moment, the post was one that fans were eager to engage with.

While play-by-play updates are a great use for social media, supporting a meaningful cause can also work like a charm. This post from NHL team the Seattle Kraken showcased players and coaches in limited-edition jerseys that were auctioned off through One Roof Foundation to benefit hockey access programs and scholarships for girls, combining team pride with community impact.

The carousel post earned an impressive 13.5% engagement rate by follower, which is more than 10x the Sports Teams average.

Another way that Sports Teams can earn engagement from fans is by tapping into buzzworthy conversations and hashtags. Using hashtags associated with major events is one effective way to boost reach and engagement. As you can see in the chart below, fans also love a quick trip down memory lane, with hashtags like #throwbackthursday and #onthisday being some of the most popular Instagram hashtags for Sports Teams.

Influencers

• Influencer Median Engagement Rate: 0.576%
• Influencer Median Posting Frequency: 4.5 posts per week

Influencers are another industry that earns above-average engagement rates on Instagram. Influencers and creators use the platform to share their creative content, provide product recommendations, and give followers a glimpse into their personal lives. For this group, carousels, photos, and Reels all perform at similar levels, giving influencers flexibility in how they connect with their audiences.

While highly produced Reels and polished photos can help influencers earn likes, comments, and shares, sometimes the most engaging content is also the simplest. One example of this comes from influencer Gerard Adams. The post below received viral levels of engagement with over 5.19 million impressions, 300K likes and comments, and a mind-blowing engagement rate of 54.2%. That’s nearly 94x the median for influencers!

The Reel was simple, featuring a short podcast clip discussing the three types of friends everyone needs. So why did it work? Adams paired a highly relatable topic with a direct call to action, inviting followers to “tag a friend who fits the description” in the caption. The content sparked conversations, shares, and tags because it hit on a universal theme — friendship — while giving viewers a simple way to participate.

This example highlights an important lesson for influencers: Authenticity and interactivity win. If you can create content that feels genuine, taps into shared experiences, and directly encourages engagement, you’re more likely to see results that outperform the norm.

Nonprofits

• Nonprofits Median Engagement Rate: 0.561%
• Nonprofits Median Posting Frequency: 4.18 posts per week

Marketers at nonprofits have the important job of using Instagram to secure donations, engage volunteers, or simply raise awareness about their organization’s mission. And achieving high engagement rates can have a direct impact on those initiatives.

Like many other industries on Instagram, nonprofits found success in using carousels to send a message and earn more engagement. This post by Pancreatic Cancer UK earned the nonprofit an incredible engagement rate of 138%, which is a whopping 246x higher than the average rate for nonprofits on Instagram. The post featured a striking installation of 797 pairs of running shoes laid out to honor the 797 lives lost to pancreatic cancer each month in the UK.

It’s also worth noting that the above was a joint post in partnership with the London Marathon, which has a massive audience of 450K Instagram followers compared to Pancreatic Cancer UK’s 19.8K. That collaboration amplified reach far beyond the nonprofit’s own audience, showing the power of partnering with larger organizations or influencers to extend impact.

Another nonprofit embracing this strategy is the ASPCA, which teamed up with TV personality Ariana Madix to spread awareness about The Rescue Effect, a campaign focused on helping more animals find homes. The carousel post announcing her involvement earned an 18.3% engagement rate by follower — 33x the industry median.

Both examples also highlight a common best practice for this industry: pairing eye-catching visuals with informative captions. For nonprofits, carousel posts work well because they allow space to tell a story. The photos draw people in while the detailed captions provide the context and emotional depth that drives action.

With so many worthy causes vying for attention and fundraising dollars, nonprofits are more pressured than ever to demonstrate their value. But by combining powerful storytelling with strategic partnerships, nonprofits can turn their Instagram presence into a movement.

How to increase Instagram engagement

If you’re feeling inspired to up your Instagram engagement after seeing the examples above, here’s a recap of the tactics these brands used to achieve their great engagement rates.

• Embrace carousels: Carousels have proven to be the most engaging post type for most industries, so don’t be afraid to mix those into your content strategy along with static images and Reels.
• Collaborate to extend reach. Whether it’s a nonprofit teaming up with a major event or a brand partnering with an influencer, collaborations can expose your content to audiences far larger than your own.
• Lean into popular hashtags, holidays, and trends: If you’re feeling stuck coming up with fresh content ideas, turn to trending hashtags and holidays to capture engagement. Using Rival IQ, you can even see which hashtags people are engaging with in your industry.
• Look to the competition: The best way to benchmark your engagement rate is to compare it with similar brands in your industry rather than the all-industry average. Doing this helps put your content and engagement rates into more context.

Want to dive into up-to-date metrics and social content from top brands in your industry? Explore our live social media benchmarks.

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Wrapping it up

To sum it up, the median engagement rate for all industries on Instagram is 0.36%, with brands posting about 4.5 times per week on average. Hitting that median means you’re keeping pace with most industries — but if you truly want to stand out, you’ll need to aim higher.

To achieve a good engagement rate on Instagram, lean into what’s proven to work for your brand while experimenting with different post types. As long as you continue to measure and assess what your audience is engaging with, you’ll be on your way to reaching stellar engagement rates on Instagram in no time.

This post was originally published in July 2022 and has since been updated.

The post What is a Good Engagement Rate on Instagram? appeared first on Rival IQ.

And as any marketer knows, the key to understanding whether or not your Facebook marketing efforts are paying off is to have a reliable way to measure your content’s performance — this is where a benchmark engagement rate comes in. But in a world where paid content rules and generating organic reach to cut through the noise is more challenging than ever, what’s considered a good engagement rate on Facebook these days?

Below, let’s go over what a good Facebook engagement rate is, how marketers can calculate engagement rate for their brand, and a few examples from the top-performing industries on Facebook so you can optimize your upcoming content and increase Facebook engagement.

How to Calculate Your Facebook Engagement Rate

Before we dive into what a good engagement rate on Facebook is in 2024, it’s important to point out what exactly counts as engagement. At Rival IQ, we define engagement as measurable interaction on social media posts. Facebook engagement includes likes, comments, favorites, shares, and reactions.

Facebook engagement rate is calculated based on all of these interactions divided by total follower count.

This formula will give you the Facebook engagement rate per post. To us, the engagement rate per post is the most accurate metric to help marketers understand how they’re doing in relation to their competitors. Engagement rate per post takes into account post volume and audience size, so it reveals what content is resonating with your audience regardless of how many followers you have.

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What is a Good Engagement Rate on Facebook?

According to our 2024 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report, the median engagement rate for Facebook is 0.063%. Out of the top 25% of brands across all industries — the brands performing best on social media — the median engagement rate is 0.19%. Using those numbers as your baseline, it’s clear to see what number you need to reach to have a good engagement rate on Facebook and what your objective should be if you want to perform above the average rate.

Another factor that goes into engagement rate on Facebook is the posting frequency. When it comes to how often to post on Facebook, the median for brands across all industries is 4.69 times per week while brands in the top 25% for engagement post 4.6 times per week.

Overall rate across industries:

• Median engagement rate: 0.063%
• Median posting frequency: 4.69 posts per week

Overall rate for brands in the top 25%:

• Median engagement rate: 0.19%
• Median posting frequency: 4.6 posts per week

Facebook Engagement Rate by Industry

While it’s a good idea to reference the average engagement rate across all industries, every industry has its own unique set of metrics. Comparing your engagement rate to similar brands helps provide better insight into how your brand is performing in relation to the industry.

Let’s take a look at the breakdown of a few industries along with examples of brands that are not only receiving high engagement within their own industry, but have posts with higher engagement than the overall median engagement rate.

Sports Teams

• Sports Teams Median Engagement Rate: 0.295%
• Sports Teams Median Posting Frequency: 24.29 Facebook posts per week

Sports Teams are the top performers on Facebook across all industries with an engagement rate of 0.295%, which is nearly five times higher than the median engagement rate. Sports Teams also have the highest posting frequency after Media brands, posting just over 24 Facebook posts per week.

Posting often is clearly working for these athletic brands, which makes sense when you consider their fan base seeks out real-time game updates, team announcements, and more.

The Carolina Hurricanes are a top-performing team on Facebook with an average engagement rate of 0.66% from posts within the past year. Posting about 26 times a week, the hockey team is slightly more active than the average sports team.

One of the Hurricanes’ top-performing posts was the photo below — a well-designed graphic that featured a team celebration and the score of a recent win.

While the post is fairly straightforward, it effectively taps into the community spirit of sports lovers, boosting engagement by acting as a central point for fans to celebrate and discuss the game. Case in point, the photo earned a killer engagement rate of 6.10%, more than 20 times higher than the average rate for Sports Teams.

The Hurricanes’ Facebook strategy has a major emphasis on posting photos, with the format being its most common and most engaging post type. It makes sense. Sports teams, as a whole, see the most success with photos on Facebook, as our data below shows.

Influencers

• Influencers Median Engagement Rate: 0.164%
• Influencers Median Posting Frequency: 3.86 Facebook posts per week

Influencers are also top performers on Facebook with an average engagement rate of 0.164%, earning 2.6 times the median engagement rate on Facebook across industries. For influencers, Photos are the most engaging and most frequently shared post type.

One example of a highly engaging Photo post comes from influencer Marly Bird. Bird is a knitwear and crochet designer (and teacher) who shares tutorials, creations, and knitting knowledge with her engaged audience across Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

On Facebook, she regularly posts photos of pieces she’s made, patterns that people can try out, and educational blog posts from her website. But what really makes her stand out is her personable approach to engaging with her audience.

In the Facebook post below, Bird asks a simple question: “What time and day is it when you see this post?” The photo emphasizes the caption, featuring the words “When?” and a Bitmoji of Bird. With an engagement rate of 2.27%, this post was nearly 14 times more engaging than the average influencer post and 36 times more than the average across industries.

The post’s high engagement is a testament to the community that Bird has built on Facebook. By asking her audience questions about themselves, she not only invites genuine interaction but also strengthens her bond with her community of followers.

And though photo posts are the most popular post type on the platform, they aren’t limited to single-image posts. Sharing multiple photos in an album also performs well on Facebook. For example, Marly Bird posted multiple photos in her post below, documenting her trip to Eugene, Oregon. The pictures featured herself, as well as the knitting project she planned to work on during the flight.

This post aligned with her personable approach. It gave her followers a glimpse into her life, while also adding value through a relevant blog post that she shared about whether knitting needles/crochet hooks are allowed on planes.

The result? The post earned Bird an engagement rate of 1.32%. That’s eight times higher than the average rate for influencers on Facebook and about 21 times better than the all-industry engagement rate.

There are a couple of key takeaways from both of these posts. For starters, after being active on the platform for years and years, influencers clearly have a handle on Facebook. They understand their audience and know what they want to see. For Bird, it’s genuine efforts to engage with the community along with a relatable look into the life of a knitter and crocheter.

The second takeaway for influencers is that they don’t need to share an overly-produced version of themselves or their brand in order to generate good engagement rates. Simple photos — with or without a CTA — are more than enough to engage their audience.

Higher Education

• Higher Education Median Engagement Rate: 0.158%
• Higher Education Median Posting Frequency: 6.16 Facebook posts per week

Schools and universities are active and engaging across all social media channels, and Facebook is no exception. The average Facebook engagement rate for schools and universities is 2.5 times as high as the all-industry rate and the posting frequency is a bit higher, too. We’ve also found that — you guessed it — photos are the most engaging and most frequently used post types for schools.

The University of Iowa is one of the top-performing schools on Facebook, according to our latest Higher Education Social Media Engagement Report. One of the school’s most successful Facebook posts this year received an incredible engagement rate of 20.4% which is over 129 times greater than the average Facebook engagement rate for schools and universities and nearly 324 times higher than the all-industry average.

NCAA wins are *always* engaging, so it’s no surprise that this photo announcing the women’s basketball team going to the national championships earned killer engagement rates for the school.

While this post received high engagement because it’s centered around exciting news, there are still takeaways for any marketer. Whether or not you’re creating Facebook content for a university or sports team, take advantage of exciting milestones and moments your community wants to celebrate with you. And when you do, do so in a timely manner so you don’t miss the moment and can lean into the momentum of the news.

Morehouse College is another top college with an impressive engagement rate on Facebook. Morehouse’s posts this past year earned an average engagement rate of 0.77%, which is about five times greater than the overall rate on Facebook for higher education institutions.

One of the school’s most engaging Facebook posts broke out of the typical mold for the types of Facebook posts that usually earn schools high engagements like campus glamour shots or sports highlights. The post announced the exciting debut of Morehouse College freshman Saxton Moore Jr.’s first book, “Born Driven,” an uplifting story about the first African-American NASCAR champion Wendell Scott.

Generating 576K impressions and achieving a 10.8% engagement rate, the post was nearly 69 times more engaging than the average Facebook post by schools. The news clearly resonated with Morehouse’s audience — the comment section buzzed with excitement and pride and the post was shared more than 900 times.

Alcohol

• Alcohol Median Engagement Rate: 0.105%
• Alcohol Median Posting Frequency: 2.56 Facebook posts per week

Alcohol brands round out the top four industries with good engagement rates on Facebook. The median engagement rate for alcohol brands is about 1.67 times higher than the all-industry rate. The posting frequency is lower than the average at just under three times per week compared to the all-industry average of nearly five times per week.

Schell’s Brewery is one Alcohol brand that stands out on Facebook. Its posts from within the past year scored an average engagement rate of 0.53%, which is five times greater than the median rate for Alcohol brands. Schell’s also posts on Facebook at nearly double the rate of the average alcohol brand, sharing a little over four times per week.

One of its most engaging posts on Facebook is a photo album that served as a recap for the massive event that is Schell’s Brewery Oktoberfest. The “photo dump” included over 70 photos and highlighted the impressive numbers the event achieved.

Schell’s shared a ton of promos for this event for months leading up to it, including a social media engagement contest that offered fans the chance to win Oktoberfest merch (and successfully earned a 7.44% engagement rate!).

And even though the photo album post didn’t come with the promise of some sweet swag, it also achieved a noteworthy engagement rate of 3.16%, which is a whopping 30 times higher than the average rate for alcohol brands and 50 times greater than the median engagement rate on Facebook.

It’s evident that the event is a big deal to them and their community, so it makes sense to share a recap in photo form. Whether its followers attended the event or not, an engaging photo album makes it possible for them to relive the fun or have something to look forward to the next year. Plus, sharing tons of event photos creates shareable content that will get connected back to you if someone were to share a photo of themselves from the album.

If you’ve been picking up on the pattern of what works well for brands on Facebook, it should come as no surprise that Photos were the most engaging and most used post type among Alcohol brands. This album that Schell’s shared aligns with the rest of the landscape’s success with using photos to engage with their audiences.

Aside from tapping into what’s working well for other similar brands and brands across industries, another takeaway is to create for your audience. Facebook content doesn’t need to be as polished or entertaining as other channels. In fact, your followers may view it as a source of information or to get updates on things like events or product launches. Lean into what’s working well and create content that meets your audience’s wants and needs.

The Wrap-Up

While 0.063% is considered a good engagement rate on Facebook, it should be viewed as a general baseline for your social media strategy. Different industries have their own median engagement rate to measure up against, so consider using social media benchmarking tools to determine how your brand stacks up against your competition before comparing it to the median rate across industries. This can help you set more realistic and achievable goals.

As evidenced by these brands, there’s no one-size-fits-all answer to achieving a good engagement rate on Facebook. Take note of what these top-performing posts are doing right, and experiment with how you can incorporate these best practices into your Facebook strategy. By continually testing and refining your approach, you’ll be able to discover what resonates best with your audience.

This post was originally published in December 2021 and has since been updated.

The post What is a Good Engagement Rate on Facebook? appeared first on Rival IQ.

However, in July 2023, the platform experienced significant changes under new ownership and, as a result, brand activity has been impacted. According to our 2024 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report, posting frequency has declined by 20% across all industries. What does this mean for Twitter engagement rate? The median engagement rate has declined compared to last year, from 0.035% to 0.029%.

Despite the ups and downs the platform has gone through over the past year or so, data-driven marketers know that there’s still value in the channel. But in order to measure your performance, figure out what your audience interacts with, and see how you stack up against the competition, you have to know what a good engagement rate on Twitter is.

Below, let’s dive into how you can measure your brand’s Twitter engagement rate as well as get some inspiration from brands across all industries that are performing well in 2024.

How to Calculate Twitter Engagement Rate

There are several ways to calculate your Twitter engagement rate. It all depends on which metrics you measure. At Rival IQ, we define engagement as measurable interaction on social media posts. This includes likes, comments, favorites, retweets, shares, and reactions.

Twitter engagement rate is calculated based on all these interactions divided by the total follower count. Here’s what that formula looks like in practice:

Twitter engagement rate = [Likes + retweets + replies] / [total number of followers]

Engagement rate per post is a slightly different metric than engagement total alone, but we find that it’s more accurate. Why? Engagement rate per follower takes into account your follower count and posting frequency which can help brands of all sizes see how their content is performing in relation to the competition — even if competitors have larger audience sizes.

What is a Good Engagement Rate on Twitter?

Now that we’ve gone over how to calculate engagement rate, let’s dive into what a good engagement rate on Twitter really is these days.

According to our 2024 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report, the overall median engagement rate on Twitter is 0.029%. This is the rate for brands across all industries, from sports teams to nonprofits. On average, these brands are also posting about 3.31 times per week.

For those who want to aim for an engagement rate beyond the average, take note of how the overall top 25% of brands are performing. The top brands, regardless of industry, have an average engagement rate of 0.08% and post about 4.2 times per week. Here’s the breakdown:

Overall rate across industries: 

• Median engagement rate: 0.029%
• Median posting frequency: 3.31x per week

Overall rate for brands in the top 25%:

• Median engagement rate: 0.08%
• Median posting frequency: 4.2x per week

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Twitter Engagement Rate by Industry

The overall median engagement rate for Twitter is a great benchmark to use, but every industry performs differently on the platform. If you want to get a more accurate perspective on how similar brands are performing on Twitter, compare your engagement rate to your industry average.

Let’s take a look at a few different industries to see what the best-performing brands are doing well and which Twitter best practices are worth following.

Sports Teams

• Sports Teams Median Engagement Rate: 0.07%
• Sports Teams Median Posting Frequency: 41.46 posts per week

Behind only media brands, Sports Teams are the second most active industry on Twitter at over 41 posts per week. And while frequent posting doesn’t always equate to higher engagement, it works for this industry. The Twitter engagement rate for Sports Teams is 2.4 times greater than the overall median across industries.

One reason Sports Teams post more often than other brands is that the essence of the industry revolves around real-time game updates and announcements during the playing season. These updates are necessary as they keep fans engaged and in the loop even if they aren’t able to watch the action live.

In an industry that puts its fans at the center, Sports Teams’ tweets are clearly community-driven. This is evident in the tweet below by Seattle Reign FC, which covered soccer icon Megan Rapinoe’s retirement. Featuring a celebratory graphic, the tweet quickly became a beacon for fans to show their support, love, and gratitude for the beloved player.

With more than 6K engagements in the form of likes, retweets, and replies, this tweet earned an engagement rate of 6.33% — a whopping 90 times higher than the industry median and more than 218 times greater than the median engagement for all industries.

While this level of engagement may be specific to the scenario, there are still takeaways for any Sports Team to make note of. Sports Teams can keep their Twitter active and their fans engaged all year round by regularly sharing player updates, highlights from the previous season, or teasers for the forthcoming season — anything that fans want to see more of.

Higher Education

• Higher Education Median Engagement Rate: 0.05%
• Higher Education Median Posting Frequency: 6.7 posts per week

The Higher Education industry continues to show up on Twitter and outperform most industries. It makes sense that schools and universities are so active on the platform since that’s where a lot of their audience — college-aged users — spends their time. In fact, Gen Z users are the slowest to leave the platform (given all of the changes under new leadership) compared to other generations due to the fact that they continue to see Twitter as a source of entertainment.

Similar to Sports Teams, schools post more frequently and earn a higher engagement rate than the average industry. Top-performing schools and universities use Twitter to share exciting student achievements, celebrate sports wins, and tap into “Twitter humor” by participating in relevant memes and trends.

One example of a top-performing Higher Education post is from The University of Iowa. The tweet below earned an engagement rate of 4.3% which is 86 times greater than the average rate for schools and universities and more than 148 times higher than the median Twitter engagement rate across industries.

The tweet is a perfect example of how timely posts that are part of a larger conversation (this one was shared right after Iowa won the women’s NCAA Elite Eight game) are great at inspiring engagement. Sports wins and achievements, in particular, are always worth celebrating as they evoke pride from students and alumni alike.

Another top-performing tweet from the University of Iowa brought at-home fans into the mix. Celebrating WNBA player Caitlin Clark’s legacy, the tweet featured a wholesome compilation of fans — young and old — who were inspired by Clark.

This tweet earned a 5.39% engagement rate, which is an impressive 107 times higher than the average rate for schools and universities. One reason for this tweet’s success could be due to the fact that it was a video. According to Rival IQ’s post type analysis, Video was the most engaging post type on Twitter for schools in our Higher Ed landscape.

If you’re aiming to achieve impressive engagement rates on Twitter like Higher Ed does, take advantage of timely events and experiment with different post types. You can use Rival IQ to see what the most engaging types of posts are for brands like yours, as shown above, to lean into what works for your competitors.

Nonprofits

• Nonprofits Median Engagement Rate: 0.04%
• Nonprofits Median Posting Frequency: 6.97 posts per week

Nonprofits earn an above-average engagement rate of 0.04% and post more frequently than most other industries, sharing nearly seven tweets per week.

A nonprofit that stands out on Twitter (and is the top-performing nonprofit across social media channels) is Bat Conservation International. The organization is on a mission to end bat extinction worldwide and regularly shares bat facts and memes on Twitter as a way to communicate that message.

Because social media is a community-driven space, one popular way to bring attention to causes is by connecting it to a holiday that people can rally around and celebrate. Bat Conservation International did this with its “Bat Appreciation Day” tweet, which earned the organization an engagement rate of 14.2%, which is a mindblowing 355 times higher than the median rate for nonprofits on Twitter.

BCI also takes a playful approach to Twitter content. Take the tweet below, for instance. The tweet featured a light-hearted meme that reflected the nonprofit’s love for bats, making for a fun and entertaining post that captured the attention of hundreds of users and earned an impressive engagement rate of 4.8%, 120 times greater than the median engagement rate for nonprofits.

No matter how broad or niche your nonprofit’s mission is, there’s always an opportunity to connect with people about your cause. Twitter can be a great platform to reach a wide audience, so experiment with different post types and styles when spreading your message.

Alcohol

• Alcohol Median Engagement Rate: 0.04%
• Alcohol Median Posting Frequency: 1.02 posts per week

Though they tend to post less than the average brand in other industries, Alcohol is another industry that earns a good engagement rate on Twitter. The median engagement rate for Alcohol brands is 0.04% and these brands post about once per week.

Given the nature of the industry, alcohol brands have a lot of leeway to be fun, celebratory, and entertaining on social media, and especially on Twitter. One way brands do this is by sharing witty jokes and entertaining images. According to our 2024 Social Media Benchmark Report, status updates (text-only tweets) and photos were the most engaging post types for Alcohol brands on Twitter.

One brand example of a successful Status Update comes from White Claw. Considering the fact that Twitter is a conversation-driven platform, tweets that encourage users to reply perform particularly well. The one below, which earned 15x the median engagement rate for alcohol brands, is a prime example of how witty humor and a strategic prompt can get followers to engage — no video or photo needed.

In some cases, simply asking for engagement pays off. Prompting your followers to reply to a tweet can be a simple yet effective way to generate engagement.

In other cases, visuals are a much-welcomed addition. Night Shift Brewery’s tweet about the release of its Captain 37: The Patrice Pilsner featured a crisp image of the beer that complemented its announcement and sparked excitement about the new product. Replies were filled with curious questions and, with Twitter being the ideal platform for efficient interactions, the brand quickly responded with answers.

All in all, the tweet earned a 1.02% engagement rate which is 25 times better than the median rate for Alcohol brands and 35 times higher than the all-industry rate. Clearly, Twitter is still a great space for making major announcements and engaging with your brand’s community.

Key Takeaways for Twitter Engagement

If you want to accurately measure and improve your brand’s Twitter performance, marketers must know how to calculate Twitter engagement rate and have a benchmark to compare it with.

To sum it up, the overall median engagement rate on Twitter is 0.029% and the median posting frequency is 3.31 times per week. These are the numbers to aim for if you want to compete with the majority of brands.

If you want to boost your Twitter engagement rate, here are a few best practices to follow as demonstrated by some of the top-performing brands we covered:

• Be timely and participate in relevant conversations by tapping into trending topics and hashtags.
• Mix up your post types between Photos and Status Updates to see what your followers engage with most.
• Entertain and educate your followers using memes and threads.
• Twitter is a place for two-way conversations — reply back to your followers to keep the comments active.

As the Twitter (X) landscape continues to evolve, so will the average engagement rate for brands. As long as you continue to measure your performance, compare it with the competition, and adjust accordingly, your brand has an opportunity to break through the noise and create content that keeps your audience engaged for the long run.

This post was originally published in March 2022 and has since been updated.

The post What is a Good Engagement Rate on Twitter? appeared first on Rival IQ.

TikTok analytics encompasses all of the metrics and data about your content, audience, performance, and even industry trends. For brands that want to make an impression and reach their target audiences on TikTok, it’s important to not only track and measure key metrics but also use this data to create actionable strategies and get the most out of the social media platform.

Below, let’s dive into why you need to review your TikTok analytics regularly, which metrics to track, and how to measure your performance using TikTok analytics tools.

Why it’s Important to Measure Your Performance on TikTok

Marketers know how important it is to monitor and track how your brand is performing on every social channel. But keeping an eye on your analytics goes far beyond counting how many followers and likes your videos get.

When you track the right metrics and understand how you’re performing in relation to other brands on TikTok (by referencing TikTok Benchmark Report, for starters), you can get much more out of the platform.

Here are the benefits you gain when you monitor and measure your TikTok analytics.

Data-driven insight

If you follow the SMART goals framework (which stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound), then tracking your TikTok data is essential for the “M” or “measurable” part.

Whether your goal is to increase your engagement rate by 5% or double your audience size in the next three months, your specific goals need to be measurable if you want to achieve them.

Quantifiable metrics like engagement rate and number of video views let you know how your videos are performing on the platform and with your specific audience. When you know what is and isn’t working, you’ll better understand if you’re on track to meet your goals or what you need to adjust to achieve them.

Competitive context

It’s important to understand what the overall landscape looks like for brands on TikTok, but every industry is different. Nonprofits perform differently than Sports Teams who also have different engagement rates and goals than Beauty brands, for example.

This is why it’s important to benchmark your data against similar brands. Industry-specific data helps you understand how similar brands are performing on TikTok and puts your brand into a competitive context.

When you can see what your competitors are doing successfully on TikTok, you can experiment with similar tactics. Conversely, you may notice a gap in your industry and can stay ahead of the curve by trying it out before your competitors do.

Connect with your target audience

Ask any marketer who’s had one of their videos go viral on TikTok: seeing your views and engagement metrics spike can give you a jolt of excitement. But when the dust settles, how many of those engagements actually turned into quality followers?

You may have a goal of reaching more people or increasing your followers, but those goals are only successful if you reach the right audience. To do that, you have to know which metrics to track. TikTok metrics like engagement rate by follower, for instance, help you understand which videos are resonating with your audience.

The better you understand your target audience and what they like, the more you can tailor your TikTok content strategy to them.

Every TikTok metric you need to maximize your engagement

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Understanding Your TikTok Analytics: Key Metrics to Track

TikTok analytics includes several helpful metrics, many of which are different from the other platforms. While we’ve covered a full list of the top TikTok metrics to track, here’s a refresher:

• Engagement rate by view
• Engagement rate by follower
• Engagement total
• Hashtags per video
• Monthly follower growth rate
• Videos with mentions
• Videos per week
• Views per follower

Let’s go over a few of these metrics in more detail and break down some examples of brands with impressive performance.

Engagement rate by view

Engagement rate by view is one of the most telling metrics for how attention-grabbing your content is. When you take a video’s total engagements and divide that by the number of views, you can see what percentage of viewers stopped to not only watch your video but like, comment, or share it. The average brand on TikTok earns an engagement rate by view of 4.15%.

This metric is important to track if you want to measure how interesting your videos are and whether or not they’re helping boost your visibility, awareness, and interest.

A low engagement rate by view tells you that while people may have seen your video pop up on their FYP, the content of the video didn’t resonate with them. This could mean that you’re not reaching the right audience or that your videos aren’t encouraging engagement from your target audience.

A high engagement rate by view lets you know that the people who saw your video were either entertained, informed, or persuaded by the content.

ACLU, for example, consistently generates a high engagement rate by view on TikTok thanks to its informative videos. The civil liberties nonprofit informs, educates, and encourages action in its videos which has no doubt contributed to earning an average engagement rate by view of 13.7%. This is twice as high as the average for nonprofits on TikTok and three times greater than the overall average.

Engagement rate by follower

Reaching thousands or even millions of people on TikTok is great, but ultimately, if your own followers aren’t engaging with your content then it’s all for naught.

If you want to see how your audience feels about your videos, take a look at your engagement rate by follower. This metric indicates how engaging your content is to your followers. To give you a benchmark to measure against, the average engagement rate by follower on TikTok is 5.7%.

Engagement rate by follower is a helpful metric because it puts your videos into context with your audience size. You might have a smaller audience compared to other brands on TikTok, so comparing your engagement rates with theirs wouldn’t be fair.

Take Bat Conservation International, for example. The top-performing nonprofit has a much smaller audience than its fellow nonprofits on TikTok with about 24,000 compared to the competitor average of 163,000.

However, the bat conservancy nonprofit isn’t missing out on engagement. The nonprofit regularly earns an engagement rate by follower that’s much greater than the average. The video below, for example, generated an engagement rate by follower of 18.1%, which is three times higher than the overall average.

Videos per week

Another important metric to measure when diving into your TikTok analytics is videos per week. Tracking your posting frequency, as well as how often your competitors are posting, and comparing it with your engagement levels helps you understand how active you should be.

Overall, brands tend to post less often on TikTok than on other channels like Instagram. The average brand posts 1.75 times per week, which is about eight videos per month. However, every industry is different, so it’s important to measure this metric against similar brands in your industry to truly understand what frequency you should be aiming for.

Sports Teams, for instance, are known to be more active across social channels compared to other industries — especially during their playing season. On TikTok, we found that Sports Teams post about twice per week.

Orlando City Soccer Club is even more active than the average Sports Team, posting about four times per week — and sometimes more. The five videos below were all shared within a seven-day time period during its season.

Posting more often can lead to higher engagement totals since you’re creating more opportunities for people to engage with your content. On the flip side, a few engaging videos per month may be enough for your audience. Every industry and individual brand sees different results which is why this is a key metric to analyze.

Hashtags per video

Another important metric to keep an eye on is your brand’s use of hashtags. Not only do hashtags increase your discoverability on the platform, but you can also analyze which specific hashtags generate the most engagement for your brand.

Hockey team Carolina Hurricanes includes hashtags in 100% of its TikTok videos. The team uses industry-specific hashtags like #HockeyTok and #nhl which is a strategic way to get in front of more hockey fans. They also have an average engagement rate by follower of 8.17% and an 8.56% engagement rate by view, so it’s safe to say they’re reaching and engaging with the right audience.

One way to see which hashtags are trending is by scrolling through TikTok or checking out the “For your inspiration” tab (more on that below). Or you can take it a step further by using a third-party tool like Rival IQ’s hashtag analytics.

Our analytics tool helps you discover popular topics and engaging hashtags within your industry so you can see which conversations are driving engagement for your competitors and participate if it’s relevant to your brand.

How to Use TikTok’s Built-In Analytics Tools

TikTok’s built-in Creator tools are a quick and easy way to check in on your videos’ performance in just a few taps. You can navigate to these insights from each video you share or head to the “Creator tools” section from your profile. Social media marketers shouldn’t rely on TikTok’s insights alone, but the data offers a helpful overview of video metrics like average watch time and retention rate.

TikTok’s native tools are organized by analytics, monetization, and inspiration. For businesses, you’ll find most of the metrics you’re looking for under Analytics. This includes traffic sources, audience demographics, and viewer types (returning vs. new).

The “For your inspiration” tab can also be helpful to stay in the loop. In this section, you’ll not only see which sounds or stickers are currently trending but also the videos your followers viewed. This helps you understand what your audience likes and engages with.

3 Tools to Track TikTok Analytics

TikTok’s native analytics are helpful in a pinch whether you’re a one-person social team on a budget or just want a quick glimpse at how your latest video is performing.

But if you want to gather more specific insights about your brand’s performance on TikTok, consider using a social media analytics tool to track your data. Here are a few worthwhile tools to add to your social tech stack (and if you’re looking for more, here’s our full list of recommended TikTok analytics tools).

1. Rival IQ

Rival IQ’s social media analytics tool provides a comprehensive, in-depth look at your TikTok performance — as well as your data from Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Facebook — all in one dashboard.

In addition to seeing detailed analytics like engagement rate by view and follower for individual videos, you can also zoom out and see how your videos are performing over a set period. For example, below is a TikTok analysis for the Red Cross’s top videos. In addition to showcasing the nonprofit’s top videos over a three-month period, our tool also highlights key metrics like which hashtags the Red Cross used that were the most engaging.

Another key benefit of using Rival IQ for your TikTok analytics is the competitive analysis tools. It’s no secret that you compare your brand’s social posts to your competitors. But instead of visiting their TikTok to check out their videos and engagement, you can analyze their performance from the same dashboard as your own using Rival IQ.

You can create customizable landscapes that rank your brand’s metrics with the companies you want to compare with. Choose which competitors you want to monitor and the metrics you want to analyze — such as follower count, engagement rate, or views — and instantly get a visual view of where your brand stands in comparison. You can also set up notifications to get real-time updates.

If there’s a particular brand you want to compare your TikTok performance with, you can also run a head-to-head report to see exactly how you stack up.

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2. TrendTok

TikTok trends pop up seemingly overnight. If you’re looking for an easy way to stay on top of the latest sounds and topics, TrendTok may be the tool for you. TrendTok is similar to TikTok’s native “For your inspiration” tab in that it identifies which sounds and songs are trending in your region, niche, or among similar creators.

The app uses AI to curate suggestions for your profile so you can stay ahead of the curve and create videos that reflect your brand and audience.

3. Iconosquare

Iconosquare is a social media management and analytics tool that is best for social teams that want to schedule, manage, and analyze their TikTok videos in one place. On the analytics side of things, Iconosquare offers over 100 metrics to track, from follower growth to historical data.

In addition to seeing key TikTok metrics in your dashboard, you can also create detailed, customizable reports so you and your team can see a visual representation of your brand’s performance.

Wrapping it Up

Your TikTok data can tell you a lot about your brand’s videos, audience, and industry. To get the most out of your data, you have to know which metrics are important to your goals and how to analyze them.

To sum it up, some of the top metrics we recommend monitoring when reviewing your TikTok analytics include engagement rate by view and by follower, videos per week, and hashtags per video.

You can also understand your performance better if it’s in a competitive context, so don’t forget to measure your TikTok metrics to your direct competitors. By making a TikTok analytics review a regular part of your social strategy, you’ll be on your way to reaching your brand’s TikTok goals in no time.

The post A Complete Guide to TikTok Analytics and Reporting appeared first on Rival IQ.

Every social media professional knows that the best social media strategies are rooted in data. Whether you’re looking to improve the ROI of your social media or to earn buy-in from your company leadership, putting in the work to back your plan with data will pay dividends.

Luckily, performing a social media competitive analysis doesn’t have to be complicated. This post will make your job easy, and our reporting template will help you look amazing.

Free social media competitive analysis template

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How to Perform a Social Media Competitive Analysis in 9 Steps (With Examples)

Before you get started, grab your copy of our free social media competitive analysis template. 

We’ll walk through an example of creating an entire social media competitive analysis using our template. Our example brand for this walkthrough will be the beauty brand Laneige, and we’ll use a set of nine other brands from our Beauty landscape as the comparison set for our analysis.

Step 1: Identify your competition

The first step in completing a social media competitor analysis is building a set of competitors. Of course, you probably know your key competitors, but if you don’t, here are a couple of ideas for finding some comparisons: 

• Google search your brand name to look for other companies advertising against your brand.
• Google search for your main product to look for other companies.
• Use your profile page on Instagram or Twitter (X) to look for recommended other accounts to follow.

With Laneige as our example brand, we’ve built a competitive landscape using the top 10 beauty brands on social media. The competitive set for this analysis includes nine other beauty brands including Glossier, Rare Beauty, and Sol de Janeiro. 

Step 2: Determine active social media channels

Now that we have our competitive set, we need to determine which social media networks to include in our analysis. Using the data from our landscape, we’ll review average performance for audience, activity (posting frequency), and engagement to determine where to focus.

Note: For the rest of this example, we’ll perform our analysis using six months of data. We’d recommend using at least three months of data. Of course, using less will work, too, but keep it to at least 30 days’ worth of data.

Using our analysis of Laneige, we can see that Instagram is the dominant channel for the brand with 631K followers — nearly twice as much as its second-biggest channel, TikTok.

How does that compare to the competition? Instagram is also the channel with the biggest audience for Laneige’s competitors, followed by TikTok and Facebook. While Laneige has fewer followers overall than the competition, its audience grew by over 32% during the six-month reporting period.

Next, we can use activity metrics to understand where our brands invest their time. This should align with the channel(s) where their audience is most active and engaged.  

The slide below shows that the average beauty brand in this landscape is posting about 31 times per week across channels. About 40% of those posts are going on Instagram, followed by TikTok at 20%. Laneige also spends most of its time posting on Instagram at 43% and TikTok at 32%.

Step 3: Conduct positioning analysis

Next is positioning analysis. Positioning analysis helps you understand how competitors position themselves so you can identify any opportunities for your brand to stand out.

Reviewing the language you and your competitors use to describe your brand will inform how you craft and refine that positioning. A good way to do this is by analyzing the social bios of similar brands. 

Let’s look at all of the Instagram bios for the competitive landscape we put together:

We’ll start by looking for a few key items beyond which words these brands use to describe themselves. Specifically, we’ll examine hashtag usage, emojis, and references to other platforms. If you’re looking for the best tips and tricks for writing your bios, definitely read How to Write an Effective Instagram Bio.

Only three of the brands, Laneige, Fenty, and OPI, use a hashtag in their bio. Typically, brands want users to use their core brand hashtags, and putting them into your bio is an excellent way to let your fans know what to do.

Next, let’s look at emoji usage. Seven of the ten brands we’re examining use emojis, not including Laneige. There isn’t a pattern or common emoji used among these brands — there are varying shades of hearts, a few flags, and a smiley face, to name a few. This could be a good sign that each brand has a unique voice and tone that resonates with its audience. Laneige has an opportunity to add a unique emoji that represents its brand voice and is relatable to its followers. 

As for references to other platforms and accounts, almost all of the brands reference accounts for retail brands like Sephora, Ulta, and Target. Using a free word cloud generator, we can confirm that specific stores are some of the most used terms in these beauty brand bios. Many of these beauty brands, including Laneige, mention in their bios where people can buy their products so followers instantly have that information.

Step 4: Gather channel-specific metrics

To understand how your brand compares to similar brands on social, let’s dig into various benchmarks and metrics around social audience, activity, and engagement.

Each social network has its own feel and required strategy, so when conducting your competitive analysis, go channel-by-channel in this section to get the broadest picture possible of their social performance.

For each channel, review followers, posting frequency, engagement totals, and engagement rates.

Let’s start by taking a look at the key Instagram metrics for our example brand, Laneige. In the slide below, we’ve included three key pieces of information: Laneige’s performance on these key metrics, how Laneige’s performance has changed over time, and competitive benchmarks for each of these metrics.

As we mentioned earlier, we can see that Laneige has a smaller following than the other beauty brands in this competitive set. On a positive note, their following is growing at a 31% rate.

With posting about nine times a week, Laneige comes in a little less than the landscape average of about 12 times per week. Notably, in addition to increasing their posting frequency by nearly 28%, Laneige also saw a 40% increase in total engagement. 

For engagement rates, the landscape average increased by about 8.7%, while Laneige’s engagement rate dropped by a little over 11%. Noting these differences in performance between your brand and the landscape benchmarks is precisely why we do these types of analyses.

After examining Laneige’s social performance against the landscape in Rival IQ’s Custom Dashboards section, we can use competitor-level metrics to see exactly how Laneige ranks and to find examples of brands that are worth studying more because they’re outperforming the rest.

In the slide above, we’ve included follower, posting, and engagement rate metrics, along with the relative change on a brand-by-brand basis. This chart is sorted by the percentage change in engagement rate, from highest to lowest. You could choose to include other metrics, like engagement totals, comments, or more.

There is a tradeoff on having too many or too few metrics, so remember to try and keep things focused.

Step 5: Review best and worst-performing content

Now that we’ve reviewed metrics and hashtags, let’s focus on some of the creative in the actual posts that drive the numbers. This step is where you’ll take a look at your brand’s top-performing posts on each channel, as well as the worst-performing posts. 

To look at the top-performing posts from a competitive perspective, it is easier to see what a brand is working toward if you analyze the posts one company at a time. Of course, we all know it helps to have on-brand, thumb-stopping shots to drive engagement on Instagram. Researching a brand’s best and worst-performing content will give you insights into what works well, regardless of brand.

To begin, let’s start with our focus brand, Laneige. Below, we’ll see their top and bottom nine Instagram posts during the reporting period.

Laneige’s top three posts were Reels featuring actress and brand partner Sydney Sweeney. Star-studded content always stands out on Instagram, so it’s no surprise that these posts’ engagement rate was well above the brand’s average of 1.86%. Two of those Reels were also the top two posts for the entire competitive landscape, which is worth noting in the analysis.

The rest of the brand’s top-performing posts had cohesive brand imagery and showcased clean visuals of the product. Bright brand colors also made it easy to stand out and be recognizable in the feed. A majority of the top posts were also Reels. Post type is something to make note of, which we’ll go into in more detail below.

Looking at top-performing content is only half of the story. Finding patterns in the content that doesn’t get engagement also yields clues as to campaigns that could be improved.

We see Laneige’s nine lowest-engagement posts on Instagram have a different feel than their best-performing content. These all performed below the brand’s average of 1.86% and even below the median engagement rate of 0.19% on Instagram for beauty brands.  

There are no clear visuals of the product and the imagery and text overlays don’t match the rest of the brand’s content, making it difficult to identify in a busy feed.

You can do the same content analysis for as many brands in the competitive set as you’d like. Here’s an analysis of one of Laneige’s competitors, Glossier.

Step 6: Identify popular topics

Though the images in our posts are a huge factor in determining their success, the words that we use to connect with our audience matter, too. 

Staying with our trend of examining social engagement on Instagram, let’s look at how to reveal high-engagement topics by reviewing the most popular phrases within this beauty brand landscape. This step is to help you identify which topics your brand and your competitors not only used the most but were the most engaging. 

We’ll start out looking at the words Laneige is using in their posts using Popular Topics within Rival IQ.

For Laneige, these were the topics that generated the most engagement for the brand on Instagram. We can see that one of the brand’s specific products, the Water Bank Blue Hyaluronic Cream Moisturizer, generated the most buzz which makes sense since it was part of a major brand campaign this year.

If you’re looking for trends and tactics in your competitor analysis, one easy way to find them is to look at phrases and topics that several brands are using.

These were the topics beauty brands used the most on Instagram for the reporting period. Words like “available” and “coming soon” indicate these brands often posted about new products.

Step 7: Analyze hashtag engagement

Similar to analyzing popular topics, you’ll also want to take a look at frequently used hashtags among your competitors.  

Hashtags help users on social media find content related to a specific topic or theme. Brands also use hashtags to help users show their affection or affinity for a particular campaign. Using the right hashtags also is vital for helping users who aren’t in your audience discover your brand.

In performing a competitive hashtag review, we’re looking to understand how content using different hashtags performs and to learn if there are hashtag opportunities we’re missing. Also, studying hashtags can reveal competitive insights about our competitors’ campaigns.

To start, let’s look at the most broadly used hashtags on Instagram by the top beauty brands on Instagram. Some of the most frequently used hashtags include #grwm (get ready with me), #giveaway, and #valentinesday. The hashtag #InternationalWomensDay earned a 7.51% engagement rate, yet only three companies used it. 

Now let’s look at how Laneige is using hashtags on Instagram. Some of the brand’s most engaging hashtags include #SkincareMusthave and #CloudMakeup, each with a whopping 105% engagement rate. Other high-performing hashtags for the brand include #SephoraHaul at 35% and #Photoshoot at 30%.

Though these hashtags performed well above the hashtags used by the overall landscape, Laneige only used some of them one time. The takeaway? Analyze your high-performing hashtags and incorporate them more often when they make sense with the post.

Step 8: Analyze specific post types

The types of media that you post on social media matter. Depending on the platform, the topic, and the audience, you’ll want to ensure you’re posting the right mix of content.

One sure way to understand how your post types affect your engagement is to break down your analyses by post type. We’d urge you to always do post-type analysis on a channel-by-channel basis. No two social platforms are the same, and mixing channels in your analysis will lead to confusion.

Below, we’ll look at a post-type breakdown for Instagram posts for this landscape. The first thing you’ll note is that Carousels performed the best for beauty brands on Instagram. Photo posts and Reels had similar engagement rates, but these brands posted more Reels than any other post type. Using this data, Laneige and other beauty brands could invest more time into high-performing Carousels.

Step 9: Conduct a boosted post analysis

We can gain powerful insights by understanding how often our competitors boost their Facebook posts – and the topics they’re boosting. Using a tool like Rival IQ, we can analyze these boosted posts to see what really matters.

In the slide below, we see Laneige is one of only three brands that doesn’t boost posts on Facebook and those that boost aren’t seeing much difference from it. The engagement rate was relatively the same across the board, even for brands like Laneige that didn’t boost any posts.

Although this won’t be the case in every landscape, it’s helpful to know where your competitors are prioritizing their efforts and their dollars.

How to Use Your Social Media Competitive Analysis Template

After you’ve worked through the entire competitive analysis template, you should have a lot of juicy insights to dissect. Make note of key takeaways so you can start strategizing different ways to apply your findings to your social channels. 

Before you share your results with your team, do everyone a favor: put together an executive summary. Describe the analysis, draw attention to key insights from your research, and highlight the next steps. This should help the rest of your team determine where they’d like to dig into your report most.

Keeping an eye on your competitors’ activity and performance on social should be a regular part of your social media routine. Benchmarking against similar brands provides more context into how your own content is performing and makes it easier to identify opportunities to stand out or improve. 

How often you decide to conduct a full competitive analysis is up to you. We’d recommend doing this at least twice a year, so every six months. You can also conduct a competitive analysis every quarter or every month — but we wouldn’t recommend anything more than that as you need at least 30 days’ worth of data for the most accurate results. 

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You can use Rival IQ’s powerful competitive social media analytics to complete every part of what you’ve learned in this article. We offer a 14-day free trial, and we promise you’ll learn a ton about your industry along the way. Get after it!

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All of the data your brand needs to better understand your audience, keep tabs on industry trends, and make better business decisions can be found on social channels — but you need a social listening strategy to help you uncover it all.

Whether you’re new to social listening or need a quick refresher, let’s go over the benefits of integrating it into your marketing efforts and how to create a powerful social listening strategy for your brand.

How to Create a Social Listening Strategy in 5 Steps

Social listening is the process of analyzing and interpreting online conversations relevant to your brand, your product, or your industry even if your brand or product isn’t directly mentioned.

To make sure you’re paying attention to the right conversations, you need a social listening strategy to use as a guide. Keep these key components of a social listening strategy in mind if you want to meet your goals.

1. Set a specific social listening goal

As with any successful strategy, the first step is to set a specific goal that you want your social listening strategy to achieve. Without a goal, your strategy will lack direction and you won’t know where to focus your efforts.

What do you hope to achieve with your social listening strategy? Do you want to better understand your potential customers or do you want to gain insights into industry trends and competitor data? Here are some examples of social listening goals you may want to achieve:

• Improve customer sentiment and experience
• Develop content, product, or marketing ideas
• Discover new audiences to target
• Increase brand partnerships and influencer relationships

If your biggest goal is to improve customer sentiment and experience, then your strategy should focus on gathering as much data on your audience as possible to determine their overall perception and attitude toward your brand. Or perhaps your goal is to find and connect with more influencers. In this case, you could keep your eye on people who organically mention your brand or product — or influencers who mention your competition.

2. Identify the key metrics

Within those goals, there are several social listening metrics you can focus on. The key is to figure out which ones make the most sense to track for the goals you set. At Rival IQ, our top social listening metrics include:

• Sentiment
• Mentions
• Post volume
• Share of voice (SOV)
• Impressions
• Reach
• Engagement rate

While you’ll likely want to track all of these through your social listening efforts, there are some you may want to focus on more than others. For example, if one of your primary social listening goals is to improve brand perception, then you’d want to focus on sentiment analysis in your strategy.

Sentiment analysis involves analyzing posts, mentions of your brand, and online conversations to understand people’s attitudes and general feelings toward your brand. You can do this on a high level or conduct sentiment analysis for individual campaigns or products.

3. Choose a social media tool

To execute your social listening strategy, you need a comprehensive social listening tool that aligns with your goals. No matter how big or small your marketing budget is, there are a range of social listening tools that can be helpful for your strategy. Here are some of our favorite social listening tools:

• Rival IQ: No surprise here, but we have to recommend our own social listening tool. Social listening is integrated throughout the app, which is built through the lens of competitive analysis. If you want to listen to your competition alongside your own brand’s mentions, social conversations, and more, then create a landscape and tap into our social listening capabilities.
• Quid: If you’re looking for an enterprise-level social listening tool, Quid offers comprehensive consumer and market intelligence from all sources of the internet — from social channels to forums and blogs to news sites.
• Mention: Mention monitors online media, brand mentions, and audience insights and compiles everything into one easy-to-track dashboard.
• Twitter (X): Despite the recent changes on Twitter (now X), it remains a valuable tool for staying tapped into current conversations and budding trends.
• Google Alerts: You can use Google Alerts to set up real-time notifications (sent to your inbox) for articles and keywords that mention your brand, your competitors, or anything else you want to track.

Check out this round-up if you’re looking for a more detailed breakdown of the best social media listening tools.

4. Conduct competitive analysis

One of the key differences between social listening and social monitoring is taking a look beyond your own brand mentions and seeing what the competition is doing — and how they’re being perceived — online.

Conduct a competitive analysis to see how your current social channels, online presence, and brand perception compare to similar brands. To get started, think back to your primary social listening goal. If your goal is to improve customer sentiment, then analyze what the overall sentiment is for your competitors. If it’s more positive than yours, dig into what consumers are saying about them. Maybe they applaud their customer service or perhaps people love their mission. Whatever insights you’re able to pick up on, you can use that knowledge to highlight similar elements of your own brand.

5. Create a response plan for social monitoring

If your goal is to improve your brand management and be proactive about potential PR crises, then a response plan is critical. Social listening and social monitoring should work together. This means that your social listening strategy needs to include a plan of action for how your team conducts social monitoring and how your social listening efforts play a role.

For example, the team behind Postmate’s Twitter account responded to this tweet from a concerned customer even though the tweet doesn’t directly mention the brand (note: Uber owns Postmates after acquiring it in 2020). This is a great example of being proactive when it comes to monitoring online conversations to prevent potential crises or backlash.

To stay on top of conversations or comments that involve your brand but don’t directly mention you, compile a list of search terms, keywords, or brand names that you want to monitor. Then, use your social listening tool to track them and be alerted anytime they’re brought up online. Setting up a system like this ensures you and your team can address potential crises or negative conversations before they take off.

Social Listening vs. Social Monitoring

Before you dive into creating your social listening strategy, it’s important to understand the difference between social listening and social media monitoring.

As we mentioned earlier, social listening involves tracking and analyzing online conversations,  even if your brand or product isn’t directly mentioned. Social monitoring is when you keep tabs on direct mentions or tags of your brand.

While the two go hand in hand, the key differences between listening and monitoring are perspective and context. Social monitoring is important for real-time actions and direct communication such as responding to customer service questions or concerns. Social listening, on the other hand, is about reading between the lines and translating relevant online conversations into actionable takeaways.

To give you a better idea of how this works, take a look at this interaction between Warby Parker and a customer. Customer inquiries like this are common on Twitter and Warby Parker is quick to ensure customers have access to a discount code they can use right away. Warby Parker’s prompt response is an example of social media monitoring in action.

Social listening comes into play if Warby Parker were to take a look at recent customer interactions and identify patterns or opportunities to better understand customer sentiment. For example, a social listening strategy could help Warby Parker notice that questions about discounts come up often. To solve this, the glasses brand could make their discounts more discoverable to Twitter users by adding a discount code to their bio or pinning a tweet at the top of their page.

Social listening is about understanding brand perception and customer sentiment and acting on those findings.

The Benefits of Social Listening

As a data-driven marketer, social listening should be integrated into your overall marketing strategy. Social listening not only guides your actions and content on social but also helps you uncover data related to your target audience, industry trends, brand perception, and more. Here are some ways that your brand can benefit from a social listening strategy.

Audience insights

One of the biggest benefits of social listening is that it helps you get to know your audience on a deeper level. When you listen to online conversations your audience is having, you can pick up on their language, interests, and behaviors beyond the surface-level feedback you may get through direct interactions like mentions and comments.

For example, using Rival IQ’s social listening tool, we can see the popular terms, phrases, and emojis used in posts about Fenty Beauty. It’s no surprise that Fenty’s famous founder is mentioned the most in people’s posts, but we can also see that the term “NEW” is used often, too. This could indicate that Fenty’s customers and fans tend to be excited and post more when a new product launches.

What’s helpful about Rival IQ’s social listening tool is that you can also see which emojis are most used in your audiences’ posts. This not only gives you a sense of the general sentiment around your brand, but also lets you know how your audience talks online. You can then use this to inform the tone of your own content so you can interact with your followers in a way that resonates with them.

Campaign measurement

You can also use social listening to measure the success of a campaign, whether you’re launching a new product, announcing a partnership, or hosting an event. While the engagement on your campaign posts gives you a sense of how your followers feel, direct interactions don’t always tell the whole story. Social listening can help you understand the overall sentiment around a marketing campaign based on online conversations that might not directly mention your brand.

For example, let’s take a look at the sentiment around some of Fenty Beauty’s recent campaigns. Below is a word cloud for Fenty Beauty generated in Rival IQ’s social listening tool. The terms are shown in either green or red to represent positive and negative sentiments, respectively. A quick glance reveals that some of the biggest terms (the size indicates the number of posts that contributed to them) revolve around makeup and specific products.

If we look closer, we can also see that terms like “come to Target” drove positive sentiment. This specific term correlates with the announcement that Fenty Beauty launched in Ulta Beauty at Target on October 1st. The teams at Target, Ulta Beauty, and Fenty, could tap into their social listening tool to see that this campaign resonated positively online.

Another campaign that yielded positive reactions is Fenty’s Holiday Collection, specifically the packaging. The term “holiday collection packaging” is listed above as a term with positive sentiment. When we dig deeper into that term, we can see that there were 30 posts in a 30-day period that contributed to the sentiment, all of which are positive. Fenty’s marketing team could then lean into that sentiment by highlighting the packaging when marketing the holiday collection.

Product development

Listening to conversations online is a great way to inform your product development. There are a couple of ways to do this. One way is to take note of what your followers constantly ask about or mention in your posts. For instance, in the comment section under one of Live Tinted’s Instagram posts, a follower asks if the beauty brand plans on releasing a tinted brow gel. If Live Tinted didn’t already have this in the works, seeing frequent comments like this would prove that they probably should.

You can also use your social listening tool to see what ideas come up online. Using that same Fenty Beauty example above, we can see that “lip pencil” is one of the positive words that drives positive sentiment when people talk about the brand. Fenty Beauty doesn’t currently carry a lip pencil, so this could indicate that people are interested in one from the beauty brand.

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Industry trends

Social trends come and go within a day or two, so it can be a challenge to stay on top of them if you’re a solo marketer or on a small team, let alone decide whether or not to participate. Social listening tools can help with this by gathering data on industry trends so you don’t have to do all of the research yourself.

The data below shows the trending topics and hashtags used by brands in the beauty industry. Discovering these trending hashtags and topics can help you identify potential content ideas. For instance, one of the most engaging hashtags in this set is #ASMRUnboxing with a 23.3% engagement rate by follower.

ASMR (autonomous sensory meridian response) is the tingling sensation that can be triggered by soft noises like whispers and has been popularized by YouTube and TikTok creators. Here’s an example of an ASMR unboxing video:

As a beauty brand marketer, you could use this insight to create your own ASMR unboxing content for TikTok, Instagram, or YouTube. You could also partner with one of these ASMR creators and send them a box of products for them to feature in their own videos like the one above.

Identify influencers and brand partnerships

Another benefit of having a social listening strategy is being able to identify potential partnerships. You may already have an eye on influencers who align with your brand, product, or industry, but you likely found them organically or through outreach. Social listening helps you discover people who may not already be on your radar.

For example, let’s say you want to generate buzz around a new pumpkin spice-flavored lip balm launching in the fall. You can use a tool like Rival IQ to search for the term “pumpkin spice” to see if there are influencers who mention it in their content and could potentially be a good fit to promote your new product. You can also see which brands mention the term a lot. This can help you identify potential competitors or partnerships, depending on the industry they’re in.

Keep tabs on the competition

The same methods you use for your own social listening strategy can be employed for your competitors. Use social listening to stay on top of what similar brands are doing in regard to product development, customer relations, and marketing strategy. You can also identify opportunities to differentiate your brand from the rest.

To do this, you can organically track what the competition is doing online, or you can use a social listening tool that automatically collects and analyzes data from your competitors. Tracking their activity and data alongside your own brand monitoring helps you get side-by-side insights into how you’re performing in relation to similar brands in your industry.

Here’s an analysis of Live Tinted’s social media posting activity compared to other beauty brands. The visual breakdown of posts per week and on which channels could help Live Tinted decide where to focus their efforts if they wanted to match the posting frequency of their competition.

Social Listening Strategy Best Practices

A social listening strategy is only as good as you make it — as in, it’s not enough to just create a strategy and let it work on its own. As you’re putting your social listening strategy into action, keep these best practices in mind to get the most out of your efforts.

Set up alerts

Online conversations move fast. As soon as a trend, conversation, or sentiment is out there — good or bad — it can easily gain traction. The only way to ensure your brand stays ahead of these conversations is to get real-time notifications about changes or trends within your industry. You can set up Google Alerts for your brand name, competitor brands, or industry topics to get notified as soon as something newsworthy crops up.

If you use Rival IQ, you can also set up custom alerts that are delivered straight to your inbox. You can set up alerts for a range of updates that are important to you including stand-out posts, trending topics and hashtags within your industry, or even when your competitors change their bio.

Filter out the noise

As important as social listening is to a brand’s marketing success, you don’t need to tune into *everything* that’s being said online. One key to effective social media listening is understanding how to hone in on the important metrics and filter out the rest.

What you focus on and what you choose to filter depends on your social listening goals. For example, maybe one of your goals is to find new audiences to reach. If your current audience spends a lot of time on Twitter, then you probably don’t want to analyze data from that channel for this particular goal. You could filter that data out and instead focus on YouTube or forums.

Measure your results

Like the rest of your social media strategy, your social listening efforts should always be measured. Use your original objective and KPIs to track your results and determine if you’re meeting your goals or if you need to make adjustments.

If your goal was to improve customer sentiment over a set period of time, then track your progress month to month. In Rival IQ, you can track your brand’s net sentiment per day which helps you visualize how the sentiment around your search terms has changed over time.

Wrapping it Up

A social listening strategy is essential for every brand. When social listening is done right, it not only impacts your social performance but also informs your overall marketing strategy and can influence major business decisions. For social listening to be effective, you have to take an active role by setting specific goals, identifying the KPIs that you want to measure, and regularly monitoring and analyzing online conversations. The data is there — you just have to know what to listen for.

The post How to Create a Powerful Social Listening Strategy appeared first on Rival IQ.

The right hashtags can help you not only land on users’ For You feed and join in on relevant trends, but they can also help establish brand awareness and be used to generate buzz around campaigns. And when you only have 280 characters to get your message across, it’s even more important to be selective about which hashtags you choose to include and why.

Below, let’s go over the benefits of using Twitter hashtags, the different ways brands can use them, and how to find the best hashtags to include in your Twitter hashtag strategy.

Why You Should Use Twitter Hashtags

On a platform as fast-paced as Twitter, staying on top of the trends and hashtags will always be one of the top best practices to follow. But it’s not enough to simply tack a trendy hashtag onto your tweets every now and then. If you really want to create engaging tweets that speak to your audience and increase your reach on the platform, then you need a solid Twitter hashtag strategy. Here are a few benefits of using Twitter hashtags.

Increases engagement

One of the biggest reasons to use hashtags in your tweets is that they can help boost engagement. The median engagement rate on Twitter across industries is 0.035%. Adding a hashtag can improve this rate in a couple of ways. First, your tweet can have greater reach when you use a popular or trending hashtag that people are already searching for (we’ll cover this more below). Second, hashtags can help start a conversation or show support which will earn your tweet more likes, comments, and retweets from followers and non-followers alike.

Here’s an example to put that into perspective. Sports Teams have an average Twitter engagement rate of 0.078% (higher than any other industry on Twitter). But when teams used the hashtags #NewProfilePic, they earned an average engagement rate of 2.33% which is nearly 30 times higher than average.

The Buffalo Bills earned high engagement rates when the team changed its profile picture and used the hashtag to show their support for injured player Damar Hamlin. This tweet received an engagement rate of 12.7%, a whopping 162 times higher than the average rate.

Builds brand awareness

Another reason to incorporate hashtags into your Twitter strategy is to build brand awareness by using a branded hashtag. A branded hashtag is an original hashtag that represents your company. It can be similar to a tagline, or you can create one for a specific campaign. Branded hashtags are a great way to communicate your message to people who may be interacting with your brand or content for the first time.

For instance, The National Park Service launched the Find Your Park campaign in 2016 to celebrate its 100th birthday. The campaign name has continued beyond the anniversary and is now used as a conversation starter and branded hashtag on the organization’s Twitter profile.

Makes your brand discoverable

Hashtags can also be used to get in front of your target audience. Twitter hashtags help your target audience find you organically if they’re searching for a hashtag or topic that you used.

To make your brand more discoverable, use hashtags that your target audience is searching for. You can do this by tapping into trending hashtags or conversations, especially when there’s a major event happening that you know a ton of people are paying attention to, like the Super Bowl or the Oscars, for instance.

Elle Singapore, the Singapore arm of the fashion media brand Elle Magazine, tapped into several timely hashtags during Paris Fashion Week. Paris Fashion Week is a global event that brings together the high fashion community, designers, and celebrities from around the world. Elle Singapore leveraged the event’s reach and momentum to get in front of a wider audience beyond its current followers.

Not only did the brand live-tweet runway shows and celebrity sightings using the hashtag #PFW, but it also included hashtags of designer and celebrity names in case anyone was searching for those individuals during the festivities.

This is a great example of how to tap into a popular conversation or timely event to help more people discover your content on Twitter.

4 Ways to Use Hashtags on Twitter

There’s no question that hashtags can help you improve your reach and impressions (among other key metrics on Twitter). If you’re looking for inspiration for your Twitter hashtag strategy, here are a few different ways you can use hashtags on the platform to increase your reach, boost engagement, and make your content more discoverable.

Branded hashtags

As mentioned earlier, branded hashtags are a great way to increase brand awareness. You can create a branded hashtag that you want people to use when tweeting about your brand, or as a way to join in on a conversation. You can also create a branded hashtag to generate buzz around a specific campaign or promotion.

One example of a branded hashtag campaign comes from Slim Jim. The snack brand has been engaged in a partnership of sorts with fellow food brand, Cinnabon for nearly a year. The two brands have been “in a relationship” on Twitter, regularly interacting with each other through flirty tweets and using the aptly named couple name, “Slimabon” to commemorate the relationship.

Recently, the two brands decided to officially tie the knot (yes, really). Slim Jim and Cinnabon involved their followers throughout the wedding planning process by using the hashtag #SlimabonWedding. Using this branded hashtag helped followers keep track of the wedding updates and get involved. And it wasn’t all for naught as the brands sent party favors to dedicated fans in the form of gift cards and merch.

Branded hashtags can also be useful if you’re running a contest or giveaway, are hosting a live event, or for real-time game updates.

Holiday hashtags

Holiday-related hashtags continue to earn high engagement rates across all industries. When we talk about holidays, they aren’t limited to the traditional ones we think of on a seasonal basis. These days, there’s a holiday, event, or dedicated day for nearly everything — and there’s also a supporting hashtag.

To stay on top of national days worth adding to your content calendar, check out National Today Calendar. The website curates thousands of holidays from federal to food-related to special interest. Identify the hashtags relevant to your industry and search Twitter to see how those hashtags were used in previous years.

You can also use a social media analysis tool to see which hashtags your competitors are using. Here’s a glimpse at Rival IQ’s hashtag analysis tool that curates the most used and most engaging hashtags for your industry. The example below is an analysis of hashtags used by schools and universities. The hashtag that earned the highest engagement was #NationalChampionship, but you’ll also notice that holidays like #NationalDogDay and #NationalMascotDay performed well, too.

Bowling Green State University took advantage of #NationalMascotDay by sharing a handful of photos of the school’s pair of mascots. The tweet below earned an engagement rate of 0.30%, which is over eight times higher than the average engagement rate on Twitter.

Start or join a conversation

Hashtags can be a powerful way to let your followers know what you stand for. For example, there are many social movements and causes that have dedicated hashtags such as #BlackLivesMatter and #StopAsianHate. Nike proudly displays both of these hashtags in its Twitter bio as a way to let its followers know what’s important to them.

You can also use hashtags to start your own conversations around timely topics. The Institute for Justice, a nonprofit that protects civil liberties, regularly does this by using the hashtag #SCOTUS to bring attention to certain Supreme Court cases that its audience might want to learn more about. The tweet below earned an engagement rate of 0.51% which is over 14 times higher than the average rate on Twitter.

Tap into trending hashtags

Like holidays, there are plenty of topics and hashtags that come up that may or may not be relevant to your brand. If there is one that’s relevant to you, it’s important to jump on the trend as soon as possible to participate in the conversation before it becomes yesterday’s news.

You can use Twitter’s Explore tab to stay on top of breakout topics and trending hashtags that have popped up organically. However, doing this can take time and resources that social media managers just don’t have. If you don’t want to be glued to your screen and refreshing your Twitter Explore tab all day, use a social media tool to keep an eye on the trends.

For example, our live benchmarks track social media posts shared by brands across industries in real-time. Below are some popular hashtags for civil rights nonprofits.

How to Find Trending Hashtags on Twitter

Figuring out which hashtags to use for your tweets can be challenging if you’re starting from scratch. A good place to start is by turning to the platform itself to see what’s currently trending. Doing an organic search can help you see what’s trending across all Twitter users. If you want to get more specific and reach your target audience, use a tool like Rival IQ to find hashtags that are trending in your industry.

Let’s go over how to find hashtags on Twitter (X) organically and using Rival IQ.

How to search for hashtags organically

The first step is to visit the Explore tab. From there, you’ll see which topics the algorithm has curated for you based on types of tweets and people you typically interact with. You’ll also see a tab dedicated to trending topics and hashtags. These are the conversations that people are having *right now* so this tab is as close to real-time as you can get.

You can also search for a hashtag to see what types of tweets people are sharing about the topic — and who is using the hashtag. Not only is this a good way to identify the topics and hashtags you should be using, but it’s also helpful for conducting competitor research. Below are the search results for #InternationalPodcastDay, for example. If you have a podcast and want to learn more about other podcasts out there, this could be a good way to discover some popular ones.

How to find trending hashtags on Rival IQ

If you have a Rival IQ account, you can use the hashtag analysis tool to find trending hashtags for your industry. If you don’t have an account, you can sign up for a free trial to take advantage of the hashtag tool and more.

With Rival IQ, you can create a landscape with a group of companies, like your competitors, that you want to analyze. Once you have your landscape created, you can compare your social performance to the competition and see what type of content — in this case, tweets — similar brands are sharing and what kind of engagement they’re getting.

Once you’re in your dashboard, head to the Social Analytics drop-down menu and select Twitter. Once there, go to the Social Posts tab and scroll down until you see Popular Topics and Hashtags. These lists display the most frequently used topics and hashtags among the companies in your landscape as well as which ones earned the most engagement.

You can also see how many of the companies in your landscape used the trending hashtags, and whether or not you did. Seeing this competitive data can help you discover relevant hashtags to use on Twitter as well as identify opportunities to join conversations that your competitors haven’t participated in yet.

Wrapping it Up

Using hashtags on Twitter is a smart way to break through the noise and reach your target audience. Twitter continues to be a lively channel where a stream of conversations come and go on a daily basis. Hashtags are a helpful way to tap into those conversations before it’s too late.

Twitter hashtags can also help your brand be more discoverable and engaging to both existing and potential followers. When you use the right hashtags — ones that are relevant to your brand and audience — you increase your chances of getting in front of more people, tapping into relevant conversations, and improving your overall Twitter engagement.

The post A Complete Guide to Using Hashtags on Twitter appeared first on Rival IQ.

There are hundreds of nonprofits on TikTok that have found success in raising awareness for their cause and generating community engagement. And we analyzed those organizations in our first-ever benchmark report for nonprofits to identify the strategies that the top NGOs are using to find success on the platform.

If your nonprofit isn’t on TikTok yet — or maybe you are, but your content hasn’t quite taken off — then take inspiration from what some of the top-performing nonprofits on TikTok are doing right on the social channel.

Top Nonprofits on TikTok

Nonprofits on TikTok are following similar best practices that most industries have found success with: tapping into trending sounds, having fun, and creating casual, less-produced videos. When it comes to engagement, nonprofits earned a median engagement rate by view of 4.37%, which is a little lower than the all-industry average of 5.69% from our 2023 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report.

Nonprofits also posted a little less often than other industries on TikTok. The average number of videos published each week was 0.5, which equals about twice a month. Most of the top-performing nonprofits posted more often than the average, suggesting there’s room to increase engagement if you have the time and resources to get more active on the social media platform.

With these benchmark stats in mind, these are the top nonprofits on TikTok. All of these nonprofits earned an above-average engagement rate on TikTok.

1. Amnesty International
2. Natural Resources Defense Council
3. Innocence Project
4. Joffrey Ballet
5. ACLU
6. Bat Conservation International
7. American Red Cross
8. National Down Syndrome Society
9. Institute for Justice
10. represent.us
11. College Board

See the full rankings for nonprofits on social.

Download the report

5 Strategies From the Top Nonprofits on TikTok

If you’re looking for TikTok inspiration for your nonprofit, let’s take a look at some of the winning strategies that the top-performing nonprofits on TikTok use to increase views, generate engagement, and raise awareness for their organizations.

1. Mix high-low content: National Resources Defense Council

One of the top-performing nonprofits on TikTok is the National Resources Defense Council, or NRDC. With around 54K followers, NRDC has a smaller audience compared with the other top nonprofits on TikTok. However, the organization earned the top spot when it comes to engagement rate by view. NRDC had a median engagement rate by view of 28.7%, which is over six times greater than the average rate for nonprofits.

NRDC is an environmental nonprofit that works to fight climate change, protect wildlife, and advocate for public health and equality. To communicate this message, the nonprofit primarily shares short explainer videos that shed light on current events, environmental terms, and different community organizations around the world. While these topics are certainly not causes to be taken lightly, the nonprofit has carved out a space on TikTok to share information in a digestible and informative way.

The video below follows a similar approach by using a trending sound to address a serious topic. This video was the top-performing post out of all the top nonprofits on TikTok for the time period we analyzed. The video generated a 32.7% engagement rate by view, which is over seven times better than the median rate for nonprofits on TikTok.

The nonprofit used the momentum from this video to continue campaigning for the same cause. As we can see below, NRDC shared an update about their campaign about a week after the meme video, and this one generated an engagement rate by view of 31.1%. It also received over one million views, which is almost twice as many views as the trendy video.

What’s interesting about these two videos is that they experimented with different approaches to address the same topic — the first being a funnier take and the second making a serious statement. NRDC makes the case for maintaining a strong point of view and leveraging TikTok trends when it’s relevant.

To make this work for your nonprofit, experiment with a mix of funny, low-lift content and more produced videos to see what lands with your audience. Funny and entertaining always performs well on TikTok, so if it makes sense to, use a trending sound every once in a while to draw more people in.

2. Tap into TikTok trends and communities: Bat Conservation International

Welcome to #BatTok. Countless internet micro communities originate on TikTok, and Bat Conservation International has tapped into one of them. BCI uses TikTok to tap into the very niche, yet engaged community that is #BatTok (the hashtag currently has over 22 million views) to share information about its efforts.

The bat conservancy nonprofit includes hashtags like #BatTok and #fyp in nearly all of its videos, which can be one of the reasons it’s finding success on TikTok when it comes to engagement. Even with a smaller audience than most of the nonprofits we analyzed, BCI has a higher-than-average engagement rate, both by follower and by view. The nonprofit has a median engagement rate by view of 16.1%, which is over three times better than the average nonprofit on TikTok.

One of the nonprofit’s top-performing videos generated an engagement rate by view of 21.2% which is almost five times greater than the average rate for nonprofits on TikTok. This video also earned an engagement rate lift that was almost 80 times higher than the average for similar videos from the nonprofit.

The short video featured a clip of a bat with trending audio in the background that perfectly synced up with the bat’s movements. It was a low-effort video with high impact, which is one of the best strategies to use on TikTok — and one that BCI leans into for most of its videos.

The takeaway? If you think your nonprofit’s mission is too niche to resonate with a broad audience on TikTok, think again. There’s a community for every interest on the platform. And if there’s not, you can always spark interest by creating buzz around the topic yourself. The key is to stay on top of trending sounds and hashtags so you can create reactive content and widen your reach on the platform.

3. Start the conversation: Innocence Project

With nearly 80,000 followers and a median engagement rate by view of 17.5%, the Innocence Project is another nonprofit seeing success on TikTok. The criminal justice organization works to free innocent people, prevent wrongful convictions, and ultimately make the criminal justice system more equitable. On TikTok, they share the stories of people they’re working with, information about the inner workings and inequities of the criminal justice system, and positive updates about clients they’ve helped free.

The nonprofit relies on the community to sign petitions and spread the word about cases they’re working on, so it makes sense to tap into TikTok’s massive reach to communicate that message. For one of their campaigns last year, the Innocence Project created a dedicated hashtag to generate awareness and increase engagement around a particular case. The original hashtag, #savemelissalucio was viewed nearly three million times on TikTok and was used in three of the Innocence Project’s most engaging videos.

In addition to creating a dedicated hashtag, the nonprofit directly encouraged its followers to duet, share, and stitch the video below to help spread its urgent message — and it clearly worked. The video generated a 22% engagement rate by view and 62.5% engagement rate by follower. More importantly, however, the video was also shared over 3,000 times.

The Innocence Project demonstrates how to start a conversation and encourage engagement to increase your reach. The key is to use clear CTAs, communicate a sense of urgency (when it makes sense to), and raise awareness through original storytelling.

4. Stay current and consistent: ACLU

ACLU, or American Civil Liberties Union, is a well-established NGO that’s been fighting for human rights since the 1920s. The organization takes on major issues nationwide, so it makes sense to be active on TikTok where it can reach as many people as possible, especially a younger audience. ACLU has around 144K followers and generates a median engagement rate by view of 13.7%, which is a little over three times higher than the average nonprofit on TikTok.

One thing that makes the ACLU stand out from the rest of the nonprofits we analyzed is its posting frequency. The nonprofit shares about two videos per week, which is about three times more than the average nonprofit on TikTok.

The ACLU is also quick to react to current events or movements and regularly shares explainer videos so its followers can better understand what’s at stake and how to get involved. Most of the organization’s videos also use a trending sound, which is a common theme among the top nonprofits on social media.

ACLU’s most engaging video had almost one million views, generated an engagement rate by follower of 132%, and had an engagement rate by view of 16% which is over three times as high as the median rate for nonprofits on TikTok.

Staying on top of current events *and* trending sounds requires active social listening so you can not only react quickly but also whip up a relevant video that addresses what your audience wants to see. ACLU has clearly invested time and resources into staying tapped into the current conversations. TikTok trends move fast, but you don’t need to have a big team or a hefty budget to keep up. Use a social listening tool to ensure you’re always up to date on what’s happening in your industry. And if you have a Rival IQ account, you can also use our analytics tool to identify trending topics and hashtags that your competitors are using so you’re never the last to know about what everyone is talking about.

5. Leverage #LearnOnTikTok: American Red Cross

Red Cross earned the gold in both follower count and views compared with all of the nonprofits we analyzed, making the organization one of the top nonprofits on the platform. Red Cross also has a median engagement rate by view of 8.14% which is almost twice as high as the average nonprofit on TikTok.

One reason for the Red Cross’ success can be attributed to its educational content. Since the Red Cross is dedicated to teaching life-saving skills and helping people prepare or recover from emergencies, most of its videos are how-to-style. They often feature quick tips for day-to-day occurrences that may require first aid, such as a nose bleed, for instance. To increase the reach of its videos, Red Cross includes hashtags like #FirstAid and #LearnOnTikTok in 100% of its videos. The #LearnOnTikTok hashtag is one of the most popular hashtags on TikTok with over 660 billion views and counting, and Red Cross leverages this opportunity to get more visibility on its videos.

The nonprofit’s top-performing video during our reporting period generated a whopping 2.5 million views and had a 12.2% engagement rate by view, which is almost three times as high as the average rate for nonprofits on TikTok. If you take a look at the types of engagement, you can see that this helpful video — which was a compilation of common first aid mistakes — generated a good amount of comments and shares, proving that the content resonates with its audience.

Another thing that the Red Cross does well on TikTok is replying to users, specifically with a video reply. Interacting with your followers in the comment section is a crucial part of maintaining an active and engaging presence, and it’s also a great way to get inspiration for more content ideas.

If you take a look at the comments section under any of the Red Cross’s videos, there’s more than likely a video response from the nonprofit’s social team that introduces another helpful topic. In the example below, a follower left a comment about tornados on one of the nonprofit’s videos about lightning, which opened the door for an entirely new safety topic that Red Cross could address.

This approach is beneficial for engagement in a couple of ways. For starters, reading the comments under your videos lets you know what your followers are interested in seeing more of. This can inspire more content ideas so that you can consistently create videos that TikTok users will engage with. And second, using video replies loops the original commenter back in, which indicates that you’re listening to what your followers have to say. This will effectively make your audience feel more involved and will hopefully inspire them to be active participants in your TikTok videos.

Wrapping it Up

If your nonprofit isn’t on TikTok yet, now is the time to build your audience and advocate for your mission on the platform. With TikTok’s incredible reach, you can increase awareness for your organization and get in front of potential volunteers, donors, supporters, and people who may need your help.

Take a cue from the strategies these top nonprofits are using to generate engagement and reach a massive audience on TikTok. By using these benchmarks and being willing to experiment with the latest trends and short-form videos, your nonprofit will be on its way to seeing TikTok success in no time.

Start analyzing your nonprofit’s social with a free Rival IQ trial.

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The post Top Nonprofits on TikTok and What You Can Learn from Them appeared first on Rival IQ.

This is why Instagram ads are important to mix into your brand’s social strategy. Instagram ads help break through the algorithm, increase your reach, and amplify the organic content you worked so hard to create.

Whether you’re new to running Instagram ads or just need a refresher, let’s go over when to use Instagram ads, the different types of Instagram ad formats, and how to run your ads and track their performance.

What are Instagram Ads and When Should You Use Them?

Instagram ads are a form of paid content used to expand your reach, increase engagement, sell more products, and convert users into customers.

If you haven’t experimented with paid social before, you may be wondering: Are Instagram ads worth it? The answer is yes, when done right.

To succeed with Instagram ads, you first need to have your target audience set up so your ads can reach the right people. You also need to have strong messaging and visuals that capture your audience’s attention and speak to the action you want them to take, whether that’s to learn more about your brand or shop a new collection of products.

When to Use Instagram Ads

The best way to use Instagram Ads is to reach potential customers who don’t already follow you and wouldn’t organically see your content.

To get the most out of your ads, each one needs a goal. What do you want users to do after they see your ad? Follow you? Visit your website? Sign up for an account? Whatever action you want them to take, Instagram probably has a CTA button for it.

Here are the CTAs you can include on your Instagram ads:

• Sign Up: If you have a subscription or account-based business, use the Sign Up button to convert Instagram followers into users.
• Learn More: This CTA is best for increasing brand awareness and can be used to send users to a landing page to learn more about your campaign, product, or service.
• Shop Now: If you have a collection of products to promote, the Shop Now CTA makes it easy for people to explore and make a purchase — all without leaving the app.
• Book Now: Similar to shop now, the Book Now CTA is best for service businesses that are advertising appointments, hotel stays, or something similar.
• Visit Instagram Profile: This CTA sends users directly to your profile. It’s best for increasing brand awareness and gaining new followers.

5 Types of Instagram Ads

Before you start creating Instagram ads, it’s important to understand your options. One ad format may be better suited for your campaign than another, so it’s essential to choose the one that will generate the best results for your ad goals.

Here are the Instagram ad formats you can choose from:

• Image
• Video
• Carousel
• Stories
• Explore Page

Let’s go over a few examples of each of these ad types so you can see what they look like in action — and get inspiration for your own Instagram ads.

Image ad

The first type of Instagram ad is an image ad. These ads are single-image, static post types that are commonly seen within the feed, though you can also use a photo ad in Stories and the Explore page. You can choose to have your single-image ads appear as a square, landscape, or vertical in the feed.

Photo ads are best to use when you have a strong message that can be communicated with a single visual. A great example of this is the ad below from First Aid Beauty. The image ad is effective for a couple of reasons. For starters, the graphic presents a simple photo with a strong message that lets people know about the brand’s biggest sale that’s currently happening.

Another great element of the photo ad is that it includes a discount code in the caption underneath the CTA to Shop Now. This makes it easy for users to start shopping within the app.

Instagram image ads can also be used to direct users to your website or landing page like this ad from Breef does. The ad includes a simple graphic that introduces users to the brand and includes a CTA button to “Learn More.”

If you don’t want to run a full Instagram ad campaign, you also have the option to boost your Instagram posts, instead. Boosting is a way to increase the reach of an Instagram post you already published. Boosting is a convenient way to get the most value out of organic content that you already created. In the image below, you can see the data behind Rival IQ’s boosted Instagram posts. You don’t have to put a ton of money behind your boosted posts to see results such as increased impressions and click-through rate, either.

It’s also worth mentioning that when you boost an Instagram post, it includes a “Sponsored” label just like an ad would.

Here’s an example of a boosted Instagram post from the Austin-based small business, Coloring Austin. The art business boosted one of its posts and included a CTA button that prompts users to visit the brand’s Instagram profile to learn more about the brand.

Video ad

If you want to go beyond a static post to capture your audience’s attention, consider a video ad. Video ads are best for taking viewers through a journey by telling a story or illustrating a process.

The idea of creating cinema-style videos may sound daunting, but just remember that you don’t need to be a videographer to create Instagram video ads. Depending on your brand and audience, your video can be more on the informal side, or you can use a tool like Canva to create animated visuals. Animated graphics and motion art can also be used for your video ads, like the one below from Linktree.

While it’s hard to tell from this screenshot, the actual video ad included moving elements to represent the different branding customizations you can make on your Linktree page. The ad included a CTA to sign up for a Linktree account.

Video ads can be used in the Feed, on Stories, on Reels, and on the Explore Page. Below are a couple of examples from a QuickBooks video ad used in two different places.

The first one is a screenshot of a video ad QuickBooks ran in the feed. The video features the story of a real-life small business owner talking about how difficult it was to track and organize receipts and other business financials before she found QuickBooks.

QuickBooks ran the same campaign as a Stories ad, too (we’ll go over Instagram ads for Stories in more detail below). For Stories, the featured small business owner was different, but the concept followed a similar storyline and included a CTA to sign up for an account.

Something to consider when using a video ad on Stories is the sizing difference. Stories are displayed in a vertical frame — which can be a plus as it takes up more of the viewer’s screen — but if your video isn’t edited to fit that specific size, you risk your video being cut off.

Another spec worth mentioning is the length of your video ads. According to Meta’s best practices for Instagram video ads, in-feed video ads can be up to 60 minutes long. However, video ads in Stories can only be 120 seconds long.

Carousel ad

As we know from our benchmark report, carousels are one of the most interactive post types on Instagram. Carousel ads are engaging for a similar reason — they prompt Instagram users to swipe through multiple slides and give your brand more than one opportunity to convince them to tap that CTA button.

On Instagram, carousel ads are an effective way to promote a collection of products, like in this Anthropolgie ad.

The carousel features multiple products, each with their own description in the caption and a CTA button to Shop Now.

You can also get creative with carousel ads and use them to tell a story or take users through a quick buyer journey. For example, you can use each slide to answer any questions a potential customer may have if they’re unfamiliar with your brand.

Vacation offers a great example of how to use a carousel to introduce your product to Instagram users. The first slide in the carousel ad showcases the product with a visually appealing image and a short tagline. It also includes a Shop Now CTA button.

As you scroll, the other slides include reviews and quotes that help build social proof. If you were unfamiliar with the product before seeing this ad, scrolling through Vacation’s carousel would certainly improve your awareness and maybe even convince you enough to add it to your cart.

Instagram Stories ad

Stories is another popular placement for Instagram ads. Ads here integrate seamlessly with the other Stories users are tapping through, so it makes sense to include Stories in your paid content strategy.

When it comes to organic Stories content, each frame needs to hook your viewer to capture engagement and improve retention. The same goes for Stories ads. If you’re looking for inspiration for an Instagram Stories ad, take a cue from the swimwear brand Summersalt.

The ad below is effective because it features an animated countdown that not only captures a viewer’s attention but also creates a sense of urgency around their sale event.

When people are viewing Stories, they’re often tapping through until something catches their eye. There’s no doubt that an interactive countdown would compel you to hold down that frame to make sure you’re not missing something.

Explore Page ad

If you ever venture into your Explore Page tab on Instagram, then you know it’s a hodge podge of content. It’s hard to tell what’s up and what’s down, so, unsurprisingly, this makes it a good place for marketers to sneak in paid content.

In the screenshot below, you can see an outlined ad from Getaway House. It’s sandwiched between numerous organic posts, though it’s bigger than the rest of the posts. However, it blends in enough for a user to casually discover and tap on.

If you were to click on Getaway’s ad in the Explore page, it would take you directly to the full post where you have the option to actually click on the CTA button and book your tiny cabin getaway trip.

How to Run Ads on Instagram

If you’re ready to start investing in paid content on Instagram, here are the steps to follow to set up and publish Instagram ads.

To start, go to Ads Manager and click the “Create” button in the left corner to start a new ad.

You’ll get a prompt to choose your campaign objective. Your options are:

• Awareness
• Traffic
• Engagement
• Leads
• App promotion
• Sales

Meta also lets you know how each objective is different and the general results it may achieve, like video views or reach. You also have the option to name your campaign before continuing to the next step.

The next step is where you’ll set up your audience, ad budget, and ad run time. You’ll start by choosing a specific performance goal. If your objective is awareness, you can choose whether you want to maximize the reach of ads, maximize the number of impressions, or maximize ad recall lift.

Next, you’ll define the audience you want your ad to reach. If you’ve run Instagram ads before, you can select the same audience you targeted last time, or create a new one if you’re starting from scratch.

As you enter the details about your audience, like demographics, interests, and behaviors, Meta will show you how many people your ad is estimated to reach based on your budget, ad placement, and any previous campaign data.

The last step when setting up your Instagram ad is to choose the format and placement. This is where those ad types we mentioned earlier come into play.

You have the option to select either a single image or video, a carousel, or a collection. Once you choose, you can see a preview of what each of your ads will look like in the Feed, Stories, or Reels.

Once you’ve adjusted everything and are satisfied with how your ad looks, you’re ready to hit publish. But you’re not quite done yet! Instagram ads may effortlessly run in the background, but that doesn’t mean you can forget about them and hope they generate results.

After you’ve published your ad, it’s time to track and measure your performance so you can know if your efforts have paid off.

How to Track Your Instagram Ad Performance in 3 Steps

Tracking and measuring your Instagram ad performance is essential to ensure the resources you’re investing in are generating results.

For instant insights, you can check on your ad’s performance directly in your Ads Manager account. Going directly to the source by using Facebook’s native reporting is a convenient way to track your ad in real time or make adjustments as needed.

If you want to conduct a deeper analysis to fully understand how your Instagram ads are performing, use a tool like Rival IQ’s Facebook Ads Analytics feature. If you already have a Rival IQ account, log into your account (or sign up for a free trial), and follow the steps below to measure your ad performance.

Step 1: Open Facebook Ads in your Rival IQ account

In the menu on the left side, you’ll see a section titled, “Your private data.” From there, head to the “Facebook Ads” tab to see your ads dashboard.

Once you’re there, you’ll see an overview of all of your campaigns across Facebook and Instagram. You can get specific about which campaigns you want to analyze by filtering by campaign status, objective, and whether or not to include boosted posts.

Step 2: Add metrics

Your analytics dashboard will automatically include a set of metrics that are common when to measure. But you also have the option to edit or add metrics that you want to analyze.

Step 3: Conduct an in-depth analysis of your ads

Now for the fun part: diving into your ad metrics. Experimentation makes up a large part of running Instagram ads, and the only way to understand the results of your experiment is to take a detailed look at your key metrics.

In Rival IQ, you can get detailed insights into your audience, ad spend, and conversions to see if your current ads are generating the results you want or identify things you’d like to change. For instance, if you see that the demographic you spend the most of your ad budget on generates the lowest click-through rate, then you know that you need to adjust your target audience.

The same goes for other elements of your ad, from your CTAs to your audience behaviors. Analyze every aspect and compare to your previous Instagram ads to identify any patterns or trends.

Wrapping it up

Advertising on Instagram is an effective way to break through the algorithm and reach the right customers. To get the most out of your Instagram ads, it’s important to consider the placement of your ads, the message and creative elements you want to use, and how that all relates to your campaign goals.

After you’ve created your ads, invested a healthy budget, and set up your campaign, don’t let your efforts go to waste. Track your ad performance over time in Facebook’s native ads manager, and go deeper using an analytics tool like Rival IQ.

With a detailed analysis of your target audience, their behaviors, and your average ad spend, you can uncover opportunities to improve your ad reach and conversions. Simply put, by following these steps, you can ensure your paid efforts amplify your organic content to make for a powerful Instagram strategy.

Start analyzing your brand’s Instagram ads with a free Rival IQ trial.

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The post How to Use Instagram Ads and Track Your Ad Performance appeared first on Rival IQ.

In 2023, organic Instagram engagement rates have dipped below the rates for previous years. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t opportunities to turn that engagement around for your brand.

Let’s go over what a good engagement rate on Instagram is in 2023 and ways to increase it using a mix of reliable and creative tactics.

What is a Good Engagement Rate on Instagram?

Before you can work on ways to improve your engagement, you have to know what a good engagement rate on Instagram is these days.

At Rival IQ, we define engagement as measurable interaction on social media posts, which includes likes, comments, favorites, retweets, shares, and reactions. Engagement rate is calculated based on all these interactions divided by total follower count.

Engagement rate = measurable interaction / total follower count

According to our 2023 Social Media Industry Benchmark Report, the median engagement rate on Instagram is 0.47% across all industries.

While every industry performs differently on the platform, 0.47% is considered a good Instagram engagement rate in 2023. You can use this number as a benchmark as you set out to improve your rate or you can dive into the specific rates for your industry. Using competitive benchmarks to measure your social performance and engagement rates helps you better understand where you stand within your industry and against similar brands.

8 Ways to Increase Your Engagement on Instagram

Now that you have a better idea of what to aim for when it comes to organic engagement, let’s go over the different ways to boost your brand’s engagement rates on Instagram.

1. Use Reels

There’s no denying it — Reels are officially the most engaging post type on Instagram. As Instagram continues to prioritize video to keep up with TikTok and YouTube, Reels have made their way into people’s feeds more than ever.

And brands that have already made Reels a major part of their Instagram strategy are seeing the benefits. Case in point: Using Reels helped Kwik Trip become one of the top convenience stores on social media and earn seven times more engagement than its other posts.

If you haven’t created a Reel yet for your brand, don’t think you need to be a world-class videographer to get started. Rest assured, creating short-form videos on social media doesn’t need to be fancy or highly produced. All you need is a phone to capture quick, lo-fi videos, and a sense of what trending audio, song, or text to use with it.

2. Create community-first content

It can be easy to forget the social element of social media, but that’s exactly what marketers need to prioritize in 2023 if you want to increase your Instagram engagement.

Whether you manage social for a sports team or a beauty product, your followers are part of your community. They want to feel involved and they want to see themselves in your content. If you want to see a community-led strategy in action, take notes from Live Tinted.

In a recent conversation with Live Tinted’s Brand Marketing Manager, Aya Diaz, the marketer shared that when it comes to social content, the beauty brand prioritizes its loyal community. The small but mighty social team does this by “creating the content they want to see, answering the questions they have, and making sure the content we create is addressing product questions,” she said. Diaz added that the brand’s goal is to “make [our audience] feel heard and seen in the way of representation.”

Live Tinted takes its community’s voice, feedback, and opinions into consideration not only for its content creation process but also for its product development which helps strengthen that trust and connection even more.

Putting its community’s needs at the forefront is clearly working for the beauty brand. It has an above-average engagement rate by follower of 1.9%, which is seven times greater than the median rate for health and beauty brands.

Not only does this community-inspired strategy come through in the content creation process, but the brand also makes it a priority to have thoughtful, engaged interactions with followers.

“The thing we never want to do is make [followers] feel like they’re having a one-way conversation when they’re commenting or messaging us,” Diaz shared. “If we see people comment or ask the same question over and over again, [we will] make a video that addresses it and invites feedback.”

Sometimes the most effective engagement strategy is the most simple: Have conversations with your followers, listen to their feedback, and create content that they want to see.

3. Tap into UGC

User-generated content is a goldmine for busy marketers.

User-generated content, or UGC, is a great way to keep your content calendar full no matter how busy you get. When you keep a file full of UGC content that you’ve been tagged or mentioned in, you never have to worry about running out of content — even during your busiest weeks.

But UGC isn’t just a time saver. The format is also a good way to get a lift in engagement. Because UGC doesn’t look like branded content, it helps build social proof and trust in your brand. If a user sees your product being used in an organic way by a real person, it can spark their curiosity more than a post that was clearly created by your brand. When someone stumbles upon your UGC in their explore tab or feed, it can lead to profile visits, new followers, and even website clicks.

The Reel below from Pley Beauty, is a video Pley reshared from one of its followers. The video generated an engagement rate of 4.37% which is 18 times greater than the median rate for health and beauty brands. It also gave the brand an engagement rate lift that was more than double the rate compared to the average for similar posts.

Your customers and followers can be a great source of content ideas and inspiration. Keep an eye on your tags and mentions to make sure you’re staying engaged with users and can stay on top of UGC opportunities.

4. Run a giveaway

If you’re looking for a quick boost in engagement, giveaways and contests are always a good way to reinvigorate your rate when it’s starting to feel flat.

The key to running a successful giveaway in 2023 is to be strategic and intentional. Use a giveaway to generate buzz and social participation around a product launch, or run it in tandem with a holiday to leverage the holiday’s momentum. And, most importantly, your giveaway should be audience-first. Think about who your audience is and what would get them excited to enter.

Look to top health food brand good culture for an example of running a successful giveaway.

There are a few best practices that good culture followed with this giveaway. First, the giveaway was themed around Earth Day, so it captured the spirit of a holiday to get people excited. And second, good culture partnered with two similar brands in the better-for-you food space to create an even more enticing prize package for potential winners. It’s clear that the brand knows its audience and understands their values and desires.

The giveaway above generated over 1,000 comments — which translates to entries — and had an engagement rate of 3.25%. This is nearly seven times greater than the average engagement rate for food and beverage brands.

Giveaways have long been a reliable tactic in every social media marketer’s toolkit and they will continue to be one of the top Instagram best practices when it comes to boosting engagement for brands across industries.

5. Create carousels

While Reels dethroned carousels as the most engaging post type on Instagram, carousels continue to be high-performing for many brands across industries. As marketers know, carousels get re-served to users who didn’t engage the first time they saw the post. This means you can earn more impressions over time and increase the chance to generate a boost of engagement. Lean on tried-and-true carousels when you want to give your feed a boost in engagement.

If you need even more proof that carousels are still a reliable way to generate engagement, look to Higher Ed. Of the top industries on Instagram, schools and universities take the gold, proving that they have more than a solid grasp of what performs well on the channel.

The carousel below from the U.S. Naval Academy generated an impressive engagement rate by follower of 21.6%, which is eight times greater than the median rate for schools and universities. The interactive post also received nearly 800K impressions and gave the brand an engagement rate lift that’s five times greater than the average for similar posts.

A good way to create engaging carousels is to use each image or video in the post to tell an overarching story that compels users to scroll through. If you scroll through the school’s carousel above, you’ll notice that the post is essentially a recap of the iconic Army-Navy football game. Fans who weren’t able to be there in person can feel the spirit of the game just by looking at each image.

Follow this format when creating your next carousel. Consider the story you’re telling as someone swipes through from one photo to the next. What’s your hook? You can use the first photo to grab their attention or use the caption to encourage people to swipe through to the end to reveal something they’d want to see (unexpected or entertaining content usually works well here).

6. Tap into hashtags

Hashtags continue to be a powerful discovery tool that helps brands connect with users. Instagram uses hashtags to categorize your posts and show them to users who may be interested — even if they don’t follow you.

To get the most engagement out of a hashtag or topic, tap into niche hashtags. Niche hashtags aren’t generic like, say, #love. Instead, they are more specific to an industry or topic. These types of hashtags generate more engagement because they’re targeted and seen by users who are highly engaged. For example, below are the most engaging hashtags for Sports Teams, another top-performing industry using Instagram.

While there are a few popular hashtags in the mix (who doesn’t love a good #ThrowbackThursday post?), the most engaging hashtags for Sports Teams are highly specific to sports, like #WorldCup, #FIFA23, and #training.

To find the most engaging hashtags in your industry, you can use Rival IQ’s hashtag analysis tool. Not only can you see which hashtags similar brands are using and what the engagement rates are like, but you can also get insight into general topics that your competitors and audience are talking about.

Staying on top of trending topics can help you join in on relevant conversations and give your brand a boost in engagement. Just remember to use these hashtags in a meaningful way — don’t chime in simply for the sake of engagement. To generate organic engagement from these hashtags and topics, contribute intentionally to the conversation and provide relevant content that people would be interested in.

7. Get interactive with Instagram Stories

While we recently discovered that Instagram Posts have a higher reach rate than Stories, there are creative ways marketers can use Stories to boost engagement.

An effective way to incorporate more Stories in your engagement strategy is to share a big announcement or product launch as a Post, then use Stories to amplify the news and deepen engagement — like food brand Deux does in the example below.

The good-for-you cookie dough brand released a limited edition product in collaboration with health, food, and wellness influencer, Rachael DeVaux. To promote the product, Deux shared the announcement Post on Stories and used the link sticker to make it easy for followers to visit its website to shop directly.

Use stickers to encourage participation, clicks, and replies, and ultimately generate more organic engagement for your brand. The link sticker is effective if you have products to promote, but you can also experiment with other interactive sticker options like questions, polls, countdown, or the emoji slider.

8. Consider boosting your posts

Let’s be honest: Generating organic engagement can be challenging in a space that’s increasingly becoming more pay-to-play. If you’ve tried to increase your engagement rate organically and still aren’t seeing the numbers you want, consider investing money into your strategy by boosting your Instagram posts.

Boosted posts are an effective way to give your content a lift in engagement without putting in the extra work that comes with creating an ad from scratch. While it may seem counterintuitive, the key to boosting posts is to choose posts that have already performed well. If a carousel post you shared generated a good amount of organic engagement, then that indicates it resonated with people. Amplify your carousel’s reach by boosting it to get it in front of people who don’t already follow you.

You can boost all Instagram post types including images, like the one from BetterHelp above, videos, carousels, Stories, and Reels. Experiment with boosting a post or two at first to see how it impacts your increase your reach and engagement. If a post performs well organically *and* when it’s boosted, analyze the content and post type to identify what worked and try to repeat that for future posts.

Wrapping it up

Instagram may not be generating the same engagement rates that it used to, but there are still plenty of opportunities for your brand to reach and connect with your audience. Lean into tried-and-true methods like giveaways, get creative with short-form video, and don’t forget to talk — and listen — to your followers.

Once you put these engagement-boosting strategies into play, it’s essential to measure your performance to see if they’re working for your brand. As always, experiment, analyze, and adjust to find a cadence and format that helps increase your Instagram engagement rates to where you want them to be.

The post How to Increase your Engagement on Instagram appeared first on Rival IQ.

We rounded up our favorite Instagram Stories best practices and loads of examples to inspire you to try new things and expand your engagement on the world’s most engaging social channel. This definitive list features copy, design, tech, and measurement tips to help you grab the most engagement with every Story.

Below, let’s go over the more important Stories metrics to track and the best practices to follow if you want to amplify your reach and engagement on Instagram in 2023.

Let’s go over the best practices you can follow to improve your Stories performance in 2023.

9 Instagram Stories Best Practices for 2023

1. Make the first few frames count

As we saw in our latest Instagram Stories Benchmark Report, retention in your first few frames is critical to keeping users engaged throughout the rest of your Story.

With that in mind, plan something extra special, visual, or attention-grabbing for your early frames. Some of our favorite ideas for this include videos that introduce the reader to what they’ll be seeing or snappy frames that use the interactive elements we mentioned above.

The hook on this frame from ice cream brand Yasso encourages viewers to continue tapping through to learn how they can earn rewards. The brand also uses an enticing image featuring ice cream to help make its case — because who wouldn’t be swayed by the promise of a sweet treat?

2. Use interactive elements like stickers and quizzes

We’ve all experienced Instagram Stories where you float from one frame to the next before exiting in disinterest. Give your followers something to do in your Stories by adding Interactive elements like quizzes, polls, emoji rating stickers, countdowns, and more. These engaging elements can also increase your reach rate. Not to mention, Instagram says that 60% of businesses using Instagram Story ads are using interactive elements to increase video view times and lower costs per click.

Aside from encouraging participation, another benefit of using interactive stickers like questions or polls is that you can gather more information about your followers and customers. Consider it a form of market research. For example, you can use a quick poll to see which product your followers prefer like the beverage brand Richard’s Rainwater does in the Story below.

Another example of this best practice in action comes from top beauty brand Laneige. The brand used a questions sticker to answer followers’ questions about one of its new products. This is a simple yet effective way to see what common questions people have and use that insight to create more content that addresses any questions or concerns.

While Instagram limits the data from these interactive elements in their API, you can at the very least track sticker taps to see how much interest they got from viewers.

Download the 2023 Instagram Stories Benchmark Report

Grab your copy now!

3. Drive traffic with links

Another sticker option that helps drive engagement for your Stories is the link sticker. Whether you want to drive traffic to a sign-up page or promote a new product, the link sticker is a great way to direct people directly to it with little effort on their end.

In this story from hotel and spa brand Miraval Resorts, the brand uses an aspirational image with a link sticker to share a booking promotion. The image gives viewers a glimpse of what their relaxing vacation could look like and the perfectly placed link sticker provides a clear call to action.

Do you have products to promote? Take inspiration from beauty brand Kosas. The brand used a link sticker to direct followers to a special product page for a sale it was running. This makes it easy for people to seamlessly shop and add to cart without ever leaving the app. Plus, the link sticker is integrated nicely with the image and colors, which makes the frame even more compelling.

4. Have a throughline to keep users tapping forward

While a compelling first frame is important, it’s important not to give away the whole farm. Treat each frame like a chapter of your favorite mystery novel and help your followers understand exactly why they can’t miss the next frame in your Story. Adding several frames that tell a story can impact your tap-forward rate, which is the percentage of Story impressions that have a tap forward.

Using multiple images that tell a story — like a before and after reveal, for example — is a great way to motivate users to stay with your Story. You can also break up your copy blocks over multiple frames using short sentences or ellipses to keep people with you. As a bonus, before and after frames also encourage tap-backs to compare, which leads to even more Story engagement!

Our favorite Instagram expert Sue B. Zimmerman also recommends adding intro and outro frames to your Stories so people know exactly what’s in store for them.

5. Don’t be afraid of long text blocks

I know I just told you not to put everything in one frame to increase retention, but believe it or not, long text blocks can help keep people around too. If you’ve ever seen a frame with a long text block, you know that a good way to consume that text is to tap and hold the frame so it doesn’t advance until you’re done reading.

In the Story below from skincare brand, Dr. Dennis Gross, the frame includes a few paragraphs that explain the ingredients and benefits of one of its products. If you’re a fan of the brand or are interested in learning more before becoming a customer, there’s a good chance you’ll tap and hold this frame to consume this info. The visual aspects like the clean background, big text blocks, and pops of color also make this information easier to digest as a viewer.

Use the tap-and-hold method to increase the time your user spends on a frame. This tells Instagram that the user is engaged with your content and makes it more likely that Instagram will serve up your stuff in the future.

6. Video matters (even if it’s lo-fi)

As Instagram continues to prioritize video, it’s a good idea to incorporate as much video into your Stories as you can.

As you can see in the graph above, video reaches more people than static images. While this graph from our Stories report is in reference to post reach rates, it still makes the case for incorporating more video into your Stories. 

Why? Photos are consumed in the blink of an eye and lead followers to move quickly to your next frame, leading to more taps forward. A strong video can hold a viewer’s attention for the full duration of the video (up to 60 seconds), which helps keep them engaged and ready for your next frame.

Don’t be intimidated about using your phone to grab a quick video: Instagram Story viewers aren’t expecting a perfect and polished video. Instead, give them something real and of the moment to help them connect with your brand. Bonus: If it makes sense, add music to your Stories to hold viewers’ (or listeners’) attention even longer like beverage brand Poppi does below.

7. Use hashtags and locations for more discoverability

Many of us spend hours scrolling through Instagram’s Explore tab for Stories and posts Instagram thinks we’ll like, and the most surefire way to show up there is by using hashtags and locations. (My Explore tab is chock full of houseplants ). These simple additions to your Stories help Instagram categorize your content and more easily show it to people whose interests align with your brand even if they aren’t currently followers.

Plus, when you use a location tag on your Story, your content will be associated with the public information for that tag and account. In the Story below from iconic fashion brand DVF, the brand took viewers inside an event the brand was having. Viewers could tap the location tag to see where it was taking place and learn more about the museum.

8. Keep a consistent look and feel

You don’t need an ad agency or a professional video shoot to be successful with Instagram Stories, but a consistent color scheme or font can help clue viewers into your brand. In these Stories from National Geographic, the consistent black-and-white imagery not only helps tell a story, but it’s also in line with the media brand’s overall branding.

National Geographic uses unobtrusive colors and fonts to let their extraordinary photos speak for themselves.

These simple color and font choices can go a long way to making you recognizable and trustworthy without looking overproduced. Don’t worry about jamming your logo into every frame or spending thousands on a new video setup–just keep things consistent so your viewers can instantly recognize that they’re viewing a Story from a brand they know and love.

 9. Be accessible and inclusive

Ensuring that everyone can consume your Stories regardless of physical ability or access to headphones makes good sense for both your bottom line and your karma, so use simple tools to make your Stories accessible. Use captions and/or thoughtful frame descriptions so every viewer can follow along.

In the video above, Everlane uses Instagram’s auto-generated caption feature to easily caption its Instagram Story which features two people talking to the camera. Captions allow those who are deaf or hearing-impaired to consume your Stories. Captions also help followers of all abilities engage with your Stories even when they can’t play videos with sound, like at a sporting event or the library. In fact, one study found that 75% of people watch mobile videos on mute. This means adding captions should be a priority if you want a majority of viewers to enjoy it.

The most important Instagram Stories metrics

There are many ways to measure success on Instagram Stories, but here are a few of our favorite metrics. Review these metrics over time to see how strategy tweaks affect your success, and don’t forget to compare your progress against industry benchmarks to see how you’re really doing on Instagram.

• Retention Rate: The percentage of your Story Viewers on any given day that sees all your frames.
• Reach Rate: Your Story Viewers on any given day divided by your follower count, expressed as a percentage.
• Tap-Forward Rate: The percentage of your impressions that have a tap forward to see the next photo or video.
• Tap-Back Rate: The percentage of your impressions that have a tap backward to see the previous photo or video again.
• Reply Rate: The percentage of your Story Viewers that replied to your frame on any given day.
• Exit Rate: The percentage of your impressions that exit your Stories by swiping right, swiping down, or closing Stories.

We like these metrics because they give a really clear picture of the number of people who are engaging with your Story as well as how engaged they are. If you’re rocking your retention rate, that’s a great indicator that your content is resonating with your followers. If all of your followers are exiting your Story quickly, that means you need to tweak your content.

Download the 2023 Instagram Stories Benchmark Report

Grab your copy now!

How to measure your Instagram Stories success

Anyone with an Instagram business or verified handle can easily access Story analytics going back seven days in the native Instagram app. Instagram has a handy primer on how to view your Story analytics.

When measuring the success of your Stories, use the metrics we mentioned earlier to see how your efforts align with your goal. For example, do you want to use Stories to drive more traffic to product pages using the link sticker? Analyze how many sticker taps your frames with links had. Bonus: see if any of that traffic converted to sales. 

Don’t forget to download our Instagram Stories Benchmark Report so you can compare your Stories performance to tons of top brands. Why benchmark? Because audience size matters. Our brand-new benchmark report helps you see if your Instagram Stories best practices are helping you get ahead of comparable brands instead of just a channel-wide average.

Wrapping it up

We hope this round-up of our top Instagram Stories best practices inspires you to try new things. Just like on any channel, our best thinking is experiment, measure, repeat. Try one (or more) of these new strategies for a week or a month, and then turn to external measurement tools like Rival IQ or internal ones like Instagram Stories questions and polls to see whether you’re making an impact on your engagement.

This post was originally published in April 2020 and has since been updated.

The post 9 Must-Have Instagram Stories Best Practices for 2023 appeared first on Rival IQ.