Alex DittyDo you know if your Instagram contests were a success or not?
Contests are powerful and smart ways to connect with your community. Understanding what Instagram metrics to track will help you tell the story of the contest’s success to your team. To be able to do this effectively you need to know what you’re hoping to achieve, how to track against those goals and the best way to interpret the results for future success. We outline some tips for you here and to learn more subscribe to our blog and stay on top of Instagram marketing best practices!
1. Set the goals
In your Instagram contest planning the first step is always to set the goal of the campaign you’re putting together. You need to understand why you’re running an Instagram contest, what you’re hoping to gain as a result of this promotion and how you’re going to achieve those results.
Set goals for your social media contests by first determining the campaign’s focus – what you’re hoping to promote. Whether you’re trying to drive sales for your new holiday candy or trying to promote your destination with authentic user-generated content from your community, each contest was created for it’s own unique goals to accomplish. When you know the campaign’s focus you can measure your target community’s existing engagement to set expectations for what’s achievable for the contest.
2. Understand the metrics to track
As you set your goal, you need to know how to track your progress towards those objectives. Having a clear and firm definition of what your contest is aiming to accomplish will help you understand what metrics to track to make sense of your progress. For example, if you’re running a contest on Instagram with the purpose of growing your following, you can track engagement measurements like Relative Engagement and audience interaction growth to understand how you’re participation is leading towards that goal.
There are some metrics that speak better to the reach and amplification of the contest while others are better suited for measuring the overall engagement and participation with the contest. When you understand what your goals are, you can set the appropriate metrics to know what efforts are helping you achieve your objectives. The table below will help you map metrics to track for your Instagram reporting.
3. Analyze the results
Instagram contests are most successful when they fit within your overall marketing objectives. We don’t recommend running one-off contests just for the sake of running a campaign. Rather, use them as an opportunity to learn. When the contest fits within your overall marketing initiatives you can see a positive lift to your goals. The objectives that you set out in the beginning of your planning process and that you measured against during the campaign can help you plan and predict success for future contests. Understanding how people are interacting with your brand and whom you’re reaching will help with your campaign planning.
These tips will help you track and understand the success of your Instagram contests. To learn more about the relevant metrics for your social media marketing, download our guide to Using Instagram Data to Drive Marketing Insights.
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