‘25% of people now trust social media messages over those opinions in articles and magazines as they are seen as direct and reliable.’

(Quesensberry, 2015).

It is therefore important that brands consistently ensure their social media sites are reflective of their brand image and that they successfully communicate messages (Singh, 2017). Consequently, brands must regularly audit their networking sites in order to ensure that they are optimizing their social media sites.   There are some questions brands should regularly ask themselves in order to do this.

Audit Question One: How many networks is the business currently available on?

There are over 150 + different social networking sites – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, LinkedIn, Snapchat, vine, google + and the list goes on (Michaelidou et al, 2011). It can sometimes seem overwhelming to have profiles on each of them. Initially, brands must determine which sites the business is currently active on. Most company’s are available on the big five; Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Google +. But you must take into account ALL profiles even ones that may have been created years ago and forgotten about! Here are some reminders (Levy, 2013):

As you locate these keep note of specific elements, one easy way to do this in a spreadsheet on excel these are some heading suggestions (Lee, 2016):

Source: Lee (2017) The 15-Minute Social Media Audit Everyone Can Do

TIP: UNLESS YOU HAVE VAST RESOURCES PICK THE TOP 3 NETWORKS THAT BEST MEET YOUR COMPANYS NEEDS AND MONITOR THEM CLOSELY, THIS HELPS YOU TO FOCUS YOUR TIME ON WHERE IT IS BETTER SPENT (Entrpreneur, 2013).

Audit Question Two: Are your networks being optimised?

Once the business is aware of their numerous social media profiles they must ensure that they are complete and consistent.  They should rigorously analyse each profile checking every one is entirely filled out. Each of these platforms have countless customisation options so it can be easy to forget one. To make sure nothing has been missed out organisations could open the customisation settings on each network and review everything individually e.g. images, texts etc are being used (Lee, 2016).

After making sure that each individual platforms fully completed companies must ensure that branding is consistent across all platforms to make sure that they are optimised! To do this businesses must ask themselves questions such as:

1. Are themes consistent across the pages?

2. Are profile pictures and cover photos the same?

3. Are all URL’s the same?

(Hootsuite, 2017)

Each social network is designed differently therefore it is inevitable that a company’s presence will differ slightly on each of these – this is not a massive problem! The tone on the network should come first e.g. LinkedIn should be more professional (Lee, 2016).

Finally, in order to ensure social media networks are being optimised make sure the business regularly posts, changes their cover photo and keeps active on them. This helps to build consumer relationships (Istvanova, 2014).

Here is an example of how to do it on twitter:

Source: Hootsuite (2017),  Optimizing Your Twitter Profile. 

Audit Question Three: Which are your best networks?

To determine which of your networks is the best you must measure specific features such as how many followers you have, engagement and customer feedback. An easy way to do this is by creating a social media audit spreadsheet like the one below. However, feel free to change your key metrics as they may differ from company to company and site to site (Lee, 2016).

Source: Lee (2017) The 15-Minute Social Media Audit Everyone Can Do

While these initial metrics are good to track delving into deeper characteristics will give you more insight about which networks are best. There are numerous different tools to use when trying to to find these characteristics, here are a few:

1. Larger businesses may fund third party analysts such as experts in analysing businesses social media profiles (Sprout Social, 2017).
2. Find the data yourself! You have access to all of your own networks where data can be found and from this metrics can be calculated. If set up as a business on certain social media sites provide you with free statistics including engagement such as Instagram (Instagram, 2017).
3. There are also sites such as google analytics where organisations can create free accounts. Businesses are then able to see both where visitors come from and to understand visitors behaviour. A tracking code is created and then added to the companies site. Businesses are then provided with endless data regarding their site that goes beyond simply lnumber of followers, it tracks product sign-ups, leads, downloads etc.  (Cisnero, 2015).

Company’s just need to decide the best method for their business and what they can afford. Once determined these analytics can be used to develop a marketing strategy and set specific goals in regard to improving social media channels.

A final word of advice is that in this era of hyper competition social media is an important way to differentiate your business, create a brand personality and build relationships, so try your best to keep on top of it (Yan, 2013)

References:

Hoosuite (2017) Optimizing Your Profile Settings on Twitter. [Online] Available at: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEkqfcOrBoI> [Accessed 26 Nov 2017]

Instagram (2016) Coming soon: new Instagram Business Tools. [Online] Available at: <https://business.instagram.com/blog/coming-soon-new-instagram-business-tools?locale=en_GB>  [Accessed 26 Nov 2017]  

Istvanova, L. (2014) The Importance Of Keeping Your Social Media Profiles Active. [Online] Available at < https://www.koozai.com/blog/search-marketing/important-business-keep-social-media-profiles-active/> [Accessed 26 Nov 2017]

Lee, K. (2016) The 15-Minute Social Media Audit Everyone Can Do. [Online] Available at

<https://blog.bufferapp.com/social-media-audit> [Accessed 26 Nov 2017]

Levy, S. (2013) How to Choose the Best Social Media Platform for your business. [Online] Available at < https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/230020> [Accessed 26 Nov 2017]

Michaelidou, N., Siamagka, N. & Christodoulides, G. (2011)  Usage, barriers and measurements of social media marketing: an exploratory investigation of small and medium B2B brands, Industrial marketing management, Vol 40, No 7, p1153-1159  

Quesenberry, K. (2015) Conducting a social media audit. [online] Available at:

<https://hbr.org/2015/11/conducting-a-social-media-audit&gt; [Accessed 22 Nov 2017]  

Sprout Social (2017) About Us. [Online] Available at < https://sproutsocial.com/about> [Accessed 26 Nov 2017]

Yan, J. (2013) The Impact of Digital and Social Media on Branding, Journal of Digital and Social Media Marketing, Vol 3, No 1, p59-72