As brands begin discussions around strategy development and the development of marketing plans for the new year, a natural place to start is often with a social media audit. Since we’ve completed many of these over the years, we wanted to share the most commonly asked questions these audits answer.

Before Getting Started – Is an Audit Right For You?

Before diving into the questions an audit can/should cover – the essential question to answer is: Does my brand need to conduct an audit in the first place?

Here are a few reasons you might not want to invest the time and resources to conduct a social media audit:

• • Your brand just launched and you have brand new social channels
  • Your brand has very little activity on social media to analyze
  • Your brand is in crisis and needs a quick shift in strategy
  • You have very little brand budget for social media, meaning nearly all of your budget needs to be applied to execution-based tactics
  • You’ve routinely analyzed your brand’s social performance and competitors and feel you already have a good handle on what’s working/what’s not

If any of the above match your brand’s situation, you may not find value in investing the time or resources in having a social media audit conducted (at this time, at least).

Questions a Social Media Audit Can Help Answer

If, however, your ready for a social media audit, there are a near limitless supply of questions an audit can help answer. Here are the most common questions that we see:

• • Which social media platforms are most effective at reaching our target audience?
  • How effective is each social media platform for our brand?
  • What content frequency and content types would yield the best performance for our objectives?
  • What type of content drives impressions?
  • What type of content drives engagements?
  • What type of content drives website traffic/conversion?
  • What is the overall impact of our social media efforts over the past 12 months?
  • What frequency and type of content should my brand be producing more of/less of?
  • Is our brand voice and visual look and feel consistent across all channels?
  • How is our brand doing compared to our competitors?
  • What is contributing to our competitor’s/our brand’s success?
  • How well is the brand managing relationships with the community (response time, approach to complaints, etc.)?
  • Is our paid social media marketing media delivering results?
  • How is our influencer marketing program performing?
  • What is the ROI of our social media efforts?
  • What are overall areas of optimization/opportunity based on the evolving platform/algorithm trends?
  • What new trends or platforms should we explore?
  • What should we doing more of/less of?
  • What are overall areas of opportunity for our brand in social media?

What Do You Want the Audit to Inform?

If your brand is considering a social audit, it’s also helpful to consider what you want this audit to help inform. Often brands start out with vague statements, such as “we want to know what’s working/what’s not,” or “we want a social media audit.” When pressed further for why they want one in the first place, however, the answers are much more interesting and telling.

In our experience, an audit is only worth conducting if it helps inform a strategic shift or improves execution. Articulating the intention of an audit before you start can help finalize the right approach and ensure the findings lead to actionable outcomes.

Consider these common intentions for conducting a social media audit:

• • I question whether our brand’s execution on social media is as effective as it could be to deliver on our marketing/business objectives.
  • I’d like to know what efforts resonate with our audience or if we’re reaching the right audience.
  • I’d like to know if our paid social media is optimized correctly to drive results.
  • I’m not sure what my brand’s budget on social media should be.
  • I’m curious what the right staffing and/or resource allocation for social media would be for our brand.

A social media audit offers key insights that help inform recommendations, but it’s essential to define the specific goals or areas you want it to impact. Below are common areas where strategic recommendations often emerge from an audit:

• • Social Objectives + KPIs
  • Content Strategy
  • Channel Strategy
  • Community Guidelines and/or Engagement Strategy
  • Paid Media Strategy for Social
  • Influencer Strategy
  • Recommended Paid Social Media Spend
  • Social Media Team Structure + Budget Recommendations

If you’re ready to take your social strategy to the next level, a tailored social media audit can provide your brand the insights you need to take your social media marketing to the next level.