0:00
Alina Dallal
Hi, everyone, and welcome to our webinar, how to confidently measure the impact of B2B social media. I'm your host today. I'm Alina Delal, the Content Marketing Manager here at Oktopost. And we always love questions, so you can go ahead and drop them in the Q and A section and we'll get to them at the end. And don't worry, you'll all receive a copy of the recording after the webinar. Today we're here to talk about how we can be more confident when it comes to proving the success of what we do day in and day out on social media. We spend so much time putting together thoughtful content, managing a calendar and creating stories that resonate. But when it comes to reporting on our performance, a lot of us don't know what we're looking for, what we're looking at, and what to do after. As well as this, our management is often asking us to prove that our activity on social media is working. While metrics and reporting might sound challenging at the end of the day, by monitoring your performance, these metrics can give you something to work towards and help you stay on track to achieving your goals and KPIs. So our goal today is to make sure you all leave this webinar with the confidence to report to your management that your hard work on social media is impacting your organization. So let's start by introducing everybody. Anna, Jen, can you tell us your name, role, what company you're from, and one of the biggest challenges you have when it comes to measuring social media? Anna, we'll start with you first.
1:17
Genevieve Davis
Of course.
1:18
Anna Pickard
Hey everyone, I'm Anna Picard. I work for boomi, which is a global software company that powers the future of business with intelligent integration and automation. I am based in Boston, Massachusetts. And are we doing the biggest challenge? Is that what we were looking for or is that kind of the challenges
1:39
Alina Dallal
of measuring social media?
1:40
Anna Pickard
Of course. So one of the biggest challenges in measuring social media is really just conveying which impact, which metrics actually impact the business and are kind of out of our control. Right. So how do we tell the story to the business and educate folks on what these metrics actually mean in the context of success for the business and what you actually have power to control. So that is one of the biggest challenges and I absolutely love doing it.
2:10
Alina Dallal
Thank you for sharing, Ana and Jen.
2:13
Genevieve Davis
Hi, everyone. I'm Genevieve Davis, but you may call me Jen. Most people do. It's a lot of syllables. I work for capco. I've been here for Three years. I am a senior analyst on the digital marketing team and have taken a special. A special interest in social media management. And so I've taken that lead role on. Capco is a consultancy and technology company within the financial services industry as well as the energy industry. And, yeah, piggybacking off of what Anna said, you know, kind of the biggest challenge is, is really telling the story of those tangible ROIs on social media efforts. You know, it's, it's constantly in flux and so know, getting the attention of your C suite and your major stakeholders to, you know, tell them the story, this is how it works, this is what we're doing and this is the impact it's having can be, can be a challenge.
3:05
Alina Dallal
Thank you both for sharing. So we're going to jump right in. Now that we know what challenges you guys haven't introduced yourself, I want to ask, since we're nearing the end of Q2, we've got two quarters to assess how our organic social is performing so far. So what social media metrics have you been tracking to understand the success of your organic social strategy? And Jen, I'm going to start with you first on this one.
3:26
Genevieve Davis
Yeah. So, yeah, Q1 and Q2, definitely, you know, you hit the ground running. You're like, okay, how are we going to start this new year off? Well, so, you know, we've been really paying attention to our engagement rate because that ultimately tells us, you know, based on the impressions of people seeing our content, how many people are actually choosing to interact with us, to read the paper, to fill in a contact form and so on. So we're really focusing on that. And then we also did a big tagging program at the beginning of the year to kind of help us measure which types, you know, of content work, whether it's a carousel, an image, a gallery, what have you and which industry it falls under. So if it's banking and payments, energy, wealth management, you know, we tagged every single post to see, okay, what is performing well. So then we can look at. Oh, okay. So their imagery is really, really good. That must be resonating with our audience. So kind of all of those aspects working together to create a story and be able to, you know, deliver in a presentation that makes sense. Yeah.
4:40
Alina Dallal
Thank you for sharing. And Anna.
4:42
Anna Pickard
Yeah. And similar to Jen, I think one of the things that we're looking at is how does like quarter over quarter, how does the different metrics impact our performance? Engagement rate is something that we look at and is one of the biggest measurements of something that we can control, you know, and it's a measurement of how many people want to interact with your content, where the stories of something like impressions and reach, that's really kind of out of your control in a sense. But it does give context to a metric like engagement rate, which really, again, is a measurement of how many people are actually choosing to interact with your content. And that is a huge win. So for us, really, that is what our success looks like. On the corporate side, we also recently launched an employee advocacy program. So we're looking at, you know, where are link clicks coming from, where are engagement, where's our engagement coming from? And how do those different channels work together? Specifically, that helps us understand where is our content performing and where should we be placing that going forward. So we really break it down by program, and that helps us kind of understand which are the driving factors for each area of the business that we're looking to drive either link clicks or engagements from. And what content should we really be creating on those channels going forward?
6:05
Alina Dallal
Yeah, definitely. These analytics and these metrics can help you see what's working for you as a brand and what's resonating with your audience. So by being looking at that, you can see how you can push your organic strategy forward. Jen, I want to ask you, you said that in the past two quarters, you were looking at the asset types that were working and the topics in the industry. So I'm wondering, how do you use these results that you've measured in Q1 and Q2 to impact your Q3 content? What did you learn from the data to help you create the content for Q3?
6:35
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, it's a really good question. So, you know, as you mentioned, that tagging kind of saved us because it showed us, okay, this is what's doing really well. And these are the tags it falls under. How can we apply what we're learning from the posts that are doing well to the posts that aren't doing so well? So, for example, you know, our personal or, sorry, employer branding and, you know, AI content was performing so, so well. And we saw, okay, we're using carousels a lot. We're using pull quotes, you know, content that kind of jumps out. How can we apply this to our events category, which is really struggling? And our events category is where we get a lot of our leads, you know, for selling future business. So in Q3, we're applying a lot of what we learned in terms of, you know, how can we make a carousel work for an event or how can we use, you know, good call, to actions for events in our Q3 strategy. So it's. It's super, super helpful. And then also, as you know, Anna mentioned, how can we get the advocates also on board with this and sharing these types of content that will resonate with their audiences?
7:44
Alina Dallal
So I'm wondering on how both of you look at these analytics and you look at the reports and you see what's working. Which analytics reports in social bi do you guys rely on and how do you set up the dashboards? And I'll start with you this time.
7:56
Anna Pickard
Yeah, my favorite dashboard is actually the breakdown of. It's like a. It's a circle. It's a breakdown of where we're getting different engagements owned versus earned. That actually helps me understand which ones are coming from our owned entities versus which ones are coming from our employee advocacy program. I do that with engagements and link clicks specifically to understand which channels are those drivers. Like I said before, and, you know, you don't want the business to have to be creating content, you know, for something that doesn't perform in a specific category. So what we've been doing is we've been tagging by different categories of content buckets that the business cares about really aligning to the different campaign structures. So, you know, for example, we can go back and actually advise a group, hey, you know, maybe webinar content, for example, performs really well on an employee advocacy program, but not so well on the corporate channels for link clicks. And we're able to see that in the Oktopost dashboard very easily. And that way we're not creating, you know, an asset that doesn't resonate with our audience everywhere. And also that kind of saves money. Right. You're not creating all these social assets for them to be placed on different channels for them just to not perform. So how can you use that data specifically to advise the business back? And those reports are super valuable at understanding which are the places that we should be placing content going forward as well. So that is an amazing breakdown.
9:29
Alina Dallal
Yeah. So, Jen, do you use similar ones or do you look at different things? Like, how does it work?
9:34
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, very similar. So I totally rely on the engagement and the advocacy dashboards for very similar reasons. As Ana, you want to see where you're getting the clicks, where you're getting the conversions. That's huge for us. We notice that, you know, our corporate channel actually doesn't always generate the most conversions. It's usually coming from our advocates, which, if you think about it, is no surprise. People trust people. They're more likely to, you're more likely to trust, you know, a friend on LinkedIn who's telling you to sign up for something or telling you about a job than, you know, some big corporation that you don't really have a tie to. So, yeah, love the engagement dashboard, love advocacy. Really kind of brings the two pillars together to tell a story of how your overall social strategy is working.
10:19
Alina Dallal
Yeah, definitely. I think it's also really interesting that both of you saying to compare owned versus earned and brand content and employee advocacy content, because if you want to build that trust of people, obviously have employee advocates to do that and that might help you get more conversion. So by looking through and seeing which content works better, you can get on each channel, you can get better results as you go through. So I now understanding we get all this data now what and how do we use this data to inform our posting strategy? What do we do next and when do we do it?
10:50
Anna Pickard
Yeah, so it's really, we look at it quarter over quarter. So it gives us a nice chunk of data that starts to establish a trend. And so what we do is we actually break it down and start using this to do little mini kind of roadshow updates to our different business stakeholders. So by educating them and saying, you know, this is what we learned in terms of what content that you're creating and how can we actually, you know, change our strategy going forward to see if we see a different result? Let's come up with some type of hypothesis. Like for example, perhaps we learn that by posting event content, you know, maybe we'll see more engagements. So when can we actually, actually balance that, you know, engaging content versus link, click content and try to figure out how we strategize that for the next quarter going forward. Right. So you want to have those conversations the minute you do have that type of data, but you want to have enough data that you are, you know, pretty confident in what that says that you can actually drive some type of, you know, business results. And I think what's really important, and I think one of my biggest themes when it comes to social data is that, you know, there isn't a right or there isn't something that is, you know, bad per se, when you're reporting on data that it is really valuable if you see that something is not performing and that isn't a failure on the social team. Right. That is something that is a valuable metric that you could come back and say, like, hey, we don't want to be doing, you know, putting all of our eggs in this basket because the data says so. And you know, how do we actually use that data to empower our decisions next time? And I think often in social we want to see these big numbers or you know, these big follower accounts or these big engagements. And you know, it doesn't necessarily tie directly to, you know, business performance like, you know, we see in Q4, for example. And this is pretty standard across the industry that, you know, that is a lower engaging time. People are on holiday and you know, people aren't necessarily buying during that time either. Right. Like, so how do you kind of shift your content strategy also to align with those economic flows that just kind of go on? So it's really important to tell this story with the data about what you're seeing across the board and that is not necessarily a bad thing. When something decreases, it could be as simple as like we posted less of that type of content and that's why you see a decrease. So it's okay for you to kind of see ebbs and flows. It's just how you kind of present that story and data and metrics to help inform the business. And it's not, there's no bad, all data is really telling something of value. So you know, what, what exactly does that mean for the business?
13:45
Alina Dallal
Stephanie, I think you touched on so many important points there, but especially that no data is negative data.
13:51
Anna Pickard
Right.
13:51
Alina Dallal
As you'll say, if something's not showing you the results you want to see, at least you know that you've tried a strategy and you know that you can move on to the next one because maybe it didn't work for your specific audience. But also including the context of the year and seasonal changes and how people are buying and the way that you're looking at your data is really important to actually know what's working, what's not working, and when to do it and when not to do certain strategies. So it was really interesting. Thank you for sharing that. So I understand now that you put a bunch of stuff on social media, you analyze how it's performing and you use that to frame your content strategy. So my next question for both of you is what do your marketing leaders expect to see from you when you report to them on the success of your social media marketing strategy? Which metrics do you use and how do you present the data? Jen, I'm going to start with you first.
14:41
Genevieve Davis
Yeah. So there's a lot there and it's multi layered. So we have a new CEO and she's very, very keen to use marketing to the best of our ability. And so Every week we present to her, you know, four, four items. We do corporate followers, the total number of engagements from corporate and advocacy, how many people are in our advocacy program and then how many of those advocates are active? So there's a lot there. So that's week on week and then month on month, we also, on top of those, add top campaigns and we try to measure more of the impact rather than the output. So quality over, over quantity. And kind of touching on what Anna was saying, like, it's the idea of failing forward, right? You can't always be coming with these monthly reports or even weekly reports with good news. That's just impossible. So, you know, you tell the story of, okay, we saw that this worked and this didn't work. All right, how can we apply that moving forward? And then on top of that, you know, we're also looking year on year. So I know Anna mentioned, you know, in Q4 you usually see a dip, which is true. We saw a huge dip last year in our Q4 with thought leadership performance. But we did actually see an uptick in employer branding engagements. So now we know this year, all right, let's shut off the thought leadership, you know, content November, and then let's just put all of our efforts into employer branding. What we're doing here at capco, you know, maybe some job opportunities that are coming up so it can really inform you. So that one failure is really just telling us, oh, no, we can serve better content to our followers in Q4. That is actually going to set them up well for the new year or get them excited or however you want to phrase it. So, yeah, amazing.
16:30
Alina Dallal
And Anna, do you do something similar or something different?
16:33
Anna Pickard
Yeah, we do a little bit differently. For us specifically, we participate in weekly reporting with the global communications team. So what are we communicating and how is that performing? And then we also do quarterly QBRs. And that's really important in communicating, you know, was what we did on social media, like what. What was that of value and what did. What data the. Did that bring back for the business? And I often say, you know, social media is not free, right? Like organic social is not free. And in the B2B space specifically, you know, different than consumer. Right. We're really responsible for driving that awareness and supporting sales. Right. Where. Where you think of that B2C side, you know, you're. You're responsible for closing that deal as well, right? You're the salesperson and the marketer and B2C. So the business side, it can often be a little bit more difficult to talk about social media, what that actually brings, you know, when we think about leads and stuff like that, right. There's, there's still a cost to social media. It's often not tied to demand gen and leads when we're talking organic. Right. So of the stuff that you actually invested, what, what is it bringing back to the business? So I love to kind of tie back, you know, you know, this is exactly kind of what we invested, what we spent and was it, was it worth it? Value? And that's what we're kind of talking about, you know, with marketing leaders, you know, at the MLT or ELT level because you are spending money at the end of the day and it's often perceived as, you know, this free platform to market on. Right. So I think it's very important to convey what value it is, whether it's awareness, you know, you're getting the eyes on that content to actually support the sales folks. Right. People won't know about your brand if it's not out there. Right. They won't know to buy from you if you're not educating them and creating that awareness. There is value there. It does cost money of people's time and creative assets and there's a strategy to it. Right. So I think being that strategic advisor is very important. Whether you establish that on a quarterly basis, a monthly basis, but we use those reports all kind of in a different way. Like I said, doing those roundtables using a stand in meeting that you already have to just show data and try to influence that strategy. But at the higher levels they're going to want to know where you're spending your money and what is it bringing back a value to that business. So as long as you could kind of explain that and try to, you know, give as much insight to why it is of value to a B2B space when it's not necessarily bringing in those business leads. You are critical in that process, whether it's something that's tangible to, you know, a return on investment metric at the end of the day or not. So yeah, I, I try to explain that as much as I can and that it is important that we get it out there.
19:29
Alina Dallal
Yeah, it's so important having these communications with your management leaders, your marketing leaders, so they can see the impact you're having. Because like you said, in the B2B world, you're kind of helping out the sales people here, you're the one nurturing them on social. You're there and buyers are on social now. So that's why they're seeing you. So you're bringing that brand awareness and you're helping the whole organization bring more leads into the company and it has value. So it's really important to have those communications with them. So I want to ask, because I think this is something a lot of social media managers have and I'm really interested to hear what you say. But we pour our heart out on social media. We put so much work into everything we do and we touched upon it before. But what do you do when you look at the metrics and it just doesn't tell you the story you want it to tell? Jen, I'm going to start with you.
20:14
Genevieve Davis
Yeah. Again, my key phrase here is fail forward. You know, it's never bad data, it's informative data. So, you know, I always take what I can learn from the data and then honestly, if I'm coming up short, I start looking at what other people are doing. You know, we're not in a vacuum. We have the ability to see, oh, okay, this company's doing this. I really like it. How can I apply that to Capco and make it successful for us? So, yeah, definitely start looking outside of yourself and your own company, even different industries. I mean, I'm in financial services, but I love looking at, you know, what is Nike doing? What are some, some of my favorite running companies doing, you know, and how can we apply it to Capcom?
20:58
Alina Dallal
I love that phrase failing forward. I think it's so important because you are doing the best that you can and if something's not working, at least, you know, okay, that didn't work for us. Maybe it works at a different time. Maybe we should try a different strategy. And, you know, before it's been months of you trying the same thing. So that's also why, Lucky, the analytics is really important. Anna, how about you?
21:17
Anna Pickard
Yeah, so it's actually, for me, it's, it's looking, it's similar, right? Like looking at the strategy that we had in place, right? And it's going through and saying, what did it tell us? Right? Like if it's something that is, you know, it's informing us of something, right? So it's kind of matching that strategy of here's what we plan to do and here's what were the results were and how are we going to use it next time, right? So reflecting on how you're going to use that data, even if it was something that was not what you thought it was going to do at all, how are you going to use that to inform your Business decisions going forward and what is our plan next time? So really outlining, you know, it could be something as wild as, you know, we invested a bunch of money in doing, you know, we'll say LinkedIn Live, right? And it didn't perform, you know, like we thought it was gonna. So next time, you know, this is what we're gonna do. We're gonna outline a plan. Xyz or maybe it's. We're not gonna. We don't think we should place this content, you know, there next time, and we actually think it should go over here. In putting a new strategy in place and testing that theory going forward will tell you even you'll get even closer to understanding that why. And oftentimes in social media, it is kind of testing before we actually like, you know, figure out a solid, solid pattern, quarter over quarter that we can use and feel pretty confident about that. And that's, that's a good thing, right? It means that you're getting closer to being really, you know, solid. And one thing I do say is when I start to see a pattern, specifically quarter over quarter, I feel more confident about advising the business to do things a certain way. So when you don't see that pattern yet, it might mean that you just need to, you know, try in a different area and just continue to reflect on what you learn and what that actually means. It could be as simple too, as, you know, it didn't do that well, but we need to try it at a different time. Right. Like it might have just been a scenario that, you know, doesn't necessarily mean an audience doesn't like it, but, you know, it might mean that you need to try it at a different time and it didn't reach the right audience at the right time. And you often see that, you know, during times of, you know, different conversations that are just going on, taking those impressions from the accounts that you. The account that you have. Right. So it's, it's all about that context and also just, just figuring out what you learn and what you're going to do next time.
23:49
Alina Dallal
Yeah, Stephanie and I think in social media, we're always told to try different things out. And if we, we fail, we fail. But at least we know what's working for us, what our audience's behavior is, and trying what other people are doing online. Like you said, Jen, seeing what works for another brand. Try it. See if it works for you. Not all brands are the same. Maybe it won't, but at least the analytics can show you what's working and what's not working? Because a lot of the time we're overwhelmed if we see negative analytics and then we're like, oh no, like business value. But you can prove what parts of your strategy are working by seeing those ebbs and flows. So I think it's a really important thing to touch upon and I want to ask both of you is how do you actually link the social media performance to these business outcomes? Because it's what a lot of us need to do, but we're not sure how to. Jen, I'm going to start with you.
24:35
Genevieve Davis
Yeah. So the first thing from a corporate side of things is we have the HubSpot integration with Oktopost, which is helpful because it links into our CRM system and tells us, okay, this person has been active on social media with Kapco social media, you need to follow up on this lead. So that is our direct link from an, from the organic point of view. The other side of things is, you know, keeping in touch with our advocates. And you know, I tend to touch base with them. I try to do at least once every other month, you know, how are things going? How can I help? I usually do this through an email or sometimes I just ping them directly. And you know, they say, actually, yeah, I've been posting consistently, you know, two or three times a week. And after six months it actually led to three business meetings and one of them looks like it's going to, it might close. And I'm, I am always elated to hear that because organic is so hard to tie back. But I mean, you know, it's intangible. Right. But that to me is proof that, okay, your social efforts eventually led to a meeting that it's looking like it's going to close and that's money for the business. So those are the things that I look at definitely.
25:48
Alina Dallal
And Anna.
25:49
Anna Pickard
Yeah, so we similar, we use integrations between Oktopost and Marketo. We also like, I think one thing that I always find very, very interesting is that, you know, you can have a post that has a lot of social media link click, right. That could be engagement link clicks. Right. And you actually can dig in. Right. If you have these types of integrations between something like Oktopost, Marketo, Salesforce, anything like that to what is actually creating a qualified lead. And so if you're able to kind of differentiate a click that is a qualified click lead from social versus engagement clicks, you're providing a lot of value about, you know, when you are, you know, putting out content specifically for demand gen versus awareness because you know, you might have something that actually is a link click of, you know, 500, it's your top link click post they might be clicking through to just learn more about who you are. Right. So which ones are actually generating qualified leads? Right. With integrations like that, you can actually dig in and say, hey, you know that post over there with that one click, you know, that was actually the one that generated lead. Why? And maybe we need to actually be doing more content like that and not so much the one that we're doing with, you know, this tons of link clicks that ends up being an awareness and engagement play. Right. So how do you actually differentiate the difference, the, you know, different types of content and what that means to the business? Like I said, the story behind the analytics are just as important at crafting that storytelling to get success next time because it's not always about, you know, the highest link click post is what's bringing in, you know, leads that actually could be the opposite. So if you can get those integrations set up and then try to, you know, advise in that way, you might have some stakeholders coming to you who just wants to drive demand and they need more leads and they're not aware that their post isn't driving that. Right. And that's, that's really valuable information to be able to share with them and then give them examples of posts that are. And you'd be surprised, I think, you know, to see that it might not be what they thought it was and you're able to influence that going forward to drive more business outcomes. So that's just as valuable as, you know, those big win marketing qualified leads coming from social media. That's actually the bulk of the value from social.
28:23
Alina Dallal
Absolutely. Jen, I want to come back to something you've spoken about your employee advocacy program at capco. So I'm wondering, when you report on social media to your executives, do you put corporate and advocacy together or do you create two different reports? Which analytics do you focus on when you compare the performance of your employee advocacy program to your corporate strategy?
28:45
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, so they are in the same report. I mean, I think I mentioned it before, but there are two pillars in our one program and so they need to be side by side. They work in synergy with each other. So, you know, we, we put them in the same report and then we also call out, okay, here are the strengths from corporate, here are the strengths from advocacy, here are the weaknesses so that we can kind of create a full picture of how we can both use the two together. You know, Corporate has its strengths. You know, we have a ton of followers on our corporate channel, but if you look at, you know, our advocacy side of things, they're the ones who are generating a lot of the real leads, a lot of the real conversions because their networks are more tapped into, whether it be cyber security, banking and payments, they can talk to their audience in a way that capco can't from a corporate side of things. So definitely in the same. In the same report and then call out different numbers. Yeah.
29:40
Alina Dallal
I think it's also really interesting because your advocates, as you said, they have the more, much more likely to have a wider network combined than your corporate account.
29:48
Genevieve Davis
Yeah.
29:49
Alina Dallal
You can compare similar assets. You can see what works better and what doesn't. So having them work in synergy is really important. And then is it to hear how you focus on it when you report on it. So I also want to ask you, Anna, as marketers, we know that social media platforms can frequently change their algorithms, which can significantly affect the visibility and reach for organic content. So with this in mind, what do you think is more important for your strategy? Is it including link attachments to increase website traffic or to create an engaged community on the platform, or is it both? I'm interested to hear because you've mentioned already that you focus on engagement, so. And link clicks.
30:27
Anna Pickard
Yeah. So I always say in terms of like, where you're actually investing your content strategy, I think it's very important to understand where you're getting the results on the different types of platforms. So, for example, in a B2B space, you know, LinkedIn, that's a huge one. Right. In Twitter or Instagram, you know, they might be performing a little bit differently than LinkedIn. Right. So you want to figure out, you know, what content actually is performing and where. And I. It's really important, you know, to actually understand too, like what content that you have from the business to that resonates with the platforms that you're using already. Right. And is the business capable of actually creating or supporting the content that you need specifically for that platform? So when we think about a TikTok, for example, or we think about Instagram to grow those platforms, you know, you're looking at video, you're looking at a lot of heavy video posting. Right. And does your business currently have that, that to be successful on that platform? And now I'm not saying, you know, you specifically need that stuff to be on those platforms. I think it's important to kind of use what you already have to make fit. Unless, you know, you know, that it's really performing there. And, you know, if, you know, that's, that's something that you're actually able to, you know, advocate for more resources being in based on what you're seeing with stuff that you've already repurposed. There's a business case to get the, you know, investment specifically for the content to grow, something like a TikTok or a Instagram. So I think it's important to use what you have, right, Put it places and, and social's always changing, right. You know, one day a platform could, could go away, right? So you don't want to put all your eggs in that basket, right? You want to put stuff out there, work with what you have, see what the data says, and then bring it back to the business on where you think, you know, you could invest a little bit more in and what that needs as a platform to be successful there. I think a lot of the times we're faced with challenges, right, where we, why don't we have a TikTok, why don't we have a Instagram that's going. And at the time, I think a lot of us are focused on where we already know is performing. So how can you test what you already have there to see if there's interest from an audience? And then what do you need to be successful? It could be as simple as onboarding a new agency that supports this type of content creation. But you need to educate the business back too on what that actually needs to be successful on a platform. Or you'll just be stuck, you know, explaining why something isn't performing on a platform when it's really that you don't have that type of content to be successful. So work with what you have and then sell it back.
33:16
Alina Dallal
Absolutely. And especially across different platforms that prioritize different content. That's how you can decide. Okay, is it, do I want to get a boost in website traffic, do I want to convert, or do I want to build an engaged community online where people come back for more information? And there's no especially business to business. There's no right answer. There's no one size fits all. But having a balance and knowing where it works and with which audiences is really, really important. So I want to ask both of you, what have you learned over the last two quarters and what insights have you gained about your social media best practices from monitoring your analytics? Jen, I'm going to ask you first.
33:55
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, we've learned a lot. As Anna mentioned, social is constantly changing. So you're always Learning you're always modifying your strateg and so on. But the biggest thing we learned is that we really have to slow down our content pipeline for it to be successful. I know we have people from businesses of all different sizes. My challenge as a social media manager in a global company is that we have tons of stakeholders in regions that are fighting to get stuff out on social every single day. They're at a point, you know, we'd had 10 social posts just go on our corporate LinkedIn. And so what we found was even though the content was great, even though the assets were amazing, good CTAs, we were cannibalizing our own content. So we had to. And I. The data showed it. The data doesn't lie. You know, you can't have 10 posts go out with an average of 20 engagements. You know, that's. Could we have had to go out and have 200 engagements on each post. So, you know, we had to go back to our regional marketers and say, and our CMO and say, hey, we got to slow it down. We got to do max one post per region per day. And you know, the fightback is always, well, but we need to get this out and that's fine. We do. But what can we focus, you know, needs to go on the corporate channel and what can our advocates actually share? If it's a webinar registration, I think that our advocates, the data shows that the advocates do a better job of getting those webinar registrations. So let's do that. So that has been the biggest learning, honestly in the last couple quarters. And, and it's, it's proving to, to be really useful to us. And we're investing a lot more in our advocacy program. We're, you know, doing personal branding trainings with them. I think, you know, for as much as you want to invest in your corporate side of things, you have to invest in your employees and the advocacy side of your social media strategy because they, it's not just B2B. You know, people buy from people, people trust people.
35:59
Alina Dallal
And I'll end with that, absolutely. I think it's really interesting you're saying that you had to slow down the content pipeline and that the metrics were showing you that and that's what you understood because we do, we have so much to say and we have so much to share and we want to provide so much value to our audience. But then if less people are seeing it or there's less engagements and it's not performing as well, then maybe there's Something that needs to be changed and we have less, maybe less is more and we should be sharing less so that people can see it and resonate with it and it can help them. Anna, how about you?
36:33
Anna Pickard
Yeah, I will echo what John said. Like quality will always win over quantity. And you know, less is more when it comes to posting. And if you're focusing on the quality of content, you are going to win when it comes to engagement and engagement rate because your audience is not going to get fatigued. Also these algorithms, they, they are built off of human behavior, right? Like we don't want to see spam, like as a, as a everyday consumer, like you don't want to see the same posts over and over again. And these algorithms are going to know it. Right? And I think that's why, you know, it's really important to, to share that message back to the business as well about the quality and the, the quality over quantity and show that data. Because you end up, you know, just posting things that ends up knocking your, you know, reach and impressions. And when you do have something, you end up burying your key messaging, right? And when you do have something really great, you kind of just, you know, cannibalized yourself in a sense of like it's not going to work when you go to post again, you're not going to get that impact on your key messaging. So how can you balance bit better? Also, you know that people buy from people, people trust people. People also trust, you know, third parties and I think byline content. If you can work with your PR as much as you can to develop a really great relationship with them and understand where are they pitching your business. Because I can guarantee you that it's probably on, you know, news sources that your audience trust, trust, right? And if you have a base that is sharing from, you know, trusted sources, they're more likely to click on something that is from a different, from a, you know, publication that they trust like let's say New York Times or Washington Post. I'm just making up a couple. But you know, they're more likely to trust something that they already consume, right? And if your brand is mentioned in that, you know, it's a great thing to put in your employee advocacy program, right. And it still gets you the reach. It develops thought leadership across the business. And we often see that to be true and very, very enticing for our salesforce to share. So as much as you can kind of sprinkle that in, you'll, you'll gain a lot of trust from people sharing that and people just trusting those editorial services that they already consume.
39:03
Alina Dallal
Absolutely. I think both of you have proven that social media analytics can reveal so much and actually help you move your strategy forward. We just need to understand what the data is telling us, what we can make of the data and the story around it to actually help us make the strategy going forward. So that moves us on to our last question, and I want to ask you both, Anna, Jen, how do you know if you're doing a good job on social media? Jen, I'll start with you.
39:27
Genevieve Davis
Yeah. When my CMO and director say run with your strategy, that's when I know and I don't get any pushback. That's one way I know I'm doing well. So I'm taking the data in, I'm interpreting it and putting. Telling the story, and they understand it. You know, that's. That's a major, like, pat on my. On the back. And then I also know I'm doing well when I get, you know, groups coming to me from different parts of the business, you know, whether it's banking and payments, wealth and asset management teams, cybersecurity teams. And they say, hey, we have a big campaign coming up. Can you help us get onto the advocacy program or build up our LinkedIn profiles? Can you teach us how to do social in a. In a more effective way? So that just makes me so happy that people are getting it. Like, okay, you're buying into this new tool that you can use as a
40:13
Alina Dallal
salesperson, and it's proving that social has value, because social media is like the anchor of B2B marketing today. There is so much value in it. And having the wider organization see that and want to be onboarded on employee advocacy is so important to help you propel your value forward. And also showing them the data so that they. They see that and they understand the numbers and like, oh, hey, this really is working. Anna, how are you?
40:39
Anna Pickard
Similarly, you know, stakeholder feedback. You know, if they want to engage us, like, upfront to strategize, and, you know, if they're happy with that, they feel like they're getting value out of our conversations, like, that is a huge win. And then also the employee advocacy side, if, you know, we have a lot of folks coming to us, like, very curious, and we're not doing a big push. We know that there's word of mouth going on behind the scenes and people are actually using it. Right. So, you know, those are two indicators of success for us.
41:09
Alina Dallal
Amazing. So I want to thank you both for joining us. As, as you can see, at the end of the day, you can't improve what you can't measure and social media is not a nice to have and analytics can prove that and get you a seat at the table and show the business value. So thank you, Anna and Jen for joining us. We're going to move on to the Q A section. So if anyone wants to pop their questions in the Q and A chat and we'll answer a few now and as you can see, also if you want to connect with us on LinkedIn, feel free to scan the QR codes to continue the conversation. So as I'm looking through the QA questions, I just want to ask you both as a quick recap, what are the analytics that you focus on? Jen, I'll start with you.
41:48
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, so definitely engagements, engagement rate are huge. Yeah. To be honest, I also look at, you know, I go through the LinkedIn feed and look at, you know, the average number of impressions to see.
41:59
Alina Dallal
Yeah.
42:00
Genevieve Davis
If the algorithm is, is serving our content, if it's working. So I would say those three are definitely important for us.
42:06
Alina Dallal
And Anna.
42:08
Anna Pickard
Yeah, engagement rate, total engagements, impressions and reach, like I said in context. So you know, if it's down or up on just kind of explaining how those will impact our total engagements and then number of posts. Right. I think that's really important when you're talking about, you know, that quality over quantity story and what did that drive, you know, for the business. So for example, a good one that you can use is, you know, what percentage did you increase or decrease posting and what percentage did you increase or decrease in link clicks or engagement rates? For example, you might have, you know, a 10% decrease in posting, but you might see, you know, 20% increase in link clicks. And I think that also helps prove that quality over quantity stories. So, so as much as you can track those, you know, quarter over quarter and compare that to your strategy and what that actually means, it's just a really great way to help prove value.
43:05
Alina Dallal
We had a question come in from Maya. She asked, do you think having less copy is more effective than more copy within the post?
43:14
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, I'll take this one first. I think it depends. We all love that answer, right? I think you can have a lot of copy in a post, but I think it's really useful to use bullet points to call out those main three points, let's say. So if you have a lot to say, say it. But at the beginning have a catchy line that pulls the person in and then if it's Too long, didn't read. What are the three points right away that you can highlight? I also love using emojis to kind of call it out too, if that aligns with your brand.
43:50
Anna Pickard
Anna, depends on the goal of your post, I think. Really, really depends. You know, if you, if you're just trying to get someone to click through, I think sometimes shorter is a little bit better because it gives them, you know, get, get the more information on the next page kind of deal. Right. If the goal is to educate and create awareness, I think you can go a little bit longer. Right. So try to break down what that goal is and then figure it out from there, you know, in terms of, you know, what, what is it that you want them to consume on platform versus what do you want them to actually consume?
44:26
Alina Dallal
After we had another question coming in which I think is interesting because social media managers are doing a lot at once and juggling different things. And someone asked, do you ever find yourself having to prioritize and spend more time on reporting your performance above the optimization of your performance?
44:45
Genevieve Davis
Yes. The answer is yes. Sometimes, yeah, you kind of have to, you know, find that balance if you're too into the, you know, never get too into the weeds that you can't see the bigger picture. So honestly sometimes it's just, you know, I take an hour out of my day and I start scrolling through LinkedIn or Instagram or whatever it is and I'm like, is my strategy aligning with what's working for other people? And that's how I can sometimes get myself out of the weeds of analytics and then present it back, hey, here's our analytics and here's how I think you can be optimizing. They have to come together, but it's almost like a self discipline thing to get yourself out of the weeds.
45:31
Alina Dallal
Anna, is there anything to add that too?
45:33
Anna Pickard
Yeah, I have a pretty stark rule here about only reporting on stuff that can bring business value, like the not reporting to just report. So I'm constantly asking stakeholders what, what are you using this for? Or you know, what are your goals in getting this information? How is it going to influence your decision? And if they're just trying to check a box like that's not going to work really in terms of us, you know, pulling the metrics. Because think about the volume of social. There's so much going on that everyone is going to want reporting and it might not actually tell the picture, giving them that one off metric. And like Jen said, the bigger picture will tell the story about that. Their post Performance. So I think it's really important to ask the question like what, what are you going to use this for? What decisions are this going to influence for your business? Because you know, more often than not it might be as simple as like, like yeah, I just need it because it's on the template request and you know, it's not providing any business value back. So ensure yourself your sanity before reporting every single day, on every single post. You know that you're not doing that. Also timelines, so set strict timelines because you know, social, I often compare it to the stock market and I know this is kind of like a weird way of saying this, but sometimes your content doesn't perform well until later down the road because that's when something starts trending in the bigger picture of things. And that's just how algorithms work as well. Right. Like sometimes you go and post and it, you know, they might want a 24 hour turnaround on reporting and you gotta explain like why that isn't, isn't like indicative or you know, it doesn't predict like success of the social strategy just yet. You need it, it, you need some time, right, for it to kind of be out there and for people to interact, interact and gain that traction. So you know, as much as you can educate people on the different timelines and you know what these metrics mean and ask those questions, you'll prevent yourself from being in a reporting loophole. And that's all you're doing all day.
47:42
Alina Dallal
Yeah, absolutely. And that also reminded me of another thing you mentioned before, that you report quarter over quarter to your marketing leaders. Right? It was quarter of a quarter. I think it's also, that's a good amount of time for you to actually see what's working. Because if you try something once after a week, like yeah, you can see the engagements, you can see the reach, but you're not going to really see the true impact that a strategy has. And sometimes it takes a few times to even get within that, get the post right within that strategy and testing different copy and like that thing that analytics can also help you with. So just reminded me there was another question that someone asked, we spoke about how you report to your leadership team. Someone asked, you send a monthly activity and metrics report to your team. So whether it's leadership or the rest, like how do you align with the rest of your team if it's not necessarily the leadership?
48:33
Anna Pickard
Do you want me to take that one? I can do it. Honestly, I think as much as you can have kind of stand in check ins with these different teams to advise them while they're creating the content. I think that is so important, whether it be, you know, popping in and just doing like a quick overview. That's something I do on a monthly basis for you know, our product marketing team for example and just kind of share what we see as performing well and just share insights because you want to help influence that while it's already kind of happening. So if you're already seeing some type of trend, communicating it to who has the, you know, power to help you change it and create those partnerships throughout the business, this, that's really important. I also never send out a report without context. So I think it's really important to book those meetings, go over them in a meeting in person because quite often people are business, you people are users of social media outside of work. Right. They don't know what this stuff means at all. So unless you're explaining it to them, they might perceive you know, like that decrease as bad had and they might just not even, you know, engage with you on that. So I think it does take some time to explain it and you know, booking those, those meetings and you know, popping in on different like team meetings that are going on to just explain symmetrics and get them talking. You can always do deep dives with people if they're more interested. Right. Like one on one. But I think it's just, you know, popping in and having those conversations as much as you can.
50:14
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, I'll just piggyback and say yes, getting in front of it when you can. When they're at the starting stage of planning their strategy like get in there, see what, how social, how you can help as a social media manager, see what metrics they are putting weight on and say okay, yeah, I agree with that. Or hey, actually these can be misleading. So just try to get in front of it and create clear KPIs from the beginning.
50:38
Alina Dallal
So as we're nearing to the end, there is another question that has actually come through a few times which I think is interesting because you guys are in different industries. But people want to know on social media, what asset do you see has been proven to be the most successful? Is it video carousel, text only promoting webinars or is it subjective to the copy? I think it's an interesting question that a lot of people want to know the answer to.
51:03
Anna Pickard
I mean I do. I wonder if we're going to say the same thing, Jen. I think we, I think we're gonna humanizing content like people like faces, actual Photos of people tend to do really well and I think that's been pretty consistent. I've worked mainly in the tech industry. I did work in E commerce and consumer brand before, but I, I saw that as well. And I know this is another funny one. Pets, dogs, cats create a lot of engagement.
51:36
Genevieve Davis
So, yes, so I will agree with that. So, yes, humanizing your brand is the best thing you can do. One of our success stories is, you know, we have this Capco in the press. It's a theme anytime we get mentioned, you know, we, we post it out there and we used to just have a standard image that said CAPCO in the press, like so and so appeared in X, Y or Z and they did not perform well. And so one day I saw someone else using a headshot on their press release and I was like, okay, we need to be doing this. And since then, our Kepigo in the press has skyrocketed. It performed so much better. I mean, I would say like 150%, like better, honestly, in terms of engagements. So, yeah, using headshots, carousels perform really well because, you know, you're clicking through, that's good for the algorithm. And then, yeah, International Dog Day at capco, your Capco canine, it performs so well. We like all get excited about it as a social team in August. So, you know, yeah, humanize your brand as much as you can. Again, people trust people. People, you know, buy from people and, and yeah, that third party. So if you can tag, you know, so and so partner was, you know, did an interview with Washington Post, you know, tag Washington Post, get, get them, get everyone in there and also get people commenting. I think if you're not creating a strategy around how your stakeholders are going to comment on posts that go out, you're doing yourself a big disservice. That's a recent find learning that I've gotten in the last two months. Your commenting game is so, so important. It's not enough just to like, absolutely.
53:14
Alina Dallal
And starting those conversations with people online as well. And then people can see, oh, this brand just is engaging with other people and starting conversations. And it's really important. And I have to say, company culture content always does so well. I think it's people in B2B. We're still human in B2B. There's still that element of the scene that it's still a person at the other end of the computer that wants to see what's going on at the company or wants to see people and people being celebrated. So I'm not Surprised that we all had the same answer. I'm going to wrap up on this question that just came through. Someone asked, do you have any tips on reaching your target audience through organic social. Most of my audience audience are current employees and I'd love to know if you have any suggestions on how to reach a wider audience.
53:56
Anna Pickard
Oh, I got one off this one. I'm thinking in terms of your posting strategy and in, in terms of what ends up coming through a lot on the B2B side ends up being very company centric and focused, which is going to be my assumption about why you may be seeing a lot of engagement on the employee side. So my biggest tip is actually asking yourself, when you're writing something, right, we often are like, oh, we're so proud. Our company is so proud. And the audience and the consumer is like, so what? Like who are you? I. What am I getting out of this post? Right? So if you can figure out exactly what your audience wants and you are the one to give it to them, you know, try to create content based off of that and see how that starts to change your interactions. Because majority of the time I'm sure employees actually know what you're, you're saying, right? Like on that. But someone else who you know might be a prospect or needs awareness might not. Right? So how can you, you know, shift your buckets of content to answer a question that your audience is looking for the answer for?
55:16
Genevieve Davis
Yeah, I tend to agree with what you're saying, Anna. And then the other side of it is no matter how you slice it, your corporate channel ends up being an echo chamber. Because if you're following the corporate channel, you know, the company, you work for the company, you used to work for the company, like it's already known to you. So that's where, you know, I really focus on our advocacy program because, because they are our little hashtag influencers that can create more engagement. If you don't have an advocacy program, that's fine. But that's where I think you gotta get your commenting game really, really strong. Have those comments pop up in other people's feeds who don't even follow Capco and who start the conversation and so they can say, oh, what is capco? I think it's really important. It's hard. It's definitely hard. But remember, it is an echo chamber a lot of the time. So, so think about the so what? As Anna was mentioning and how do I cast the net wider? And usually that's the comments. If you don't have an advocacy program.
56:20
Alina Dallal
So thank you both for the tips. That was really valuable. And with that, I want to say thank you so much for joining me and for helping us build this confidence in other social media managers and anyone who's working in social, because analytics can really help us prove our value, move our strategy forward and make an impact. So thank you again for joining me and I'll see you all next time.
