Understanding and exploiting Facebook Insights
Updated: Dec 12, 2019
To get the most out of your business Facebook page you need to consistently post worthwhile content, share it with the appropriate groups AND you must learn to assess and to exploit Facebook's Insights tool. The following is an in-depth explanation on this incredible - free - tool. Note: Keep in mind that Facebook regularly rolls-out (introduces) and repeals features without prior notice and that the Facebook interface displayed here may differ from the interface found on various mobile phones, tablets, as well as on Mac and PC. The following interface screenshots are from a PC.
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS
Organic vs Paid: Once you begin to pay attention to your Facebook stats – it’s important to know that there are organic and paid posts and most of the Facebook Insights will graphically reflect this. Organic means that people have begun to view your posts in a natural process as you share with friends and groups and Paid – means just that, you paid to have Facebook expand and increase the reach of your post.
Facebook and time: Timing of posts is important to maximize your post's reach, since you want people to see and react to your post when it is convenient for them. If you post in the middle of the night and your viewers generally view your posts in mid-afternoon, by the time they are viewing Facebook your post is buried under tens or maybe hundreds of other posts and they may never see it. Posting time always has a sweet spot for your business and Facebook provides this information according to your time zone, since for the most part Facebook recognizes that you live in Israel – because of your IP (internet protocol) address. However, some of the data may correspond to Facebook's location time in San Francisco.
Exact numbers: You can mouse-over on any graph in Insights and see the exact number/percentage and explanation for any given point.
Engagement means an action taken by someone on your page/post, such as a Like, Share and Comment.
How to make the most out of this blog: Open Facebook and find and review each of the Insight pages one-at-a-time. They may not make a lot of sense to you the first time you review them (and some may never have a true value for you), but as you begin to post on a regular basis, you will begin to see patterns of your viewer's behavior: when they read your posts, what subjects interest them (you will see a pattern of more views with certain subjects) and more.
As patterns of viewing emerge you should be able to write more worthwhile content for your viewers and improve your viewing numbers and keep track of your success. Consider 'mixing things up' from time to time and change the day or time you post to see how it affects your numbers - have you improved your viewing numbers or have they declined?
It's also important to understand that Facebook changes the rules and adds (Facebook uses the term 'rolls out') and removes features on a regular basis, so the information you find in Insights today may look different a year from now.
INSIGHTS INTO INSIGHTS
Everything that is discussed from this point on can be found by clicking Insights on the menu just under the main blue Facebook menu.
INSIGHTS
Once you click Insights’ the following menu is displayed on the left-hand side of the screen.
List of insights
Please note: This list may vary or be disolayed in different order.
Overview
Promotions
Followers
Likes
Reach
Page Views
Page Previews
Actions on Page
Posts
Events
Videos
Stories
People
Local
Messages
Let's review them one at a time.
OVERVIEW
Click Insights > Overview
Page Summary
You can choose a summary for Today, Yesterday, Last 7 days and Last 28 days of overview - click any of the words next to Page Summary in the title and click the timetable.
The information on this part of the page includes the following list. Click the small letter "i " next to the titles to get a short explanation.
Actions on Page
Page Views
Page Previews (explanation of previews is found later in this doc)
Page Likes
Reach
Recommendations
Post engagements
Videos
Page Followers
Next: Your 5 Most Recent Posts
Click on to the link of any of the posts and get even more information on a specific post:
Next: Pages to Watch - you can add pages of competitors or anyone else. See their page’s performance and compare to your own.
PROMOTIONS
Click Insights > Promotions
These are paid promotions – once you boost a post or promote a post– you can view the stats here.
FOLLOWERS
Click Insights > Followers
This page gives you information on Followers to your page at any given period of time: 1 week, 1 month and 1 quarter, including unfollows.
Total page followers as of today
Net followers
Where your page follows happened
LIKES
Click Insights > Likes
This page gives you information on Likes to your page at any given period of time: 1 week,
1 month and 1 quarter, including unfollows.
Total page likes as of today
Net likes
Where your page likes happened
REACH
Click Insights > Post Reach
This page gives you information on Reach (according to Facebook Reach is "the number of people who had any posts from your Page enter their screen") at any given period of time: 1 week, 1 month and 1 quarter. Click to see more information on graph, including:
Post reach
Recommendations
Reactions, comments, shares and more
Reactions (love and such)
Hides, report as spam and unlikes
Total reaches
PAGE VIEWS
Click Insights > Page Views of your profile
This page gives you information on Page Views of your profile at any given period of time: 1 week, 1 month and 1 quarter.
Total views
Total people who viewed - including By Section and By Age and Gender. By Country, City and Device (usually not available)
Top sources
Page view by age and gender, country, city (not always available)
PAGE PREVIEWS
Click Insights > Page Previews of your profile
What does a Facebook page preview mean? It simply means that someone hovered over your Page's name to see a preview of your page's content.
This page gives you information on Page Previews:
Total page previews
Total people who reviewed - including By Age and Gender
ACTIONS ON PAGE
Click Insights > Actions on Page
This page gives you information on Actions on page at any given period of time: 1 week,
1 month and 1 quarter, including:
People who clicked Action button
People who clicked Get Directions
People who clicked Phone Number
People who clicked Website
POSTS
Click Insights > Posts
This is one of the most important insights in the Insights page:
This page gives you information on when your fans are online and includes the following information:
When you fans are online
Post types - The success of different post types based on average reach and engagement (when someone performs an action: Like, Share and so forth)
Top posts from pages you watch
What you can view in this section:
Days of the week are displayed in separate boxes - with average number of daily views.
Click any Day square and the graph underneath displays a line with the viewing rates – on an hourly basis for that specific day.
Times of day listed are according to your computer's local time zone.
Click on any time on the graph and see a number of views according to the hour shown.
Scroll down to see ALL your posts (in Overview, above, we saw only the five most recent).
EVENTS
Click Insights > Events
This page gives you information on Events with information including reach, engagement, tickets and audience for any event you created on Facebook.
VIDEO
See Understanding and Exploiting Facebook Video Insights blog for details and updates.
STORIES
Click Insights > Stories
Welcome to Stories January 2019: Stories has come to Facebook business pages, but at this time they can only be accessed via a mobile phone. The good news is that once you publish a Story, it will appear at the Facebook Newsfeeds on both desktops and mobiles.
Access your business page on your mobile, click Create Story and simply follow the screens.
Facebook Stories are much like Instagram’s Stories – image-based and lasting only 24 hours. This could be a great tool to get your branding or an interesting back-story for your business out to many more viewers. You can also push an Instagram Story to Facebook Stories reusing image-based content.
Plan your stories wisely. Ask yourself: what is the goal of each story and what message do you want to convey – this 'here today and gone tomorrow' model invites more of a ‘guerrilla type’ of marketing – quick images and videos to take new and existing viewers on a journey. You can use this method to check out a new product or service idea, without leaving ant trail on your social media.
Once you have published Stories you can view the insights in Stories.
PEOPLE
Click Insights > People
This page also provides important information on your posts and contains three tabs:
Your Fans
Your Followers
People Reached
What's the difference between Fans and Followers? Basically Fans like your page and followers follow your page.
Both the Fans and Followers tabs displays the same information types: demographics are people who like/follow your page divided into women and men, countries, languages and cities.
People Reached tab displays the number of people who saw any content by your Page or about your Page divided into women and men, countries, languages and cities.
LOCAL
Click Insights > Local
Learn more about the people near your business (based on your address listed in page information). Click the Request button to get access to this information.
MESSAGES
Click Insights > Messages
This page provides insights into Messenger conversations between your page and other people; including connections, blocked messages, page responsiveness (how quickly you answer messages).
The information found in this blog is part of a two-day hands-on Facebook workshop. If you or your group are looking to learn more about utilizing Facebook as a marketing tool contact me today. You can learn more about my business training workshops here.
Do you want to open yourself to a more successful business? Are you lost in the social media jungle? Let me help you re-energize your business and rediscover your passion in your profession. We’ll work together to improve your marketing strategy and online exposure and find the perfect target markets for your business. Contact me today to schedule a free introductory meeting.
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