Photo by Matheus Ferrero
If you’ve ever heard me speak or been to one of my training seminars, you know that I’m not a huge fan of the glamour metrics. Size of your community doesn’t matter as long as it’s big enough to seem legitimate. After that, it doesn’t matter until you’re absolutely massive. There are so many metrics that mean nothing to me when I’m measuring the success of my campaigns, mostly because these metrics don’t actually prove any real customer buy-in or drive an action. Here’s a metric that does matter that 90%+ of marketers aren’t even looking at today.
There are so many metrics that mean nothing to me when I’m measuring the success of my campaigns, mostly because these metrics don’t actually prove any real customer buy-in or drive an action. Here’s a metric that does matter that 90%+ of marketers aren’t even looking at today.
Instagram Saves are Important
I’m willing to bet money that most of you didn’t even know that this was a metric that you could find. If you guessed that you could, you probably don’t know where to find it. (See below for instructions.) Ever since Instagram introduced saves at the end of 2016, people have been able to use Instagram as their own treasure trove of great content that is highly relevant to them beyond the like. When Instagram introduced saved collections in April 2017, they quietly made Instagram the Millennial Pinterest. We can now track how impactful each of our posts is to our community and the public.
How to see your Saved posts:
Step 1: Go into the Posts analytics section and click on any of the blue words.
Step 2: Scroll down to Saved as the metric.
Why Does This Matter?
Years ago, I started speaking about the hierarchy of likeability. On the top end of that was content that people engaged with at the highest level because they felt like it spoke to who they are as people who who they want to be. Inside of Facebook, this is measured in a share. When you’re on Twitter, a RT is how people define themselves with someone else’s content. On Instagram, there is the regram but that’s not yet official. A save though, that means that someone needs your content for later. They might want to share it with a friend or simply refer to it later when shopping online. Either way, this is the highest official form of engagement that you can receive.
What Should I Do with This Information?
Once you realize that this metric is awesome, the next step is to decide what actions it should drive. This is two-pronged. Here are those prongs.
- Put out more content like that! It seems basic but looking for trends in which content is saved tells you a lot about which content is your best. For my fitness account, I know that people react more strongly to my posts about calisthenics workouts and challenges. Guess what I’ll post more. If you’re a clothing store and people are loving a certain style of photography or clothing/accessory line, start creating an editorial calendar that focuses more heavily there. If you’re a hotel, look for whether shots with people or without people do better. Do they love the bar more or shots of the rooms? Pay attention and reward your community with the content that they want.
- This is the content to place advertising dollars behind! My best performing ads on social media are the ones that feel real and/or have a UGC-esque component to them. If I’m seeing positive reactions to certain content on my organic posts, I’m going to test those out next in my paid campaigns. This isn’t always a perfect comparison but, I bet that you’ll see the same increase engagement that I have since I adopted this tactic.
All in all, the Instagram Save is the most important metric that many marketers are forgetting to pay attention to you. If you’re reading this, you’re not wanting to be like most marketers. You’re awesome. Now, go forth and conquer!
