For digital strategists, it has been many years trying to understand and keep up with Instagram’s ever-changing algorithm. There are two things that seem very clear at this point: Instagram has more secrecy with its algorithm than the Coca-Cola formula, and on the other hand, Engagement Rate are the magic words to measure the success of your strategy.
What Is The Engagement Rate?
Engagement rate is a calculation that allows us to see in real numbers what percentage of our following users have interacted with our content. This formula considers the number of likes and comments a post receives related to the overall follower count. Sometimes, it includes the number of saves, shares, or impressions.
The engagement rate will give you a general view of how relevant your content is to your audience.
Why Is It Important To Rate The Engagement Rate?
Engagement is the most relevant metric when building our content and marketing strategies because it shows us how much the audience cares about our content. Measuring engagement becomes essential before making any business-related decisions regarding content creation, advertising, influencer marketing, etc.
How To Calculate The Engagement Rate?
If you like math, you’ll find this part fun. Initially, there are three formulas for measuring the engagement rate: engagement by followers, engagement by impressions, and factored engagement rate. Let’s get started!
Engagement By Followers: To calculate the engagement rate by followers, divide the number of comments and likes by the total number of your account’s followers. Then, multiply it by 100
Engagement = (Likes + Comments) / Followers x 100 = X
These numbers are public, except for those who hide the number of likes. But this formula is perfect for you if you want to check others accounts’ engagement of your niche to compare. It can also work to see if an influencer you’d like to partner with has the impact you need in the audience.
Engagement By Impressions: The second formula allows you to calculate your engagement by dividing the number of likes, saves, and comments by the impressions and multiplying it by 100.
Engagement = (Likes + Comments + Saves) / Impressions x 100 = X
This formula takes into account the total of people who saw your posts and decided to engage with them. It shows a more accurate insight into your performance.
How can you see this data? First, make sure your account is set as a Business Account. Then, go to your profile and select the drop-down menu in the corner. Tap into Insights, choose “Post,” and adjust to “Impressions” and “Engagement.”
Factored Instagram Engagement Rate: If you’d like to pay more attention to other factors like comments, you can customize the equation the following way:
Engagement = (Comments X2) + Other interactions / Impressions x100 = X
The issue with this formula is that it apparently inflates the final result. That’s why it is not so recommendable.
What To Expect From The Results
Once you have followed any of the 3 formulas, you may wonder if the result is satisfactory. The numbers may fluctuate depending on your account situation, but there are some benchmark results to give you some guidance.
You’ve got a low engagement rate if the result is less than 1%. An average/good rate is between 1% and 3.5%. From 3.5% to 6% is a more than positive result, and at 6% and above you are well above average.
Generating real engagement is the most important thing to keep in mind when creating content. In the end, the number of followers won’t matter, indistinctly of how many you have, that doesn’t guarantee that your account will get organic traffic.
Ratings are important to keep track of what’s working in your account, but there are types of content that don’t generate numbers but are still important for your brand to express itself and build its identity. The symbolic values of your content cannot be measured but are part of your brand voice.