Guest Post by Dawn Baird, Sensei Learning and Performance.

There are many tools to measure links, interactions, visitors and stuff, but what about Facebook?  Facebook Insights has been around for a little while, but with news out this month that they’re now they’re monitoring interactions with your postings on the wall of your Page, this lets you see a little more about who’s engaging with your content, and should help you prioritise what content to post in future.

Facebook Insights will appear on the left-hand side of your organisation’s Page on Facebook.  Note: a Page is not the same as a Profile.  Click See All to view full details.

To highlight Facebook terminology, it appears in Italics.  To distinguish the two main areas on the Page, they are in Bold.

Age, Gender and Location

There are two main sets of statistics on display: Fans Who Interact With [Organisation Name] and All Fans of [Organisation Name].  The first is vital information, in that it will help crystallize who is watching, reading, conversing with you on your Facebook Page.  The second will give you a broad view, of general trends among your Fans.

Both sections provide an breakdown of Male and Female fans by age, displaying this as a percentage.  For example, on our Page, 67% of our Fans are Male and 33% are Female.  Our largest age-group is 25-34, followed by 35-44.

This seems to tally fairly closely with general Facebook statistics on users.  It will also indicate a number of Active fans this week.  The View All link at the bottom of Fans Who Interact displays Top countries and Top languages, while Top towns/cities is also displayed under All Fans.

Why might this information be useful?

If you know your target audience very well, including location, age and gender breakdown, then you might be more or less likely to use your Facebook Page as a medium, depending on the statistics you find there.

Interaction – Which Fans are Helping You?

Both sections also display a graph.  The Fans Who Interact graph displays results based on a drop-down selection: Interactions; Interactions per post; Post quality; Posts (shown in image below); Discussion posts; Reviews and Mentions.

Here is a brief definition of each:

• Interactions – when someone writes on your wall, comments on a post, or likes a post.
• Interactions per post – the average number of wall posts, comments and likes on each item you post
• Post quality – a high quality post is identified by the increasing numbers of people engaging with it
• Posts – the number of items posted by the Page admin
• Discussion posts – the number of discussions other users have added to your Page
• Reviews – the number of times Fans have used the Reviews application on your Page
• Mentions – the number of times your page has been referenced by Fans

Why might this information be useful?

1. Fans who interact with you and your content, are more likely to spread your posts and content around Facebook.  If this is not happening, this might encourage you to reevaluate your content, or choose another medium.
2. Secondly, you should return the favour once in a while.  And, be systematic about it.  Those who’re loyal to you soon drop off if you forget to help take five minutes to promote them!

Other Statistical Information

The All Fans graph also displays results based on a drop down selection:  Total fans/unsubscribed fans; New/removed fans; Top countries; Demographics; Page views; Unsubscrubes/resubscribes; and Media Consumption.  Those items that display both offer a tickbox option to switch on and off one or the other, or display both on the same, simple line graph.

Here is a brief description of each:

• Total fans/unsubscribed fans – the number of fans, including the total number who have chosen to hide your posts in their News Feed
• New/removed fans – the total number of new and removed fans per week
• Top countries – Fan locations by country
• Demographics – Fans by age and gender
• Page views – Page views, including Unique Views per day
• Unsubscribes/resubscribes – total number of times fans have unsubscribed and resubscribed to your Page
• Media Consumption – total photo views, audio/video plays of your content

Why might this information be useful?

1. It gives  abroad indication of how popular your content is, with different groups of the Facebook population, and may therefore help you to tailor your content.
2. It helps you track how fast your Page popularity is growing, to help you decide how much time and effort to put into updating content

What’s the Upshot?

The more popular your Page, the more content and the more quality content and interactions you will post.  The word about your organisation spreads and continues to spread.  It’s a vicious happy circle!!

I’d love to hear your thoughts or questions on Facebook Insights.  Contact me on Facebook, our Facebook Page, or Twitter.