5 Social Media Metrics That Actually Matter (And 5 That Don't)

Open any social media dashboard and you'll see dozens of metrics. Impressions, reach, engagement rate, follower growth, link clicks, saves, shares, profile visits, story views — the list goes on.

Most of these numbers are noise. They make you feel good (or bad) without telling you whether your social strategy is actually working.

After managing social media for 50+ brands, we've narrowed it down to 5 metrics that actually predict business outcomes — and 5 that are distracting you.

5 Metrics That Actually Matter

1. Engagement Rate (Meaningful Interactions)

Not all engagement is equal. Likes are low-effort. Comments, saves, and shares are high-effort — they indicate that someone found your content genuinely valuable.

What to track: (Comments + Saves + Shares) / Reach × 100

Why it matters: This tells you whether your content is resonating deeply enough to drive action. A post with 10,000 impressions and 2 saves is performing worse than a post with 1,000 impressions and 50 saves.

Benchmark: If your meaningful engagement rate is above 2%, you're creating content worth amplifying with paid spend.

2. Click-Through Rate (CTR)

When you share a link — to your website, product page, or landing page — what percentage of people actually click?

What to track: Link Clicks / Impressions × 100

Why it matters: CTR is the bridge between social media activity and business results. High impressions with zero clicks means you're entertaining people but not driving them toward a business outcome.

Benchmark: 1-3% CTR on organic link posts is solid. Paid ads should target 1%+ on cold audiences, 3%+ on retargeting.

3. Conversion Rate from Social Traffic

Of the people who click through from social to your website, how many take a desired action (purchase, sign up, book a call)?

What to track: Conversions from Social / Social Website Sessions × 100

Why it matters: This is the metric that connects social media to revenue. If your social traffic converts at 0.1%, you have a landing page problem or an audience targeting problem — no amount of impressions will fix that.

Benchmark: 2-5% conversion rate for e-commerce, 5-15% for lead generation landing pages.

4. Cost Per Acquisition (CPA) — Paid Campaigns

For every customer or lead you acquire through paid social, how much did it cost?

What to track: Total Ad Spend / Number of Conversions

Why it matters: CPA tells you whether your paid campaigns are profitable. If your average customer is worth $200 and your CPA is $150, you're barely breaking even. If your CPA is $30, you should be scaling aggressively.

Benchmark: Varies wildly by industry. The key is that CPA should be significantly lower than your customer lifetime value (LTV). Aim for a LTV:CPA ratio of at least 3:1.

5. Revenue Attributed to Social

The ultimate metric. How much money did your social media efforts generate?

What to track: Total revenue from social-referred purchases + attributed assisted revenue

Why it matters: This is the answer to "what's the ROI of social media?" It requires proper tracking setup (UTM parameters, conversion pixels, multi-touch attribution), but it's the only number that truly justifies your social media investment.

Benchmark: If you can't answer this question, setting up attribution tracking should be your immediate priority.

5 Metrics That Don't Matter (As Much As You Think)

1. Follower Count

A large follower count feels impressive, but it doesn't pay the bills. We've worked with accounts that have 500K followers and generate zero revenue, and accounts with 5K followers that drive $50K/month in sales.

Why it's misleading: Followers can be bought, accumulated from irrelevant audiences, or simply inactive. A smaller, highly engaged audience is worth 10x a large, passive one.

When it matters: Only as a credibility signal. If a potential customer lands on your profile and sees 47 followers, it may hurt trust. Beyond a basic threshold, though, follower count is vanity.

2. Impressions

Impressions tell you how many times your content was displayed — not how many people cared about it.

Why it's misleading: A post can generate 100,000 impressions and drive zero clicks, zero conversations, and zero revenue. Impressions measure exposure, not impact.

When it matters: As a directional signal for reach. If impressions are trending down month-over-month, something is wrong. But chasing impressions as a goal leads to clickbait content that doesn't convert.

3. Likes

Likes are the least valuable engagement signal on every platform. They require minimal effort, don't signal deep interest, and don't correlate with business outcomes.

Why it's misleading: A post with 500 likes and 0 saves is entertainment. A post with 50 likes and 200 saves is valuable content that people want to reference later. The second post will drive more business.

When it matters: Only as a baseline engagement signal. If a post gets significantly more or fewer likes than average, it's worth investigating why — but likes alone don't tell you much.

4. Reach

Reach tells you how many unique accounts saw your content. It sounds important, but it's just a bigger number than impressions that tells you the same limited story.

Why it's misleading: Reaching 50,000 people who don't care about your product is worth less than reaching 500 people who are actively looking for what you sell.

When it matters: When paired with engagement metrics. High reach + high engagement = you're reaching the right people. High reach + low engagement = you're reaching the wrong people.

5. Follower Growth Rate

Growing by 1,000 followers per month sounds great — until you realize none of those followers are potential customers.

Why it's misleading: Growth rate doesn't account for the quality of new followers. Viral content often attracts audiences that will never buy from you. We've seen clients go viral, gain 20K followers, and see zero impact on revenue.

When it matters: Only when paired with engagement and conversion data. If new followers are also engaging and converting, your growth is healthy. If they're just inflating a number, it's meaningless.

The Dashboard That Matters

Here's what we recommend tracking weekly:

1. Meaningful engagement rate — Are we creating valuable content?

2. CTR on link posts — Are we driving traffic?

3. Social traffic conversion rate — Is the traffic converting?

4. CPA on paid campaigns — Are we acquiring customers profitably?

5. Revenue from social — What's the bottom-line impact?

Everything else is context. These five numbers tell you whether your social media strategy is working.

Stop obsessing over vanity metrics. Start measuring what matters.