Wondering how to calculate your engagement rate on social media? You’ve come to the right place!
An engagement rate is like the currency for social media marketing. It lends perspective to how well your marketing strategy is performing and whether it is a good return on investment or not.
The engagement rate looks at active actions in the form of how your fans interact with your content. This can be comments, direct messages, shares, mentions, click-through, and more.
A high engagement rate tells you that your content is quality and that it speaks to your audience. So while follower growth is important, it doesn’t mean much if your fans don’t find value in what you create and share.
So, let’s find out exactly how to calculate your engagement rate. This will help you better understand how your audience is reacting to your content and social media posts.
How to Calculate Your Engagement Rate: 7 Methods
There is no industry standard formula you can use to calculate your engagement rate (ER).
How you calculate your rate depends on the social media platform you use as well as what type of engagement you look at (e.g. shares, comments, etc.)
ER by Reach
The first method on how to calculate engagement rate is known as the engagement rate by reach or ERR. This is one of the most common methods social media marketers use. It shows you how your real content viewers interact with the content you post and with your brand.
Calculating the ERR shows you how many people (in percentage) interacted with your content after they saw it.
To calculate the ERR for one post, use this formula:
ERR = the total number of engagements per post / (reach of the post) x 100
If you want to calculate the ERR across multiple posts, you would have to tally up the ERR for every post and then:
Average ERR = total ERR / total number of posts
So, if post 1 came to 3%, post 2 to 5%, post 3 to 2%, and post 4 to 1.7%, then it would be:
Average EER = (3% + 5% + 2% + 1.7%) / 4 posts
ER by Posts
The second method calculates how many of your followers engaged with a post. So instead of measuring the reach, you discover the rate at which your fans engage with the content you share.
To determine your ER:
ER = total number of engagements on a post / (total number of followers x 100)
To work out your average ER, you would need the engagement rate for each post, and then use this total and divide it by the total number of posts. This is similar to how you calculate the average ERR in method #1.
Average ER = Total ER of your posts / total number of posts
ER by Impressions
The impression ER metric tracks how often your content appears on your followers’ screens. This calculation is especially useful for paid content and when you want to evaluate how effective your campaign is based on impressions.
To calculate your engagement rate by impressions:
ER impressions = total engagements on a post / (total number of impressions x 100)
To work out the average, you would need to get your ER impressions per post, add this up for a total, and then divide it by the total number of posts.
Average ER impressions = Total ER impressions of your posts / total number of posts
ER Views
Use this calculation if you post a lot of video content on your social media feeds. The ER views metric shows you how many of your followers engage with your videos after they have watched them.
To determine your ER views:
ER view = total engagements on a video post / (total number of video views x 100)
To get the average ER views, first get the ER view for every video post.
Average ER view = total ER views / total number of video posts
Daily ER
Your daily engagement rate tells you how often your audience engages with your social media account every day. This metric looks at old and new posts together.
To calculate your daily ER metric:
Daily ER = total number of engagements in a day / (your total following x 100)
To get your average daily ER, look at the total engagement over a period:
Average daily ER = total number of engagements over Y days / [(Y days x total number of followers) x 100)]
Factored ER
Not a common metric, but marketers use the factored engagement rate when they want to place more value on a certain factor in the ER calculation. For example, they may want to place a higher value on comments over likes.
The factored ER equation may be:
ER weighted by comments = (Total comments x 2) + all your other engagements / (reach per post x 100)
Cost Per Engagement
You may also want to know the extent of your investment into sponsored content and engagement is paying off. In this case, calculate the cost per engagement (CPE):
CPE = how much you spend on sponsored content / total number of engagements
What Is a Good Engagement Rate?
A good engagement rate for your social media content depends on the platform you use. However, in general, a good ER is anything between 1% and 5%.
For example, according to a report from Socialinsider, the average engagement rates by followers for various social media platforms in 2020 were as follows:
- Facebook: 0.27%
- Twitter: 0.07%
- Instagram: 1.16%
You may now wonder what exactly a good engagement rate on Instagram is. And the answer is that it varies according to the type of post.
Statista found that video on Instagram has an engagement rate of 1.45% while an image post has a 1.74% ER rate. The average Instagram carousel rate is 1.92%, with two slides scoring a 1.9% rate and 10 slides getting 2.07%.
Time To Get Your Calculator Out!
Knowing your ER rate is important. As part of your social media strategy, you want to know how much and how often your audience engages with your content.
Your engagement rate also indicates whether you are getting a good return on your investment.
Luckily, how to calculate your engagement rate is easy. Simply follow our formulas above and you’ll be all set!
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