facebook page analytics

Stratigent, Facebook Page Analytics. © 2011 Stratigent, LLC. All rights reserved. www.stratigent.com

MAY 2011

Whitepaper by Nestor Archival Jr, Senior Consultant and Team Lead at Stratigent

FACEBOOK PAGE ANALYTICS:USING AND INTEGRATING DATA FROM FACEBOOK INSIGHTS

Stratigent, Facebook Page Analytics. © 2011 Stratigent, LLC. All rights reserved. www.stratigent.com 02

Executive SummaryWith more than 150 million active users in the US and 500 million active users worldwide (facebook fact sheet)

Facebook has become a powerful marketing and communication platform. Unfortunately for marketers who

want to understand the impact of their Facebook presence, Facebook is not easy to measure. Using Facebook

Insights (the built-in analytics tool) is complicated by poor documentation, unclear definitions, inconsistent

naming and frequent updates. However, savvy marketers are able to leverage Facebook Insights to extract

useful insights and make actionable recommendations.

This whitepaper covers everything you need to know to be one of those savvy marketers. It starts by identifying

the components of the Facebook platform and defining key Facebook metrics. Then the whitepaper will cover

some simple strategies for identifying what is important to measure. It also provides a quick reference guide

with recommended resources and a glossary.

FACEBOOK PAGE ANALYTICS:USING AND INTEGRATING DATA FROM FACEBOOK INSIGHTS

http://www.stratigent.com

http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?factsheet


Executive Summary.............................................................................................................................................02

Facebook as a Multifaceted Platform..................................................................................................................04

Facebook Insights for Pages, Apps, and Websites...............................................................................................05

Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) for Facebook Pages..................................................................................06-08

Conclusion .........................................................................................................................................................09

Recommended Resources.....................................................................................................................................10

Glossary ........................................................................................................................................................11-12

About Stratigent .................................................................................................................................................13

OUTLINE OF PAGES



Facebook As A Multifaceted PlatformThe first thing to remember when trying to analyze Facebook data is that Facebook is a

multifaceted platform. The platform enables marketers to interact with users in many ways –

from posting stories to encouraging user generated content to running targeted ads. If that isn’t

challenging enough to analyze, these interactions can occur on a company’s Facebook Page,

on other users Facebook pages, and on websites other than Facebook. So, it doesn’t really make sense to say

that you’re “analyzing Facebook” unless you add the clarification that you’re analyzing Facebook Pages or

Facebook Ads, etc.

One way to cut through the complexity is to think about the Facebook platform using the Owned/Earned/Paid

classifications formalized by Forrester Research.

Definition

General Examples

Facebook Examples

DEFINITION

GENERAL EXAMPLES

FACEBOOK EXAMPLES

Channel that a brand controls

When customers become the channel

Brand has to pay to leverage the channel

Website, blog, newsletter, Twitter account, YouTube channel, etc.

Word of mouth, buzz, etc.

Paid search, display ads, sponsorships, etc

Pages, tabs, apps, and any content that originates from the brand’s page, tabs or apps, such as likes, comments, and user -generated photos, videos, and audio clips that are posted on the brand’s page . This also includes clicks on a “Like” box that appears outside of Facebook.

Content that originates outside of the brand’s page, tabs or apps, such as fan-generated pages and photos, videos and audio clips that a user posts to their own or their friends’ pages

Ads and sponsored stories

OWNED MEDIA EARNED MEDIA PAID MEDIA

We could have a lively debate about whether user-generated content posted to a brand’s Facebook page

should be classified as “Owned” or “Earned.” However, the distinction that Forrester makes is useful when

you’re trying to analyze Facebook data, because Facebook Insights only covers the things that fall in the

“Owned” media category. For example, I can use Facebook Insights to determine how many times a Stratigent

post was “liked” but not to see how many times users posted something about Stratigent on their own pages.


http://bit.ly/mq7X9U

http://bit.ly/mq7X9U


Facebook Insights for Pages, Apps, and WebsitesPages are the most common way that marketers leverage Facebook, so when a marketer refers to

Facebook Insights, s/he is most likely referring to Facebook Insights for Pages. However, Facebook

Insights also incorporates analytics for Apps and for Websites (formerly called Facebook Insights

for Domains).

• Facebook Insights for PagesThr Facebook Page owners will automatically be given access to Facebook Insights for Pages once they

have 30 users who “Like” their page. Facebook Insights for Pages provides Users reports (with metrics

such as Active Users, Lifetime Likes, Like Sources, Tab Views, Media Consumption, External Referrers and

Demographics) and Interactions reports (such as Post Views, Post Feedback, and Page Activity).

Unfortunately, Facebook Insights for Pages is the only tool that can be used to measure many of these items.

On the plus side, Facebook Insights for Pages is updated and enhanced on a weekly (and sometimes daily)

basis.

• Facebook Insights for AppsIf you have a custom Facebook App, you will automatically have access to Facebook Insights for Apps. This

includes User reports and metrics (such as Installs, Active users and Demographics); Sharing reports (such as

Contents Shared, Feedback per Share and Requests); and Performance reports (such as API calls, Request

Time and Errors Returned).

If you don’t like Facebook Insights for Apps, you have other options since custom apps are implemented

via iFrames. You can add your own web analytics tracking code into the pages where your apps are hosted,

which will enable you to count unique cookies, visits, and even create a scenario funnel appropriate to your

app’s predefined set of events. Many of the traditional web analytics vendors, such as Adobe, WebTrends and

Google Analytics have specialized offerings for measuring Facebook Apps.

• Facebook Insights for Websites (formerly Facebook Insights for Your Domain)

Facebook also enables you to track Social Plugins that you add to your website, such as Like Button, Send

Button and Comments Box. Accessing this data is not automatic and requires some simple set up. Fortunately,

the set up is simple as long as you have the ability to add a meta tag to your website (as a way to prove that

you are the site owner).

In general, Facebook Insights for Websites provides you metrics on Site Engagement (i.e. shares and

likes outside Facebook), Distribution on Facebook (impressions generated by said likes and shares), and

Referral Traffic to your Site (clicks to your site generated from News Feed stories by said shares and likes).

Demographics data is also available. The Engagement, reach and click through, effectiveness of the Send but-

ton as well as the Comments Box are also being reported on.

This whitepaper focuses on Facebook Insights for Pages.



Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) for Facebook PagesThere are three primary challenges for marketers trying to analyze Facebook Page data:

• Unclear Purpose

Measuring performance (KPIs) assumes that there was a goal or at least a purpose. Too often companies

create Facebook pages because they think everyone else has one, which isn’t much of an objective. In that

situation, you might have to identify an objective (Reach, Brand Awareness, Engagement, Advocacy, etc) by

retrofitting a strategy. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than nothing.

• Confusing Definitions

Of all the analytics tools that we have worked with, no one has more confusing or less intuitive metric

definitions than Facebook. For example:

- Unique Page View is not really a page view; it’s more of a visitor or visit metric. The official definition

is: “The number of unique people who have visited your Page on that day.” If you’re only looking at the

number for one day, it would be very similar to what we would consider a Unique Visitor in web analytics.

However, if you want to know the number for the last 7 days you would have to add the daily values together,

which means that they aren’t truly unique. In that case, Unique Page Views is more similar to what we think

of as a Visit in web analytics

- To be considered an Active User, a user doesn’t have to interact with your pages or posts. In fact, a user

doesn’t even have to read your page or post. I would be considered an Active User if one of my friends

commented on your post and the comment appeared in my stream. If that isn’t confusing enough, there is

really no such thing as an “Active User” metric as the metric is only meaningful in the context of the time

period. So, if you are looking from a monthly perspective, only “Monthly Active Users” is relevant. If you are

looking at a weekly date range, only “Weekly Active Users” is appropriate.

- A Post View is the number of times that a post appears on a page. So, if I visit your Page and you have 5

posts on the page, that one visit will count as 5 impressions. Or, if I “Like” your post, it may appear in the

stream of my friends, but it will only be counted if it displays on their screen.


http://www.facebook.com/pages/manage/


• No Concept of “Last Month”

As if all that isn’t enough, the fact that Facebook data is only available on a daily basis, makes it very difficult to

incorporate Facebook KPIs into a dashboard that shows data for “Last Month.” In some cases, such as Unique

Page Views, you have to aggregate daily values to get the value for the month. For Monthly Active Users, if

you’re looking at the topline number, you have to specify a 30-day date range for this metric to appear. If you’re

looking at the trend graph, or if you’ve exported the data, the Monthly Active Users number pulled at that point

in time represents the number for that day and 29 days prior. For example, to see monthly active users in May,

you need to pick the number for the last day of the month, May 31st.

Here are a few Facebook metrics to look at based on what you’re trying to measure.

(** definitons continued on next page)

The size of your fan base todate

PURPOSEif you want to know...

KEY METRICthen look at this metric...

CALCULATIONfor ‘last month’

The size of your fan base to date

The size of your fanbase to date

Lifetime Likes* This is an aggregate number, so it doesn’t make sense to report Lifetime Likes for May. If you want to know the number for May, you should look at New Likes, aggregated daily for the month.

This is a rolling number, so you have to capture a point in time and be consistent. So, you might decide to take the number on the last day of the month or the first day of the followin r you are looking at a month with 31 days or 28 days.

This is partially an aggregated number and partially a daily number. You will have to add the daily values together to get the monthly value. Remember that when you add the daily numbers, they are no longer Unique.

This is a daily number, so just add the values together to get the monthly value.

This is a daily number, so just add the daily Likes and Comments together and then divide by the number of Post Views (aka Impressions) during the month.

Monthly Active Users*

Unique Page Views**

Post Views (aka Stream Impressions or News Feed Impressions)

Post Feedback Rate (calculated by Likes + Comments divided by Post Views)

The number of people have been exposed to one of your posts, likes, or comments in the past month

The number of times your Page was visited ( the times your content was viewed off Page)

The reach our your content

The extent to which your content is engaging



* Lifetime Total Likes:Facebook originally used the term “fan” to express your fondness for an entity in Facebook. Fandom is old

news. They have since dropped the phrase “Become a Fan” and replaced it with “Like.” Naturally, people

asked why. Here is Facebook’s response:

‘To improve your experience and promote consistency across the site, we’ve changed the language for Pages

from “Fan” to “Like.” We believe this change offers you a more light-weight and standard way to connect with

people, things and topics in which you are interested.’

A lot of people still associate with the old “fan” idea. Facebook has not eradicated the term “fans” completely

from its system, as you can observe when you go to the Pages You Admin page. However, Fans are really a

thing of the past. Instead, the correct term is “Likes,” or “Lifetime Likes” to be exact, as it is shown in Insights

below:

Note that Lifetime Likes and Fans won’t match exactly in Insight. That is because the Fan count is updated

in real-time, whereas Lifetime Likes is aggregated on a daily basis and then updated. Usually Lifetime Likes is

updated within 24 hrs after the previous day was complete, but we have seen delays of up to 48 hours.

Your “Fan” count will almost always be higher than the “Lifetime Likes” number. The only time that “Lifetime

Likes” is bigger is when you have incurred a net loss of likes (i.e. there were more “unlikes” than “likes”)

within the past two days.

** Unique Page Views:

The name of this metric is so unintuitive that we recommend calling it ‘Visits’ instead. You can always add a

note somewhere on the report that lets people know that the metric has a different name in Facebook.


http://on.fb.me/kUzICo


Conclusion In the ever-evolving world of online marketing, Facebook has established itself as an influential

leader in social media and has become a powerful communication tool for marketers. Its built-in

analytics tool, Facebook Insights, offers Page owners a way to evaluate their Facebook initiatives. It

can be a perplexing tool to use, especially to those just starting to use it. After familiarizing with the

definitions and getting used to its intricacies, however, a savvy marketer can use it to retrieve key insights for

online marketing initiatives.



h Facebook Documentation

• Insightshttp://developers.facebook.com/docs/insights/

• InsightsHelpTopicshttp://www.facebook.com/help/?search=insights

• IntroducingiframeTabsforPageshttp://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/462

• Real-TimeAnalyticsForSocialPluginshttp://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/476

• InsightsforWebsiteshttp://developers.facebook.com/attachment/Insights_for_websites.pdf

Useful Blog Posts

• FacebookPostInsightsGoLivehttp://www.allfacebook.com/facebook-post-insights-2010-01

• Facebook‘LikeButton’Replaces‘BecomeAFan’http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/19/face

book-like-button-repl_n_543439.html

• Facebooklaunchesreal-timeanalyticsintegratedwithyoursitehttp://www.smartinsights.com/blog/

digital-marketing-strategy/facebook-launches-real-time-analytics

CHANGE LOGBecause Facebook Insights updates frequently, this white paper is a living document and will be updated

periodically. Below is the change history of this white paper:

Version Description Revision Date1.0 Initial Release 5/26/2011

RECOMMENDEDRESOURCES

http://STRATIGENT.COM


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http://on.fb.me/kkZr9G

http://bit.ly/l9RjSm

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http://bit.ly/kDGMQx

http://bit.ly/m4458o

http://huff.to/mlAOU1

http://huff.to/mlAOU1

http://bit.ly/kqEcRB

http://bit.ly/kqEcRB


Active Users: The number of people who have interacted with or viewed your Page or its posts.

Cities: Number of people who like your Page, broken down by city based on the geolocation of users’ IP ad-

dresses.

Countries: Number of people who like your Page, broken down by country based on the geolocation of users’

IP addresses

Daily Active Users Breakdown: Breakdown of the number of people who have interacted with or viewed your

Page or its posts on that day, by type of action, during the date range you specified.

Daily Page Activity: Other than liking and commenting on your posts, people who like your Page can engage

with it in a number of ways. They can write on your Page’s Wall, upload photos or videos to your Page, write re-

views (if applicable), create posts on your Discussion Board, or mention your Page in their own status updates

or Wall Posts to their friends.

Daily Story Feedback: When you post stories to people who like your Page, they can engage with your content

by liking or commenting. They can also choose to unsubscribe from your Page so that stories will not appear in

their News Feed in the future.

Gender and Age: Aggregated demographic data about the people who like your Page based on the age and

gender information they provide in their user profiles. This data corresponds to the date range you specified.

Language: Number of people who liked your Page, broken down by language, based on the default language

setting selected when accessing Facebook.

Lifetime Likes: The total number of Likes your Page received, as of the end of your date range.

Like Sources: Breakdown of the number of Page likes from the most common places where people can like

your Page, during the date range you specified. Note: this does not include all areas of Facebook where users

can like your Page.

GLOSSARYOF TERMS




Monthly Active Users: The number of people who have interacted with or viewed your Page or its posts in the

last 30 days. This includes interactions from fans and non-fans.

New Likes: The number of new Likes your Page received, during the date range you specified.

Page Content Feedback: The number of likes and comments made on News Feed stories posted by your Page,

during the date range you specified.

Post Feedback: The number of likes and comments made on News Feed stories posted by your Page, during

the date range you specified.

Page Posts: The total number of times your Page post was seen in News Feed or on the Page Wall. The feed-

back percentage is the ratio of the total likes and comments on that story over the total number of times the

story was seen.

Post Views: The number of times people (Fans and non-Fans) have viewed a News Feed story posted by your

Page, during the date range you specified.

GLOSSARYOF TERMS

http://stratigent.com



Stratigent LLC, based in Naperville, Illinois, was founded in 2002. Stratigent focuses on transforming the way

organizations leverage data to make decisions. As a pioneer in the multi-channel analytics space Stratigent has

the industry’s most talented team of business and technical consultants.

To learn more visit http://stratigent.com or email [email protected]

Nestor Archival JrNestor Archival is a Senior Consultant and Team Lead at Stratigent, where he focuses on developing and lead-

ing strategic roadmap deployments for enterprise-level organizations. He is regarded as an expert in techni-

cal implementations of multiple web analytics tools, including Webtrends Analytics, Unica NetInsight, Adobe

SiteCatalyst, and Google Analytics. Nestor is an experienced user of Ensighten, the leader in tag management

solutions. He has extended his technical repertoire into the social media domain, particularly on Facebook

Analytics.

Contact Nestor Archival Jr

[email protected]

Stratigent, LLC

1771 W Diehl Rd Ste 330

Naperville, IL 60563

877.427.2900

ABOUTSTRATIGENT

http://stratigent.com



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