Given the current fluctuations in social media referrals, which have trended downward for many industries, it may be tough to get a real measure of how your content material is definitely performing, and whether or not the declines that you just’re seeing are a results of your technique failing to ship, or the platforms lowering attain and engagement.

The newest Social Media Benchmarks report from RivalIQ may help to supply some further context on this respect, with insights into the typical engagement charges that manufacturers in varied industries are seeing throughout all the main apps.

The total report, which you’ll be able to take a look at your self right here, is predicated on greater than 5 million posts, and over 10 billion likes, feedback, and favorites throughout Fb, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter. The report additionally contains business breakdowns, offering extra particular perception, however on this put up, we’ll check out the topline numbers.

First off, on Fb. In keeping with the info, the median engagement fee for all industries on Fb is 0.063%, which is a slight rise on final 12 months (0.060%).

As you’ll be able to see on this chart, sports activities engagement lifts that common up, whereas influencers, greater training, and alcohol manufacturers additionally proceed to see comparatively robust engagement within the app.

But even one of the best performers are solely getting a tiny share of their viewers to interact with their posts. That seemingly factors to succeed in being a greater metric to measure, as most individuals merely don’t ever have interaction in social apps.

Does that imply social media is much less efficient as a advertising device than has been introduced? Nicely, model consciousness, and subsequent oblique motion would in all probability counsel that it’s nonetheless well worth the effort. However as fewer individuals really look to actively take part in social apps, preferring to solely eat content material as a substitute, it could be value re-aligning your KPIs round different metrics, like precise gross sales, e mail sign-ups, and so on., in an effort to monitor relative efficiency.

Total engagement charges on Instagram, in the meantime, declined barely on 2023, all the way down to 0.43%.

Instagram engagement charges have really been steadily reducing for years now, with the identical report exhibiting common model IG engagement was at 0.98% in 2021.

So whereas the general engagement share continues to be small, it’s really dropped by greater than half in a few years. Growing competitors, and once more, altering tendencies in consumer consumption, aligned round Meta’s AI-based content material suggestions, have led to fewer individuals seeing or instantly interacting with model updates.

RivalIQ additionally appears to be firmly within the “by no means calling it X” camp, with “Twitter” common engagement at 0.029%.

The platform previously referred to as Twitter has by no means been an amazing driver of referral visitors, and that is solely a slight drop-off in common engagement fee from final 12 months (0.035%). And truly, provided that X proprietor Elon Musk has made it very clear that he’s positively not trying to help manufacturers with referral visitors, it’s not as unhealthy as I might have anticipated, however once more, it’s one other engagement decline so as to add to the collective shift.

And eventually, there’s TikTok, which, in line with RivalIQ’s information, has seen a major decline in model engagement.

TikTok’s common engagement fee final 12 months was 5.69% per clip, so TikTok referrals have dropped by greater than half, on common, over the course of a 12 months.

Although on the identical time, model engagement within the app continues to be effectively greater than the opposite platforms. So whereas manufacturers might have misplaced some floor, as TikTok utilization behaviors shift, and its algorithms re-align round totally different content material (and likewise, extra manufacturers put up extra usually to the app), there may be nonetheless important alternative for attain and engagement for these that may get it proper.

RivalIQ’s report offers some fascinating notes on model engagement, and what you’ll be able to anticipate to see on all the main apps. However actually, your precise outcomes will come all the way down to your understanding of your viewers in every app, and the way you drive motion based mostly on that, although it is usually seemingly comforting to notice that every one manufacturers are seeing comparatively low engagement.

Does that imply that folks wish to have interaction with model content material much less, or that manufacturers, typically, usually are not nice at connecting with them? You determine.

You may take a look at RivalIQ’s full “2024 Social Media Trade Benchmark Report” right here.