Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

Fotolia 16439562 XS Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

If you’re just starting out on Twitter, you’ll want to set a baseline so you can measure growth over the next 2, 3 and 6 months. Following are six stats that will help you determine if you’re expanding awareness and influence on Twitter.

The three basic measurements

twitter numbers Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

1. Followers

This number indicates reach. Your followers number is the number of people that have shown on interest in your Twitter stream. Track how your follower numbers grow by jotting it down every month or so in an excel spreadsheet. You’ll notice the more followers you gain, the faster this number will grow (to a point). Keep in mind that some of these folks only followed you in hopes that you’d follow back and may not be part of your actual community.

2. Following

This number has meaning when put next to your followers number. Are you following more people than the number of people following you? If so, you might want to look at adding more value on Twitter. If you’re new on Twitter, keep in mind that this number might be higher than your follower number. That will change with time and effort.

3. Lists

This number indicates the amount of value you create for others on Twitter. Look though the lists that people have put you on to see how people perceive your contribution on Twitter. For example, if you look at the lists I’m on, most of them have to do with non-profit social media topics.

perceived value Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

Measuring network and impact

Measuring your network and your impact can be done in a number of ways (and with a number of tools), but remember, you simply want to document where you’re at on Twitter right now.

Two tools make it easy to measure your impact. Both are free.

4. Measure Your Network with Twitter Friends

Twitter-Friends is a free tool for measuring the health of your network. There are three basic reports you should study:

Network overlap: This graph shows you the level of two-way conversations you have with folks.

network overlap Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

Conversation Quotient: The Twitter-Friends FAQ states, “People with a high CQ are using Twitter to have direct conversations with other users. People with a low CQ are using it more for broadcasting links or status messages.”

Retweet Quotient: This tells you what percent of your tweets are retweeted by others.

twitter friends Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

5. Measure Your Impact With Twitter Grader and Klout

Twitter Grader is a free tool from HubSpot that grades your use of Twitter and offers recommendations for improvement. Of course a computer won’t take into account the nuances of your blog strategy, you can get a few useful suggestion, and a grade of your use of Twitter from 0-100.

twitter grader Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

Klout is another free tool that allows you “track the impact of your opinions, links and recommendations across your social graph”. I like this tool, because, like Hubspot’s Twitter Grader,  it’s very easy to understand. For example, they give you an overall klout score and even suggest what “personality type” you are:

twitter persona Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

You can also see a list of your most retweeted posts:

klout top retweets Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

Measuring how your content is tweeted

6. Tweetmeme Analytics

Tweetmeme is a tool that allows you to analyze how people are talking about your content on twitter. You need to set up an account with Tweetmeme so you can view the analytics directly in WordPress (download this free overview of Tweetmeme’s reporting).

tweetmeme wordpress report Six Simple Twitter Stats You Need To Track

Homework: Capture these 6 sets of Twitter stats in an excel spreadsheet. Update as often as you like, but at least note the date when you collected today’s homework.

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  • http://ariwriter.com Ari Herzog

    While enjoying your graphics and overall perspectives, there are also some ingrained philosophies you imply that are not necessarily correct.

    1. Followers may imply reach but when spammers, gamers, and inactive accounts are following you and you are not blocking them, how is that an accurate reach?

    2. Following and Listing needs to be viewed more complementarily than you have it. I follow you on Twitter right now, John, but you are in a list, not in my stream. So your name will not appear in my “following” set nor will my name be in your “followers” set. But I do follow you. What does that say about reach?

    • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

      Ari – good point. That's why I used the word “Indicate” in regards to follower numbers. You follower numbers can be better understood alongside other stats, like retweets or mentions.

      Same thing with Lists.

  • http://www.diary4life.com Paul

    John, some this I'm using but the stuff I'm not doing is very useful.
    Thank you for sharing
    Regards
    Paul

    • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

      What did you find useful?

      • http://www.diary4life.com Paul

        John, the info that faces me everytime I went on Twitter; followers, following and lists and using it to measure my value. So obvious when you think about it.

        Also using Twitter Friends; a great tool, to measure my network. This one needs a little more work on my part but it needs doing.
        Regards
        Paul

      • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

        Twitter Friends has so many stats, it almost requires a PhD to read. :-D

  • http://www.netwitsthinktank.com frank barry

    I really think 4, 5 and 6 are where the money is at. Tracking that type of info and taking action based on what you learn is important – something most don't think about doing. I know I don't.

    Another great tool is http://www.twitalyzer.com/ – they just upgraded it. Great tools, data and visuals to help anyone begin tracking their success on Twitter.

    Sounds like you've got more coming in a few weeks related to analyzing your network. looking forward to that.

    • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

      Yes – I do. The purpose of this post is really to help folks establish current benchmarks.

  • http://accessibleweb.eu/ Richard

    The Hubspot’s Twitter Grader link doesn't work. It asks me to fix the URL but I would rather you did :)

    • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

      All set now, Richard. Sorry for the inconvenience.

      • http://accessibleweb.eu/ Richard

        Thanks John, very fast customer service.

      • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

        It's easy when you can moderate comments on your iPhone. ;-)

  • http://www.buildmysiteforfree.com/ Roy Weissman

    Excellent distillation of lots of information into a concise presentation. I never thought about the lists element until now. Tracking and measurement is very critical in order to build an overall successful social media strategy. Of course we must never forget that offering the most value to our readers at our websites is the ultimate way to grow the numbers. In our society numbers are like test scores and we're always looking to get the A.

    Roy Weissman
    Publisher: BuildMySiteforFree.com

    • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

      Agreed. There's measuring to set benchmarks, and there's measuring navigate
      a strategy.

    • http://www.johnhaydon.com John Haydon

      Thanks, Roy!

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