Any effective social media marketing strategy needs goals if you plan to achieve a worthwhile level of engagement and growth.
Businesses that jump into the social media game without any goals often see their profiles drift into neglect.
Setting specific, measurable goals helps you track progress and prove the value of social media to your business. Aligning these goals with broader business objectives ensures that your social media efforts support and strengthen your overall business strategies. Follow your social media strategy, and you’ll soon come to realize what an effective platform these sites can be for connecting with your audience.
However, determining the right goals to strive for can be challenging. Your business needs a purpose and an attainable “endpoint” – so what does that look like for you?
This guide will help you understand the sorts of smart social media goals businesses can set and follow. We’ll look at these goals but also show how you measure them and overcome some of the challenges you’ll face.
In this guide:
- Understanding the importance of social media goals
- Common social media goals and how to achieve them
- Steps to set effective social media goals
- Monitoring and adjusting your social media goals
- Best practices for social media goal setting
- Frequently asked questions
Understanding the importance of social media goals
Before we look at what you can achieve, let's first assess why social media goals matter. After all, do businesses really rise and fall on the success of a social strategy?
Well, yes, they do. In fact, social media is now the main "shop window" for the majority of businesses. It's where you create an audience, set your brand tone, and sell things.
Even if you plan to only use social media lightly, you need to have some goals attached. A neglected social media profile is a bit like a shop window that hasn't been cleaned. It quickly looks untidy and neglected.
Aligning social media efforts with business objectives
It goes without saying that your social media marketing goals must support your broader business objectives and overall business aims. There’s no point building a huge Gen Z audience if your target demographic is seniors, for example.
You therefore need to think about what you want to achieve as a company. Do you need more sales? Better customer service? A stronger brand? Are you just trying to get noticed? Your social media can help with all of these.
Let’s say you want to boost sales via your new website. You’ve worked hard on your search engine optimization, but you need to pull audiences from your social media platforms. Your goal, then, is to increase traffic to your website via social media. You also want to boost brand awareness to grow your follower count. You therefore need both goals to tie back into your key business objective, which is to boost web sales.
This alignment ensures your social efforts aren’t wasted. Every post, every campaign, and every interaction will serve a bigger purpose for your company.
Measuring success through defined targets
You can only truly track your business goals if you have targets to meet along the way. Your targets need to be achievable and progressive. For example, it's not enough to say you plan to "increase engagement." What you should aim for is 200% increased shares on social media year-on-year. You can then look at month-on-month data to track the progress.
Social media analytics tools like Measure are great for overseeing goals like this. You'll see if you're meeting your targets or falling short.
Only by measuring your progress and regularly checking in can you truly understand the impact of your social media campaigns.
Enhancing strategy with clear direction
Your social media goals also help inform your overall marketing strategy. Now, this is really important for brands because social media platforms are now the go-to place to implement the bulk of your marketing efforts.
Without goals, you might waste time on marketing initiatives that just don't help your business. Your messaging becomes unclear and your brand suffers because of it.
But with clear aims, you can make smart choices about your content and tactics.
For instance, if your goal is to drive website traffic – as we mentioned earlier – then you'll need to focus on creating posts with compelling links. You'll also need to create other marketing materials that build brand recognition, making your audience more likely to click on the link when they see it.
5 Common social media goals and how to achieve them
Social media marketing has become a central pillar in pretty much all brand strategies. Increasing brand awareness is a primary social media goal that helps businesses reach a wider audience and gain visibility. You can’t really achieve your marketing objectives without at least having some form of social presence. Even brands that don’t prioritize social media still have profiles on the likes of X, LinkedIn, and Facebook – sometimes to prevent someone else from taking their brand name.
If you’re serious about your social media marketing efforts, then below are five attainable goals that can get you started.
These goals are:
- Increase brand awareness
- Boost customer engagement
- Drive traffic to your website
- Generate leads and conversions
- Improve customer support
This list isn’t exhaustive, but it'll get you thinking about your overall social media marketing strategy and how each goal can relate to it.
1. Using social media to increase brand awareness
Increasing brand awareness is one of the easiest ways to leverage social media, especially for new brands.
It involves creating eye-catching content that reflects your brand’s personality. You need to look professional here, so high-quality images, videos, and graphics are a must. Develop a consistent posting schedule to stay top-of-mind with your audience.
You need to be patient with brand awareness campaigns because it takes a long time for brands to filter into people’s minds. Established brands often find it even harder to change people’s perceptions if the goal is to pivot a brand’s image.
You need to be smart with your content and make sure you speak directly to your audience demographics in everything you do. Social media listening tools like Listen are essential for these types of goals.
Track metrics like follower growth, post reach, and brand mentions to measure awareness. Adjust your content strategy based on what resonates most with your audience, and evolve your social media campaigns as they unfold.
2. Using social media to boost customer engagement
Engagement shows how well your content connects with followers. To improve it, you can do what many brands do and try to be so eye-catching and noteworthy that people organically find you.
Or, you might need to be a little more interactive with your audience. Try to ask questions, run polls, and encourage comments on your posts. Respond promptly to create two-way conversations. Media and entertainment brands do this all the time. After all, if you don't instigate engagement, then who will?
You can also share your brand's stories, such as your ethical suppliers or how you've changed as a company to address issues within it. Sharing user-generated content is another great way to spread your brand across social sites.
Of course, you can track it all with a tool like Brandwatch to see what works and what doesn't.
3. Using social media to drive website traffic
Use social media to funnel followers to your website or online store. You can do this by including clear calls-to-action and links in your posts and profile bios. Create teaser content that encourages clicks to “learn more” on your site.
There’s a real art form to this. Social media users rarely want to leave the app or site they’re on, so trying to get them to your website is difficult.
There needs to be an incentive. Whether that’s a competition, exclusive content, or access to something you can’t see on social media sites – a click to a website is valuable and users know that.
Experiment with social media ads to expand your reach beyond organic followers and see what hits. Target ads based on demographics, interests, and behaviors to drive qualified traffic.
Track click-through rates on posts to see what content drives the most visits.
4. Using social media to generate leads and conversions
Lead generation techniques are fairly similar to those you use to drive people to your website. It's all about convincing people to leave the comfort of their social media app and actively engage in your platform.
Facebook and LinkedIn are really good for lead generation ads, so give them a go. You need to ensure your social media accounts are fully optimized, so they rank well when people search for your products or services.
Of course, you can showcase your products and services on sites like TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook, and sell directly on the platforms. This is a great way to send someone down the sales funnel without them leaving the app or site.
If lead generation is one of your social media goals, then make sure you use a customer relationship management tool. You'll be able to calculate your social media ROI to justify your efforts.
5. Using social media to improve customer support
Social platforms are increasingly important for customer service. In fact, sites like X and Facebook are often the best way for customers to speak directly with brands.
It's therefore important that you monitor brand mentions and direct messages to catch and resolve issues quickly. Set up automated responses for common questions to improve response times.
Create a knowledge base of FAQs to share with customers needing help. Use private messaging for sensitive issues.
Large brands even create their own dedicated support handle on X. This means people have a place to complain or raise issues, without littering the brand's main feed. Doing so keeps negative posts further from the core brand, which might be your overall goal.
Again, you can use a tool like Brandwatch to monitor customer support and track response times, resolution rates, and customer satisfaction scores. Analyze common issues to improve products and prevent future problems.
Steps to set effective social media goals
Now we know some of the social media goals that are common in any marketing strategy, it's time to look at ways to implement them. No matter what you do, it's important to follow five simple steps in preparation for your goal. Overlook these, and you'll struggle to achieve what you set out to do.
1. Conduct a social media audit
First up, do a full audit of all social media platforms and any existing accounts on each one. You need to understand the uniqueness of each social media platform and look at how your accounts are performing.
Figure out what content leads to the best engagement. Are your existing accounts aligned to deliver this? If they’re not, you need to start strategizing content so that it delivers your overall business goals.
Perhaps you want to double your followers in six months. Your audit reveals most followers join your channels within 24 hours of a successful video. Perhaps you need to make more of those videos to start your path toward achieving that goal.
It’s definitely worth using social media analytics tools like Brandwatch to dig deeper into your data. They can reveal valuable insights about your audience and content performance.
2. Identify target audience and platform preferences
Social media can reveal a lot about your target audience. There's data on social sites that you can't get from traditional market research, particularly when it comes to brand sentiment analysis.
Research your target audience on each platform and figure out which sites they like most and why. Dig into the demographics and understand your audience's interests and frustrations.
Then look at when your audience is most active online. This helps you post at the best times for engagement. You can now align your goals to fit with your audience and potential customers.
3. Analyze your competitors' social media strategies
If your competitors are thriving on social media, why not learn from them? Use the right social media analytics tools to study rival brands and assess their content, posting frequency, and engagement rates.
Note any tactics that seem to work well for them. Think about how you could adapt those ideas for your own brand. You may even set social media goals based on these insights.
Just remember not to copy your competitors. That looks bad. Instead, look for gaps you could fill or ways to differentiate yourself. Your goal is to stand out, not blend in.
4. Define your key performance indicators (KPIs)
A crucial step to creating realistic social media goals is to establish metrics that align with your business objectives by setting smart social media objectives. These key performance indicators ensure you’re trending toward success.
Top social media KPIs include:
- Follower growth rate
- Engagement rate (likes, comments, shares)
- Click-through rate on links
- Conversion rate from social traffic
- Reach and impressions
Each KPI needs to have specific, measurable, and realistic targets. They need to be realistic but still challenging. There’s no point in setting a goal of two million impressions on your Instagram posts if you only have 50 followers. Remember, so much about your social media marketing strategy is in understanding it all takes time to deliver your overall goals.
5. Develop a content strategy aligned with goals
Regarding strategy, social media marketers need to ensure that the content that goes out into the world is actually aligned with the brand's goals. This means ensuring brand consistency across all platforms – the tone of voice, response times, visual designs – all must be aligned.
You then need to figure out what content you'll put out there. Here are some examples:
- Educational posts
- Links to blogs and thought leadership articles
- Behind-the-scenes glimpses
- Responding to other posts
- User-generated content
- Jumping on viral trends
- Promotional material
- Using influencers
You'll need a content calendar to stay organized and deliver your content strategy. Make sure you optimize each post so that it nudges you toward that overall goal.
Monitoring and adjusting your social media goals
So, you've set social media goals and are about to start the journey toward achieving them. Your content is ready to go and everyone knows the strategy.
The last thing you need is a method of tracking your social media posts and the responses to them. This way, you can follow your social media performance and make timely adjustments along the way.
Here's what you need to know.
Use analytics tools for performance tracking
Analytics tools are crucial if you are to truly understand your social media presence and ensure everything is on track toward those big goals.
With a tool like Brandwatch, you can monitor engagement rates, reach, and conversions across different channels. See how well your content is performing and which posts are resonating with your audience.
Your custom dashboard allows you to track the metrics that matter most to your goals. This might include follower growth, post engagement, or website traffic from social media. By having all your data in one place, you can quickly spot trends and areas for improvement.
Regularly reviewing and interpreting data
Your software also collects reams of data and helps digest the numbers so you can understand it more easily. Make it a habit to check your social media metrics weekly, monthly, and quarterly to understand what's going well and what isn't.
Look for patterns in your data, such as which types of content get the most engagement or what times of day your audience is most active. Pay attention to both positive and negative trends.
Ask yourself:
- Are you meeting your goals for brand awareness and engagement?
- How does your performance compare to last month or last quarter?
- Which posts or campaigns are driving the most traffic or conversions?
Use these insights to inform your content strategy and posting schedule.
Making data-driven adjustments to strategies
Once you've analyzed your data, it's time to take action. If a certain type of content is performing well, then go ahead and create more of it. Social media users generally like to see the same things again and again – that's how trends start. So, if your audience loves your behind-the-scenes videos, then get more of them out there.
Likewise, if your engagement rates are dropping, try new formats or topics to re-engage your audience.
Best practices for social media goal setting
Before we wrap up this guide, let's take a quick look at ways you can manage your social media strategy to hit the goals you've established. You may be a lone business owner who runs each of your brand's social channels; you may work for an agency that handles lots of brands, or you may work as part of a larger in-house social media team.
No matter your situation, here are some best practices for social media success.
Involve stakeholders in the goal-setting process
Don't create social goals in a bubble – it almost never works. Make sure you get input from other people to ensure alignment. This might require you to talk with your sales team about their needs or your content team. You might need to discuss your goals with customer service to ensure the team knows what you're doing.
Make sure your strategy is collaborative. Audiences notice if there is bad alignment in a brand's social media presence. If you have a calm, caring outward presence on your brand's main X feed but neglect to address customer complaints on your brand's customer service account, then you have a problem.
Consistency and collaboration are often the key to delivering a great social media strategy that helps you reach your goals.
Share goals with your team
Make sure your goals are documented and shared with everyone. Create a simple one-page document outlining each goal, why it matters, and how you'll measure it. Include specific numbers and timeframes.
For example:
Goal 1: Double Instagram followers in six months
Why: To generate more interest in our products
How to measure: Using the Meta Business Suite's analytics tools
You don't need to have the entire strategy in place here. So long as your team can see the overall goals, they can then work on formulating the strategy that achieves it.
Celebrate milestones and successes
It's important to recognize wins to keep your team (or even just yourself) motivated. Set up alerts for when you hit big milestones across your key metrics. Share this progress and don't be shy about championing people who have done well in your team.
It doesn't matter how big or small the victories are. If your influencer marketing team has signed a new contract with a rising star, this calls for celebration. Likewise, if a new employee has doubled your engagement on LinkedIn posts by improving content on the platform, they deserve praise.
Be wary of algorithm changes
Algorithms can be a real hurdle for brands seeking to deliver social media success. Platforms tweak their algorithms all the time, so it's crucial that you stay on top of the changes. You might have lots of success getting engagement from a content type on various social media channels, only to see the algorithm shift priority to different types of content.
We've seen it recently with the rise of TikTok and short-form video. Platforms like Facebook and Instagram have tried to follow TikTok's lead and prioritize the same content. Brands have therefore had to tweak their social media efforts toward a specific content type – short-form video – and drop other forms of content.
Make sure you're not left behind.
Frequently asked questions
Social media goals help businesses grow their reputation. You're able to more easily measure brand awareness when you have goals to follow and can understand your audience far better.
Before we end this guide, here are some common questions about setting and achieving smart goals on social sites.
What are some short-term objectives businesses can aim for on social media?
Quick social media wins can boost your presence – but don't rely on them to steer your brand in the long term. Most short-term objectives focus on follower growth and boosting engagement rates. You want to reach more people, so you need to be more proactive in your approach.
Businesses that use social media for their customer service must ensure they protect their brand while helping people. A short-term objective could be to establish a private messaging function, so people's complaints are taken out of the public realm.
Can you list long-term social media goals for business growth?
Some long-term social media goals include:
- Increasing your follower rate five times over the next two to three years
- Boosting website traffic year-on-year
- Growing social media sales targets by 50% each year
- Rebranding your social media presence to better align with your overall brand
- Using social media management tools like Brandwatch to thoroughly understand your audience over the next decade
How should the objectives of social media be tailored for student engagement?
Students love a sense of community, so make sure you set goals to run weekly live Q&A sessions with professors. Aim to increase student group membership each semester and be sure to retain graduates within your social media community by engaging with them too.