Social Media Benchmarks
Do you wonder how your social media marketing performance stacks up to the competition? Or how your social performance compares to your industry as a whole?
To give you stronger, deeper competitive insights, we’ve gathered the averages of social media benchmarks from our database to help you measure success.
See how the hard work of social pays off
Our engagement benchmarks show how frequently brands post on social, the number of social messages they receive each day and how effectively they reply to those messages.
Social Media Benchmarks Data Definitions
- Messages Sent: Original content a brand published that wasn’t in response to anyone else. Includes posts shared on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and Pinterest.
- Messages Received: The number of messages brands receive on social media each day. Includes messages from Facebook and Twitter.
- Daily Engagement Per Post: How much the public is responding to each one of the brand’s posts on the same day that each post was published. Includes engagement data from Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn.
- Total Engagement Per Post: Total number of written interactions that the general public has in response to original content that the brand published. Includes engagement data from Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn.
- Response Rate to Messages: The rate that brands respond to messages or comments that they receive on a daily basis. Includes data from Facebook and Twitter.
- Number of Outbound Engagements: Written posts in which a brand interacts with content/posts that someone else created, such as if a restaurant retweeted a photo that a member of the public took of their food. Includes data from Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and Pinterest.
All Social Media Engagement Benchmarks
| Industry | Messages Sent | Messages Received | Daily Engagement Per Post | Total Engagement Per Post | Response Rate to Messages | Number of Outbound Engagements |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All Industries | 28.2 | 58.8 | 13.2 | 306.8 | 0.95 | 11.4 |
| Health Care | 16.5 | 17.3 | 9.4 | 78.2 | 1.06 | 9.4 |
| Retail | 35.9 | 81.3 | 19.5 | 256.4 | 1.20 | 12.4 |
| Consumer Goods | 16 | 51.5 | 21.2 | 269.4 | 1.16 | 12.8 |
| Travel & Tourism | 19.1 | 27 | 8.4 | 101 | 1.00 | 10.5 |
| Sports | 42.3 | 226.6 | 20.3 | 965.1 | 0.32 | 13.4 |
| Media & Entertainment | 66.7 | 128.9 | 19.1 | 1125.4 | 0.81 | 15 |
| Finance & Banking | 21.6 | 39.8 | 5.6 | 74.8 | 0.75 | 10.4 |
| Legal | 14.2 | 21.4 | 22.3 | 305.9 | 0.60 | 5.6 |
| Education | 19.7 | 20.3 | 3.8 | 64 | 0.59 | 7.3 |
| Real Estate | 19.5 | 10.2 | 3.3 | 41 | 1.07 | 6.4 |
| Recruiting & Staffing | 19.1 | 27.7 | 2.9 | 60 | 0.80 | 12.5 |
| Software, Internet & Technology | 26.8 | 64.3 | 17.0 | 357.8 | 0.80 | 14.3 |
| Nonprofit | 18.3 | 98.6 | 12.6 | 276.3 | 0.73 | 9.3 |
| Food & Drink / Restaurants | 24.7 | 25 | 9.6 | 98.2 | 1.02 | 9.8 |
How to find your social metrics
You can’t compare your numbers to the numbers above if you’re not familiar with your data. It’s easy to start your own free 30-day trial of Sprout Social, where you’ll gain access to all your social media data in one spot.
Here’s how:
- Start your Sprout Social trial.
- Connect the social profiles you’d like to see benchmarks on.
- Navigate to the Reports tab and analyze your own social data.
Engagement Report
The Engagement Report showcases all the metrics you see above, pulled right from your attached social profiles.
The high-level graphic above shows how your response time and response rate compare to other organizations. Below is a detailed breakdown of messages received and replies sent.
The Engagement Report also compares how days of the week or hours of the day impact your overall social media engagement rates.
Individual network reports
The Engagement Report also compares how days of the week or hours of the day impact your overall social media engagement rates.
It’s easy to customize how you analyze your social data to see how you’re performing compared to your industry.
About the Data
All referenced data is based on the social media profiles and self-reported industries of 22,487 brands reviewed between January 1, 2019 and December 31, 2019. The messages analyzed include posts and engagement data from Facebook Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Pinterest.
Benchmarking your business’s social presence to industry peers is a start. But real progress will come with consistent improvements and evolution in your social media efforts.
The best way to make it all happen is with a social media analytics tool that shows you exactly how your data changes every day, month and quarter.
Explore Sprout Analytics