As more and more agencies chase the social concept of “Big Data,” the market has flooded with hundreds of agencies and thousands of freelancers, all shouting to the heavens that THEY have the data system that can define social. When you’re on the buying side, this can make the process of choosing a vendor incredibly stressful. They all walk into your office wearing the same suit, but each has a different way of looking at data.

To help you sift through the numbers, here are some hard and fast rules for dealing with Facebook Metrics:

“Engagements” Shouldn’t Be Lumped Together

Technically a five-dollar bill and a 100-dollar bill are both one sheet of paper, but they’re hardly worth the same amount. Facebook’s algorithm doesn’t value likes, shares and comments the same, so neither should you.

Not All Comments Are Created Equal

Raw volume of comments doesn’t mean you’re doing a good job. In fact, it can mean the exact opposite. 1,000 comments on a post can be 1,000 people telling you how much they dislike your product. Think back to high school – was it always a good thing when everyone was talking about you?

“People Talking About You” Is Not All It’s Cracked Up To Be

It records “liking” a page as an engagement, so when brands buy fans, their PTAT goes up like magic. This gives most clients a warm fuzzy feeling that the money they spent created more conversation. Unfortunately, any metric that is so easily bought isn’t the right measuring stick for tracking engagement. We recommend you look at what we call, “Real PTAT”, (PTAT - Daily New Likes). Consider the volume of positive comments on your page or an increase in influencers.

Telling You What Time To Post Isn’t Enough

There are so many variables that go into putting together a good post. Tone, day, season, visual, structure… the list goes on. So offering to optimize by only one of those variables is like trying to build a house out of only paint. It’s one of the tools you need, but certainly not enough.

Instead of trying to look at these variables in a silo, we encourage you to mix and match. Don’t just look for the best day to post, but look at what kind of content performs best on those days. Do sales messages play better in the afternoon or the evening? This is the kind of matrix you should be creating to inform your posting strategy.

Now that you are armed to sift through the mound of metrics, “Big Data” beware!