OBJECTIVE
The objectives of this group discussion are to help you:
- Discover resources for online analytics
- Analyze social media metrics
- Improve online content based on your findings
INTRODUCTION
It is very important to analyze your social media content, whether it’s on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. By studying your habits and seeing how the audience members interact you can make necessary improvements for both personal and professional accounts. Thankfully there are many free resources out there that will help you with the data.
You will have two options when doing this discussion board activity (just pick one of them). Either you will analyze Twitter metrics or Instagram metrics.
If you are not active on these social media platforms, or don’t have a lot of data to analyze from your personal accounts, do not stress. I suggest setting up a temporary Twitter account, and analyzing the data of a role model or public figure’s account. Then, you are welcome to delete your new Twitter account after this assignment.
Option A: Twitter
Please visit the website http://www.twitonomy.com. On the homepage there will be an option to sign-in and it’s completely free. You can always sign-out afterwards if you are concerned about privacy issues. There are many tabs at the top of the screen once the data loads, but you are only concerned with the Profile tab.
Once you select the Profile tab you will see some useful metrics based on your Twitter activity. If your numbers seem very low and insignificant, you can select someone you follow or someone who follows you and their data will be presented instead. Just locate and select them on the right side of the page.
Option B: Instagram
There are actually two possible resources for Instagram. Please visit either https://www.socialbakers.com/free-tools/tracker/ or https://squarelovin.com/instagram-insights/. I’ve noticed that the second site (i.e. squarelovin) may produce a few zeroes and/or blank graphs if your account is private.
If visiting the first link you will see an option to login using your Instagram username and password. Some other basic info may be required, including your name. After this quick process you will see all data conveniently displayed in a single location.
For those using the second link you will quickly create a free account. This process will be very similar. Once the results are displayed you will need to select different options (or tabs) on the left side of the page in order to see all available data.
INSTRUCTIONS
First Post – due Wednesday by 11:59pm EST
- Answer the following questions (minimum of 4-5 sentences each):
- Which option did you pick (Twitter or Instagram)? If you chose Twitter did you analyze your account or someone else’s?
- Explain the metrics that are displayed. You can pick and choose what you want to discuss since it would be impractical to cover everything. However, I would like some thoroughness and variety. For the items you address I will need to see screenshots of the information.
- Are any results surprising? Do you disagree with anything?
- Please provide a proper reference of the site chosen (i.e. twitonomy, socialbakers or squarelovin).
Second Post – due between Thursday and Sunday by 11:59pm EST
Do not limit the second discussion post to “I agree,” “That’s great” and so forth. Substantiate the position by using meaningful observations to corroborate it, such as professional experiences, relationships, and citing scholarly sources etc. when appropriate. As a guide for high quality response posts, use the RISE model, which encourages the steps as outlined in the rubric.
(For your Response Post)
1. Select a student’s post and provide your own assessment of at least one item. Try to point out something new that hasn’t been addressed already.
2. What tip can you offer that would help improve the student’s numbers?
3. Second post must be a minimum of one paragraph and must be made on a separate day than your initial post.
