For years, earned media value (EMV) has been a staple for marketers trying to measure the impact of their social media efforts, especially for influencer marketing and organic social media efforts. But in today’s data-driven world, where we can track everything from website clicks to conversions, is EMV still a relevant metric?
The answer, as with many marketing questions, is a bit more complex than a simple yes or no. While EMV is a great tool for understanding your brand’s social presence, it’s just that—a tool.
This blog post will explain in detail, explaining its benefits and its limits. It will also help you understand why a complete approach to measurement is important for showing social media ROI.
What is earned media value?
Earned media is any content that mentions your brand that your business didn’t paid for. In simple terms: Earned media means earned engagement by your “digital word of mouth,” not engagement from your own media channel or bought through paid promotions or advertising of content.
Earned media is most commonly relevant in the realm of social media, where user-generated content, influencer collaborations and online conversations can significantly impact brand perception. It also is relevant in public relations, content marketing and event marketing. But today, we are going to focus on earned media value in the world of social media.
Earned media value, or EMV, is a way to value the different actions people take when they interact with different social media content. These engagement actions include comments, likes, shares and mentions. These actions are then projected to be worth a numerical dollar value to your business.
So, for example, if a creator receives 1,000 likes on an Instagram post, using a customized EMV benchmark of $0.10 per like, that post would provide an estimated value of $100.
While earned media value can provide valuable insights into the impact of your social media efforts, it isn’t the only metric that should be considered. It’s important to also track other key performance indicators, such as reach, engagement rate and conversion rate. This will help you to get a more comprehensive understanding of your social media success.
Ultimately, using EMV as a tool together with other metrics can still help guide you in guaging the effectiveness of your social media strategy.
Earned media value can be a useful metric for:
Benchmarking: Track your brand’s performance over time and compare it to competitors.
Identifying trends: Spot spikes in EMV that might indicate successful campaigns or viral content.
Reporting to stakeholders: Provide a high-level overview of your social media impact.
However, keep in mind that EMV has its limitations. It doesn’t directly correlate to business outcomes like sales or leads, and it can be influenced by factors outside your control (like changes in platform algorithms).
What to look out for when earned media value is calculated
When reporting to stakeholders about your social media impact, it’s valuable to include a high-level overview of your earned media value.
While earned media value can be a useful measure for evaluating the success of your social media efforts, it’s important to keep in mind common challenges around earned media value formulas.
Here are a few key things to watch out for around how earned media value is calculated:
Common calculation inconsistencies: The challenge with EMV calculations is that there is no standard way to assign a monetary value to social media engagements. Some methods rely on advertising equivalents, like cost-per-click (CPC) or cost-per-engagement (CPE), while others use arbitrary multipliers based on perceived value. Not to mention, the calculation of earned media value can vary significantly between different social media platforms and partners. This can lead to inconsistencies and make it difficult to compare results across platforms.
Lack of transparency: Be wary of partners who are vague about their approach to calculating EMV. Some may claim their calculations are based on a “proprietary algorithm” or a “trade secret.” This lack of transparency makes it difficult to determine the accuracy and reliability of their results.
Misaligned KPIs: Ensure the EMV calculation aligns with your specific goals. Misalignment can lead to skewed earned media value figures and make it challenging to accurately measure the success of a campaign. It’s crucial for companies to carefully choose and align their KPIs with their EMV calculations to get a more accurate understanding of their campaign’s effectiveness.
Over-reliance on EMV: Don’t fall into the trap of relying solely on earned media value. In today’s sophisticated marketing landscape, we have access to far more granular data and attribution models that can paint a bigger picture on ROI than this one calculation.
Looking for the best way to capture your social media data across various social platforms accurately for calculating your social ROI and overall EMV?
Enter: Sprout Social, the all-in-one social media management platform.
Under Sprout Social’s Premium Analytics, Sprout seamlessly integrates reporting across various social media platforms for you. This integration ensures that you have a comprehensive view of your social media engagements for your various accounts across multiple social media networks. It enables you to analyze accurate data for seamless EMV calculations. Additionally, with Sprout Social’s reporting, you will find a repertoire of invaluable data tracking and visualization to present your social media ROI to stakeholders.
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As previously mentioned, calculating earned media value does not look the same for everyone. A common approach we can easily recommend, however, is as follows:
Determining your average cost-per-engagement (CPE) for paid social media. This provides a baseline for valuing organic engagement.
Assigning weights to different types of engagement. For example, a share might be weighted more heavily than a like.
Multiplying the number of engagements by their respective weights and your CPE.
Let’s give you an example. We’ve decided that our average CPE is $0.50.
You receive 100 likes, 50 comments and 20 shares on a post.
You assign weights of 1 to likes, 2 to comments and 3 to shares.
Likes: 100 likes x 1 x $0.50 = $50
Comments: 50 comments x 2 x $0.50 = $50
Shares: 20 shares x 3 x $0.50 = $30
Total EMV for the post: $50 + $50 + $30 = $130
Important Note: This is a simplified example. More complex calculations might factor in reach, content type and other variables.
Leverage powerful social media analytics to prove ROI
To sum up, earned media value is a useful metric for benchmarking, identifying trends and reporting to stakeholders. However, it isn’t the be-all and end-all of social media measurement. To truly maximize your social media strategy, it’s essential to integrate EMV with other metrics that provide a more complete picture of your efforts. By understanding the nuances of EMV calculations and leveraging tools like Sprout Social’s reporting tool, you can ensure that your social media strategy is data-driven and aligned with your business goals.
The role of social media in sports is quite literally game-changing. Local franchises now have global fanbases, and those fans expect real-time updates on and off season. When official team accounts fall short, fans are quick to fill the gap with their own content. This dynamic presents a unique challenge for sports marketers—but like all challenges, it also offers great opportunity.
Just ask Tim Brogdon, Director of Digital Content for the Chicago White Sox. He and his team modernized the franchise’s approach to social media management, creating space for fans to celebrate—and commiserate.
We sat down with Brogdon to learn more about the team’s strategy, and to get his perspective on the ups, downs and best practices of social media in sports marketing.
Social media’s impact on sports marketing
Social media has reshaped the way teams, athletes and brands engage with fans. What used to be a one-way broadcast is now a conversation with the masses. To succeed, teams first need to keep up—which is easier said than done.
“While there is fan focus on the games themselves, sports marketing is so much more than those individual events.” says Brogdon. “We strive to authentically grab attention and engage with our audience year-round.”
In the past, sports fans only saw game-day footage captured by professional broadcast crews using high-tech cameras and audio equipment. Today, meeting fans’ growing demand for content requires a small army of contributors. Everyone plays a role—from digital content teams and fan services to the athletes themselves—ensuring a steady stream of engaging content.
All those efforts reap big wins in terms of fan engagement. According to the 2024 Content Benchmarks Report, organizations in the leisure, sports and recreation sectors typically receive eight times the average number of inbound engagements on their content each day compared to other industries.
The benefits of social media in sports marketing
Sports marketers who step up to the social media plate can score major rewards for their franchises. Here are three ways social media strategies can benefit the teams they support.
It promotes fan engagement—even during tough seasons
A social-first media strategy allows teams to connect with fans in a less corporate, more relatable way, making teams less reliant on wins for positive engagement. The White Sox aren’t the first to pioneer this strategy. Brogdon was inspired by another big name in the sports marketing world: The Cleveland Browns.
“One example I’d always bring up internally while trying to get buy-in is the Cleveland Browns,” shared Brogdon. “Allie Raymond—who’s now with the Los Angeles Chargers—led their social media strategy during the team’s 19-game winless streak. Even during a winless season, they were widely regarded as the best NFL team on social.”
The White Sox social media team captured similar success after setting the record for most losses in a single season. “In September, the White Sox were the third highest ranking team in terms of engagement on X, and number one in engagement per follower. That’s during the time Shohei Ohtani made history with his 50/50 season and other teams were vying for playoff spots. We took difficulties on the field and made them wins off the field.”
It expands reach into new audiences
Thanks to the rise of the algorithmic feed, a stranger is just a fan who hasn’t come across your content yet.
“Our strategy doesn’t hinge on follower growth,” explains Brogdon. “The algorithms are feeding people content whether they’re following the Chicago White Sox accounts or not. Instead, we want to create content that encourages people to pause, view, like and comment. Shares and sends (DMs) are also important, because that impacts virality.”
This impact of social media on sports marketing goes far beyond baseball. A record-setting 5 billion people engaged with the 2022 World Cup on social, and the 2024 Summer Games saw 12 billion engagements. The channel turns die-hard fans into armchair sports analysts while introducing the game day experience to new audiences, ready to be captivated.
It creates new revenue opportunities
Corporate sponsorships have long been a key revenue stream for professional sports teams, but in the past, opportunities for promotion were mostly limited to stadium signage and jerseys. With social media, however, the potential for lucrative partnerships has expanded dramatically.
“Our reassessed strategy at the end of the season caught a lot of attention on social and earned media, which led to a partnership with Dude Wipes,” says Brogdon. “So, in addition to boosting engagement, impressions and growth on our social profiles, we were able to generate revenue for the organization even as the season was winding down.”
The story behind the Chicago White Sox’s new social media approach
Every social media manager knows that behind every brand meme are multiple strategy discussions and layers of internal approvals—and sports is no exception. So how did the White Sox get buy-in for a relatable and self-aware social media strategy that navigated on-field challenges? To put it simply, they worked as a team.
“Our team did a lot of internal advocacy to showcase the potential benefits of talking about losses in a relatable way while taking eyeballs off of players and the front office,” says Brogdon “Our roster saw a lot of new faces added before 2024 season, so early on our strategy was dedicated to getting to know them. We want to humanize them so fans look at them with a sense of empathy and respect.”
As September arrived and the possibility of making history became real, Brogdon and his team took some time to get everyone on the same page. These efforts called for a bit of managing up, along with a solid proof of concept.
At one point, the social team even created memes on the spot during a meeting with the front office’s senior vice president of communications to show what the strategy could look like in real time.
“We would literally go into meetings with printed out memes to share as examples during presentations,” shares Brogdon. “We had to prove that our ideas were grounded in best practices while breaking our normal cadence. We wanted to move forward with a more relatable version of our existing brand voice, but wrapping that up in a presentation that appeals to executive staff takes some time, effort and energy.”
All the internal advocacy, meetings and effort behind their strategic vision ultimately led to a 5% increase in social media sentiment during the month of September. Plus, it gave fans another team to root for: the social team.
4 social media best practices sports marketers need to know
When it comes to professional sports, a great strategy can’t be built in a silo. There are countless other teams and individuals that’ll impact and be impacted by your efforts. To create more seamless social-first experiences, you need to work with all of them. Here are four best practices for getting it done.
1. Take the time to secure internal buy-in
In a perfect world, all of your colleagues would be on board with your strategy after a single presentation. In reality, it’s never that easy, but don’t let the work scare you. The time you take to secure internal buy-in plays a critical role in the success of your strategy.
“Communicating and building relationships with other people who have the ability to enhance your strategy can’t happen overnight,” says Brogdon. “It takes time and effort to sell your strategy internally. There are so many stakeholders that need to buy in, including the social and video teams, marketing, sponsorship and supervisors, etc.”
If you want to give your organization’s social presence a creative overhaul, you have to slow down to speed up. Talk with individuals across your organization, share the rationale behind your ideas and listen to their critiques. This will help you create a stronger business case once the opportunity knocks.
2. Lean on your network
The role of social media in sports marketing is major, but teams are still smaller than you might expect. If you’re a sports marketer in need of some creative inspiration, try looking beyond your organization for help.
“One of my favorite things about sports marketing is the community,” says Brogdon. “It’s much smaller than people realize. You’re able to see a lot of cool success stories from people you’ve worked with or run into over your career.”
Sharing victories and losses with other social media professionals working in the sports industry can spark big ideas. “Everyone creates content around their core and secondary audiences, all while taking their brand identity and account demographics into consideration. It’s interesting because we all get access to the same data, but everyone does something different with it.”
3. Make the most out of time with players
Players are your greatest content creators, but their main focus is on performing on the field. So how can you prep them to capture social content without disrupting their game?
The Chicago White Sox social team maximizes their limited time with players by integrating content strategy into existing touchpoints. “We have two major opportunities to educate our players on social media,” explains Brogdon. “We connect with newly acquired players at a social media session in the fall in Glendale and hold a full team session during Spring Training”
These sessions not only allow the social team to introduce the White Sox digital brand but also give players a glimpse of how the social and video teams will work with them throughout the season. It’s a relationship Brogdon describes as ‘symbiotic’—players learn how to support the social team’s efforts, while the social team helps players amplify their personal brands.
4. Develop a reporting infrastructure to support corporate partnerships
When the Chicago White Sox sought a new social media management solution, Sprout Social’s Tagging feature stood out as a game changer.
“The ease and convenience of reporting through custom Tags stood out to us immediately” says Brogdon. “Being able to provide marketing, PR, corporate partners and senior leadership with precise, channel-level data is huge for us.”
MLB isn’t alone in recognizing the benefits of this feature. The Atlanta Hawks social media team also uses Sprout to implement their sophisticated Tagging strategy.
“Everything we post gets a content pillar tag and a content medium tag, at minimum,” shared Katie DuPre’, Atlanta Hawks’ Social Strategy Manager, in a previous interview. “We also create campaign ID tags for any larger marketing campaigns. For example, when we were at All-Star Weekend, all live content coverage got a specific tag. After the event concluded, we were able to go back and recap the success of our event coverage.”
When it comes to social media in sports, you have to bring your A-game
Sports marketers across countries, teams and leagues are doing some big things on social. These efforts don’t just impact marketing KPIs—they introduce franchises to the next era of fans.
If you want to get into the game, you need a social media management and analytics platform that can provide you with real-time insights and engagement opportunities. Download our social media management buyer’s guide and learn how to make the most informed choice today.
As brands continue to rely on multiple social media accounts to reach audiences and grow, influencers have become a fundamental part of successful digital strategies. It’s not hard to see why—Influencer marketing can increase your brand’s reach, engagement and overall credibility.
But that’s only if marketers understand how to hire an influencer in the first place. The process of sourcing, contracting and managing influencer contracts plays a key role in the eventual success of any influencer campaign.
Read on to find out how to hire an influencer the right way, so you have a better chance of assuring success for your social marketing efforts.
Understand the process of hiring influencers
Marketers rarely stumble on the perfect influencer for their brand by chance. The hiring process needs to be treated as a dedicated strategy in its own right to establish strong working relationships with the right influencers from the get-go.
When you’re learning how to hire an influencer, consider the process as a type of recruitment, except you’re looking for independent contractors/freelancers instead of new employees. The typical influencer hiring process is made up of five key steps:
Creating a shortlist of influencers
Engaging in influencer outreach
Negotiating and signing contracts
Sharing a campaign brief, alongside objectives and expectations, and then managing the influencer campaign performance
Maintaining a continued relationship with your freelancers
Influencer marketing tools, like Sprout Social Influencer Marketing (formerly Tagger), can help streamline this process. Below, we’ll go into detail on how to optimize each step.
Create an influencer shortlist to partner with
Learning how to hire an influencer successfully isn’t as simple as partnering with the biggest account you can find. A far more effective strategy is making sure you source influencers with the same target audience as your brand. Check out their profiles, posts and engagement rates.
Once you start finding an influencer make sure some, if not all, of the below metrics match with your business needs. When creating your influencer shortlist, consider using a data-driven solution like Sprout Influencer Marketing so you can easily track each influencer’s account performance. A dedicated platform like Sprout’s allows you to vet influencers, assess their alignment with your brand values and understand their audience demographics–without a bunch of manual research.
As you think about what influencers are right for your brand, watch our video on how to build the best influencer partnerships. These insights will provide a solid understanding that’ll also support you through the later stages of influencer marketing.
Tracking metrics is a smart, data-driven way to create an influencer shortlist of people who match well with your brand. To find your ideal influencer partner, make sure you’re tracking the following metrics:
Content health and performance benchmarks
Content health refers to how well an influencer’s content is performing compared to similar creators. This metric looks at specific content updates like individual reels to see how effective an influencer’s work is.
Performance benchmarks are similar, but they look specifically at an influencer’s standing among other influencers. Instead of honing in on individual content, these benchmarks show how an influencer’s overall account is performing.
These benchmarks are useful because they put a greater focus on an influencer’s tier or size. Several influencer marketing benchmarks are used to figure out an influencer’s content health and overall performance, though the most important is usually engagement rates.
Combining content health and performance benchmarks gives you a clear idea of how well an influencer’s overall account is doing.
Track these metrics across an influencer’s social media platforms because success on YouTube can look very different from success on TikTok, or X (formerly Twitter).
By tracking influencer performance benchmarks and content health on your platforms of choice, you’ll also get specific insight into their popularity across particular platforms. This will help you partner on more targeted and effective campaigns.
Brand and audience affinity
If you’re marketing a health product, it’d be counter-productive to partner with an influencer known for reviewing fast food. Tracking affinities makes sure you avoid situations like this and hire influencers within the same niche as your brand.
Brand affinity and audience affinity work slightly differently, but it’s worth factoring both into your influencer sourcing strategy.
Brand affinity refers to how much an influencer’s values and beliefs overlap with your brand. For example, if you’re an athleisure company, a fitness influencer will likely have a strong brand affinity with you.
Audience affinity refers to how much an influencer’s audience qualities and interests overlap with those of your brand’s audience. For example, if you’re in the gaming industry, a Twitch streamer should have a strong audience affinity with your brand’s audience.
Paying attention to both of these qualitative metrics will help you find the right influencers for your brand’s niche.
Audience demographics
Audience demographics help you identify an influencer’s audience. This demographic data can be diverse, but usually includes information like:
Location
Gender
Language
Age
Make sure an influencer’s audience demographics are similar to your brand’s target audience, so your campaign reaches the right people.
For example, Cadbury partnered with Xiensscran, a London-based food influencer with an audience of millennials and Gen Z. Because of these audience demographics, Cadbury knew what to expect when partnering with her and could create a campaign tailored to the target audience they wanted to reach–younger consumers.
Much like with performance metrics, audience demographics will also differ based on social platforms. As a general rule, TikTok audiences skew younger, while Facebook audiences are older. It’s worth tracking the different audience demographics for each influencer across all of their platforms.
Influencer authenticity
Authenticity on social media is a hot topic. According to our 2024 Influencer Marketing Report, 35% of Gen Z consumers rank authenticity as a top trait they care about when following influencers. So if it’s your first time learning how to hire an influencer, make sure the influencer you’re looking for is legitimate.
This means determining that their follower count and engagement rates are genuine. Otherwise, you risk working with an influencer who doesn’t have as active of an audience as it first appears.
In the below example, M&S Food partners with UK footballing legend Ian Wright. He’s a legitimate celebrity with his own influencer following, and they use his sporting background to help promote their healthy product range.
Ensuring authenticity also means reviewing parts of an influencer’s profile that are harder to track. For example, figuring out whether they’re genuinely passionate and knowledgeable in the topics they’re discussing, and understanding their audience’s overall sentiment toward them.
Reaching out to influencers
To create an influencer outreach strategy, find out how each of your shortlisted influencers prefers to be contacted. Do they want inquiries to go through their agent, or prefer an email over a DM. Using an influencer’s chosen communication channel is the first positive step toward a longer working relationship. You can usually find this information on their profile page.
In the example below, Nadir Nadhi shows that he prefers inquiries to go through a specific email address.
Then, create influencer outreach templates for your DMs and emails. Focus on making these templates clear, concise and respectful.
Personalize each outreach message based on the individual influencer you’re contacting. Let them know you’re familiar with their work, as this personalization can go a long way toward establishing a good first impression.
Finally, remember that working with an influencer is always a two-way street. Define a clear value proposition in your messages that shows how you’ll both benefit from the campaign.
Negotiating contracts before hiring an influencer
After your outreach messages are successful, you’ll enter the negotiation phase. Influencer compensation can work differently depending on who you’re working with.
Knowing what kind of influencer campaign you plan to create before you enter negotiations is helpful. A single sponsored post will cost far less than a week-long influencer takeover, for example.
Familiarize yourself with typical influencer pricing expectations for your chosen content type, so you know what kind of price to expect initially. Make sure to also factor in the size of the influencer you’re contacting and your industry, as these will also impact rates.
Before you start to negotiate, figure out any perks or alternative payment methods you can offer, like free products or affiliate commissions.
Once you have all this information, read up on how to negotiate influencer rates with your chosen influencer. Go into any negotiation with consideration and respect for the other person, and aim for a solution that benefits both of you. Whatever you decide, everything needs to be written into your influencer contract.
Your influencer contract should include the payment terms you’ve agreed to and influencer deliverables. It should also include further information like who owns any content produced, content usage rights and who’s responsible for content production costs.
An ideal influencer contract should fulfill two clear roles. It should first serve as a legally binding contract that protects your brand. It should also serve as an outline of expectations that an influencer can refer back to throughout your working relationship.
Campaign management and performance
After a contract has been signed, provide your influencer with a further campaign brief.
This document should clarify the goals of your campaign in more detail, including your expectations from your chosen influencer and any content guidelines. Send a few influencer marketing examples along with your guidelines, so the creator knows your expectations. The more detailed you can make this document, the more likely an influencer will create content you’re happy with.
Your onboarding might be more substantial than this one document, particularly if this is your first time working with a new influencer. Get further contact details from your influencer at this stage if you haven’t already, as you’ll need their address to ship any product samples.
In the example below, Airalo Global eSim partnered with the travel influencer Omar Nok. As part of their agreement, they provided him with one of their eSim products, which he used throughout his travel content journey.
To define expectations and deliverables that will support a campaign, hold a kickoff call. A kickoff call, where the influencer can ask you any questions before creating content, will help clarify your campaign goals with them directly.
Your goals should be aligned with influencer marketing KPIs. Some important KPIs include engagement rates, click-through rates and conversion rates. This will make it far easier to track a campaign’s performance against your expectations and change tactics accordingly if it’s a long-term campaign.
Tracking success can also be streamlined by using a campaign management tool like Sprout Social Influencer Marketing. A campaign management tool can centralize your campaign data and provide clear visualizations of how your campaign is doing against your KPIs.
You can also track financial data like the number of influencers you’ve partnered with and their rates against your chosen budget. Tracking this data regularly helps you avoid overspending on your influencer campaigns.
Maintaining long-term relationships with influencers
Influencer marketing is rarely, if ever, a one-and-done strategy. Even when you’re confident you know how to hire an influencer, you need to learn how to retain influencers. You may want to work with them again on new content, or an entirely different campaign.
This recurring part of influencer marketing pairs well with the importance of authenticity. If you continue to work with the same influencer on multiple campaigns, they’ll build further trust in your products with their audience.
Long-term relationships can also lead to a natural increase in brand advocacy. When combined with the right kind of content, it can also increase conversions and bring a stronger ROI.
If you’re really happy with a particular working relationship, you could further your influencer brand partnership by making them a brand ambassador.
Even if you’re not prepared to go this far, it’s worth nurturing your working relationship with your influencers. Keep in contact with them regularly, and make sure they’re kept in the loop on your wider marketing strategy.
The more you work together, the more familiar they’ll become with your brand. This can often lead to better content, which results in superior campaign results. As long as you continue to treat influencers with respect, you’ll both be able to reap the benefits of your continued work together.
Drive measurable results with influencer partnerships
We hope these tips and best practices have helped you understand how to hire an influencer who matches your brand and your upcoming campaign.
Treating your influencer outreach like its own strategy can lay the foundations for great influencer partnerships and multiple successful social campaigns. Especially because partnering with the right people enables you to create significant, measurable results for your brand that boost your growth.
If you’re looking for a tool that makes influencer marketing easier, consider Sprout Social. Reach out to get a personalized demo today.
With countless channels for brand promotion, marketers face an overwhelming amount of data. To cut through the noise, focus on metrics that provide a clear picture of your brand’s position, like share of voice (SOV).
SOV illustrates your place in the market. It puts all of your other social media metrics into context so you can understand where your brand stands.
Is your brand present in relevant product conversations? Do people consider your company a leader in the industry? If not, you might have a problem with your brand’s share of voice.
But here’s a crucial point: It’s not about dominating every conversation. True SOV comes from strategically placing yourself in the discussions that resonate with your target audience and contribute meaningfully to an industry narrative. Think quality over quantity.
In this post, we explore this metric in depth and show you ways you can build up your share of voice on social media and other channels—the right way.
Bonus resource: Keep executives informed of the impact of your social strategy and position your brand’s share of voice with the right competitive context using Sprout’s social media scorecard template.
Share of voice (SOV) is a measure of the market conversation your brand owns compared to your competitors. It measures your brand’s visibility and influence within industry conversations. The more market share you have, the greater popularity and authority you likely have among users and prospective customers. SOV isn’t a static metric; it’s constantly evolving alongside consumer interests and competitive dynamics.
While SOV sometimes refers to a brand’s share of paid advertising in a competitive marketplace, it also has a broader definition that can include various elements of digital marketing and advertising, including mentions on social media and traffic for certain keywords.
Understanding your SOV provides insight into your brand’s position within the current market, illuminating opportunities for growth.
Why you need to measure share of voice
Measuring your brand’s share of voice helps you see the bigger picture and where your brand fits into it. It adds context to your performance data, allowing you to pinpoint opportunities for growth and improvement.
Calculating your share of voice benefits your business in several key ways:
Audience insights
Share of voice can act as a barometer for how effectively your brand messaging is landing with your target audience. A strong share of voice often indicates that your messaging is aligned with your audience’s and values. Conversely, a low SOV might suggest a need to re-evaluate your messaging or content strategy.
Share of voice data can reveal why customers choose your brand (or your competitors), and even highlight untapped market segments.
For example, imagine you manage social media for a pet supply store. You’re analyzing your share of voice and notice a trend: customers are constantly asking about a particular type of treat that none of your competitors seem to carry. This unmet need represents a potential goldmine—an untapped market just waiting for you to offer that sought-after treat.
Competitor research
Share of voice data is your secret weapon to uncover competitive intelligence. It provides insight into competitor strategies, strengths, weaknesses and everything in between. Regular SOV analysis clarifies your competitive landscape, providing data-driven insights for success.
With SOV data, you can:
Identify industry leaders in relevant market conversations.
Track your SOV to measure market share growth.
Analyze the sentiment within conversations around your competitors to identify opportunities to gain market share.
By analyzing this data, you can identify opportunities to improve and differentiate your brand. For a truly comprehensive view of your competitive landscape, combine SOV data with other forms of analysis, such as SWOT analysis and market research. This holistic approach will enable you to make more informed decisions and develop winning strategies.
Brand management
Share of voice data reveals the volume and sentiment of conversations surrounding your brand, allowing you to monitor and benchmark your brand reputation against competitors.
Additionally, this data serves as an essential safeguard. By gaining visibility into the entire landscape of brand conversations, you can proactively address emerging issues and minimize potential risks that might otherwise go unnoticed.
With Sprout Social’s Listening capabilities, you’re equipped to keep a pulse on brand conversations and boost your share of voice with relevance and positivity. Use it to monitor fluctuations in brand sentiment, helping you decode the factors driving these changes and respond effectively.
How to calculate share of voice
Now that we’ve explored the benefits of measuring share of voice, let’s dive into how to measure it. Use the following formula to calculate share of voice:
Share of voice = Your brand metrics / Total market metrics
This formula applies across all marketing channels, with slight variations in specific metrics. For example, you might track brand mentions across Facebook, Instagram, X (formerly known as Twitter) and more, for social SOV, while the volume of brand mentions across media channels determines media SOV. In this formula, “brand metrics” refers to the data points you’re tracking for your own brand, while “total market metrics” includes the same data points for all relevant competitors in your industry.
While this formula provides a basic understanding of SOV, it’s important to remember that it doesn’t capture everything. Qualitative factors, such as the impact and relevance of mentions, also play a crucial role.
Generally, there are four major areas to focus on when calculating share of voice:
Social media share of voice
Let’s zoom in on a crucial aspect of share of voice: social media. Your social media share of voice reflects consumer conversations across platforms, making it a valuable metric for understanding audience sentiment and brand perception.
Social listening tools simplify the process of tracking social media SOV by identifying all your brand or product mentions across platforms. Compare your brand’s performance to competitors to understand your position.
Sprout’s Listening tools help you visualize and analyze this data, providing a breakdown based on engagements, impressions, unique authors and sentiment. You can also filter results by network, keywords and other criteria.
Media share of voice
Media share of voice reveals which publications mention your brand, the context of those mentions, and your overall popularity among reputable sources.
By comparing your media SOV to your competitors, you can identify key publications for outreach and PR. This data can also inform your content strategy and help you tailor your messaging to resonate with specific media outlets.
While social listening tools like Sprout’s are excellent for tracking social media conversations, you’ll need specialized public relations and earned media software to effectively measure media share of voice. At Sprout, our social media team combines social media share of voice and media share of voice for a more accurate measure of our brand performance.
PPC share of voice
Your PPC share of voice measures your ad’s visibility compared to its potential reach.
Google Ads calculates this using Impression Share, factoring in your campaign and keyword settings. To find this data in your Google Ads account:
Go to the Campaigns tab.
Click the columns icon.
Select Modify columns.
Click on Competitive metrics.
Choose the Impression Share columns you want to track.
By analyzing your Impression Share, you can gain valuable insights into your PPC performance and identify opportunities to improve your visibility. For example, a low Impression Share might indicate that your bids are too low or your targeting is too narrow.
SEO share of voice
Beyond paid advertising, understanding your share of voice in organic search is crucial. Measuring SEO share of voice requires specialized tools that analyze your search visibility compared to competitors.
To measure this, you’ll need specialized search optimization (SEO) tools that analyze your rankings for relevant keywords. These tools provide insights into how much of the organic search traffic for those keywords is going to your site versus your competitors.
By analyzing this data, you can identify opportunities to improve your SEO strategy, target valuable keywords that you might be missing and ultimately drive more organic traffic to your website.
What you can measure with share of voice
Share of voice measures your brand’s presence in broader market conversations. Marketers can use SOV data to track general brand awareness, identify industry trends and benchmark their performance against the competition. A strong overall SOV often indicates a healthy level of brand awareness and engagement.
To gain even deeper insights from SOV data, consider segmenting it by key brand priorities. This allows you to tailor your analysis to specific business goals and uncover nuanced audience insights. For instance, an automotive company measuring its presence among electric car enthusiasts should focus on the specific conversations within that segment to extract meaningful takeaways.
At Sprout, we use custom Listening Topic Themes to understand how our message resonates across key brand priorities. If you’re unfamiliar with Themes, here’s a quick explanation:
Drilling down into this segmented data allows us to tell a more nuanced story about our brand’s market share to senior leadership. This granular level of analysis also supports more data-driven decisions, so we can optimize our content for maximum impact.
How to increase your share of voice on social media
Social media is a great channel to actively increase your brand’s share of voice for quicker results that you can measure and refine.
It can take time to analyze the impact of your SEO and PPC campaigns, which delays your SOV measurement. And you have a little less control over your media SOV since it involves working with third-party publications.
Meanwhile, social media SOV is easier to control and adjust. Plus, you can measure performance in real-time and make changes to optimize your efforts.
Try out these five tips to boost your social media SOV, specifically.
Develop your content calendar around key brand priorities
Trying to keep up with the saturated state of social media by constantly churning out new content is exhausting and unsustainable. Content’s life span is shorter than ever, and this approach can quickly lead to burnout. Instead of chasing fleeting trends, align with your leadership team to understand your company’s key focus areas.
Once you’ve identified those priorities, use share of voice data to establish a data feedback loop. Analyze which topics are generating the most buzz and how sentiment varies across those topics, and optimize from there.
This data-driven approach may not be as splashy as achieving virality, but you can’t control virality. What you can control is creating specific, value-driven content tailored to the platforms where your audience spends their time.
Tap into trends strategically
While you don’t have to jump onto every single trend, you should harness the right ones to increase your share of voice. Trends are informal, but they can be impactful. According to the 2024 Social Media Content Strategy Report, social users primarily want entertaining content from brands.
However, jumping on a trend without considering your brand identity and target audience can dilute your brand, alienate your audience and erode trust with your customers. To avoid this pitfall, use your SOV data to understand if and why certain trends resonate with your audience.
Strategic trend analysis is key. By analyzing which trends are gaining traction and aligning with your brand values, you can participate authentically and connect with your audience in a meaningful way. Use what you learn to spot relevant trends faster and more accurately in the future, allowing you to proactively engage in conversations and beat your competitors to the punch.
Create share-worthy social media content
One of the best ways to get people talking about your brand is to create share-worthy content.
When your audience finds your content valuable, they’re more likely to share it with their own networks, expanding your reach and amplifying your message.
Great social content entertains and educates, motivating action and sparking conversations. Think about the types of content that resonate most with your audience. This could include practical tips and how-to guides, the latest industry news or even relevant memes and jokes.
For example, instead of simply posting game highlights, the Chicago White Sox create share-worthy content during baseball’s off-season by tapping into other local events, like the start of the basketball season, and connecting them to their brand in a creative way.
This approach not only keeps their audience engaged but also increases their brand’s visibility during a typically quiet period.
Partner with relevant influencers
Brand and influencer collaborations are increasingly generating earned media attention. As consumer-influencer relationships evolve, influencer activations are becoming more newsworthy, often rivaling traditional celebrity campaigns.
This shift is fueled by the trust consumers place in influencers and how that trust influences their online behavior. The 2024 Influencer Marketing Report confirms that trust in influencers remains strong and is even growing in some demographics.
When done well, influencer campaigns can prompt algorithms to favor your brand, organically increasing the visibility of your content. This increased visibility can lead to greater engagement, brand advocacy and ultimately, a stronger share of voice.
Invest in an employee advocacy program
Employee advocacy programs can significantly boost a brand’s share of voice. By encouraging employees to share company content, you can tap into their networks to expand your reach and increase brand visibility. This introduces your brand to new audiences and creates a more authentic presence online.
Employee advocacy fosters consistent brand conversations and helps maintain visibility. Content shared by employees often drives higher engagement, as people are more likely to trust and interact with posts from individuals they know.
Ultimately, employee advocacy turns your workforce into brand ambassadors, amplifying your message and building trust.
Benefits of measuring share of voice
Some of the benefits of measuring share of voice include:
Perform competitive analysis on a market-wide scale. Get the big picture of how competitive the market is and whether you’re an up-and-comer or the dominant player in the industry.
Use SOV as a way to segment your target audience. Calculating SOV is a powerful way to analyze your audience, but you can take further steps to organize this data into segments for more insight into your strengths and weaknesses. Look at your SOV within crucial regional markets, demographics and more.
Evaluate the success of your marketing campaigns. If you launched a campaign recently, determine whether you made gains in your SOV that indicate your marketing message and tactics were effective.
Improve future campaigns based on findings in SOV reports. Use the insight from your analytical reports to expand your reach, get involved in social conversations and ensure your voice is amplified across marketing channels.
Tap into your share of voice data
Your social data holds a wealth of knowledge about your brand’s share of voice and how to increase it. Capitalize on this valuable intelligence to expand your reach, strengthen your brand and uncover rich customer insights.
But don’t keep these insights to yourself! Effectively communicate your social media performance to your leadership team with this social media scorecard template. This presentation-ready resource provides a clear framework for showcasing your progress, highlighting your successes and demonstrating the value of your social strategy
It’s time for another edition of the Post Performance Report (PPR), a series where we showcase social media posts and campaigns inspiring us, and explore what makes them so genius. We unpack how your brand can use these examples to spark your own scroll-stopping ideas—while maximizing your budget and doing more with less.
If a C-suite executive says the wrong thing on social, it could snowball into a brand crisis and cost them their job. That’s why many leaders stay away from building a personal brand, whether by choice or corporate mandate. Despite the risk, many grow their followings by regularly sharing brand content, thought leadership and even a peek into their personal lives.
Because when executives approach social in an intentional way, it makes their brand seem more approachable, honest and trustworthy. With a focused executive social strategy, leaders amplify visibility and deepen connections with customers, employees, investors, media and partners.
Let’s dive into our lineup of executives (and the teams who support them) who are the most effective on social, and tips for developing your own successful executive communications program.
Salesforce: There’s a first time for everything
As the company behind a leading CRM software, Salesforce is a B2B marketing icon. With massive events like Dreamforce and millions of followers across platforms, the SaaS company sets the standard. Yet, up until recently, they weren’t able to do something pivotal: Leverage their CEO on social media.
When CEO, Marc Benioff, published his first LinkedIn post on October 30, 2024, it rocked the network’s algorithm. At time of publishing the post has over 18,000 likes, 800 comments and 1,900 reposts. Benioff’s post focused on an AI system update to their platform—a move that comes amid fierce competition in the AI landscape.
The post dramatically boosted the reach of the announcement through organic engagement and paid investment.
The PR lift from Benioff’s post and related commentary contributed to media pickups related to the launch, and reassured customers and investors of the company’s direction.
The play: For social and communications professionals who have struggled to get their executives (especially their CEO) on board with social brand advocacy, you’re not alone. Even some of the world’s biggest brands are figuring out how to overcome this challenge. Let Salesforce give you hope.
Make a case for creating an executive communications strategy by using Benioff’s post as a proof point. Tell a compelling story of what can happen for your brand when you tie a pivotal brand launch to a leader’s debut on social.
Symphonic Capital: Creating a sense of belonging
Symphonic Capital is a venture capital firm that invests in the next generation of institutions through serving overlooked and underserved communities. On LinkedIn, their founding general partner Sydney Paige Thomas has amassed a following by reflecting on what she’s learned investing in infrastructure technology and highlighting the firm’s events.
Thomas is consistent on social, which matters. But more importantly, she’s herself. She talks about her experiences as the daughter of the first Black Chief of Staff of San Diego Mercy Hospital. She shares personal anecdotes from her school years. She even mentions astrology in her posts.
Thomas demonstrates why executives can (and should) bring their full selves to their online personal brand. Humanizing your leaders creates confidence in your mission by allowing your community to see your leaders’ values first-hand. What motivates them, what their purpose is, why they think their work matters.
Thomas’ efforts helped her land on the AFROTECH™ Future 50 list. This accolade is one of a growing list of accomplishments she’s achieved as a trusted voice in the investment space. As she continues ascending in the field, so too does her firm’s profile.
The play: Take a cue from Thomas and Symphonic Capital by giving your leaders space to embody their full identities on social. Give them permission to talk about their upbringings, hobbies and families as well as their passion for their work. People trust people, and want to hear from them.
Raising Cane’s: From CEO to celebrity
In both B2C and B2B, it’s rare to see a CEO as involved in company marketing as Todd Graves. Graves is the founder of Raising Cane’s—the rapidly growing American chain known for their chicken fingers. He has shared the stage with Snoop Dogg, appeared as a guest shark on Shark Tank and gave Travis Kelce free chicken for a year.
The Raising Cane’s team uses Graves’ outgoing personality, likeability and popularity to their advantage, frequently featuring him in the brand’s social media content. Graves also has his own public Instagram channel (another CEO anomaly) where he is tagged as a collaborator on most of Raising Cane’s posts—amplifying their reach to his more than 500,000 followers. He appears in influencer posts, like this one where he shared a meal at Raising Cane’s with an influencer who had never eaten at one of his restaurants.
It’s difficult to articulate just how effective this strategy has been for raising Graves’ profile. His unlikely origin story became the bedrock of the brand’s image, forever intertwining Graves and Canes. Awareness of one inevitability creates success for the other. The company is on track to amass $5 billion this year and Graves was subsequently named to the Fortune 400 list.
The play: The “throw your CEO in the spotlight” strategy will not work at every company. Probably not even most companies. This playbook is only meant for founders who stick around for their entire career, until the next generation inherits their business. Even when brands fit into that bucket, they should only pursue this approach if they have a leader who has clearly defined values, flourishes in the limelight and is discerning about what to share publicly.
For brands with all pieces of that puzzle, your CEO might be the golden ticket to massive growth and outpacing the competition. For others, adapt what makes sense for your company. Maybe it’s encouraging your CEO to create an Instagram account managed by the social team. Or doing more media outreach for your C-suite.
Google: Sharing the spotlight across the C-suite
For a multinational, publicly traded corporation like Google, having executive thought leaders on social can be a significant risk (even more so than for startups or small companies). For this reason, some members of the C-suite might not be present on social at all, while others take a restrained approach.
Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai, chooses the latter, and shares well-curated content like highlights from earnings calls, clips from conversations with leaders at other companies and reflections about the future of global emerging technology on LinkedIn.
Similarly, Google’s Chief Sustainability Officer Kate Brandt shares how Google technology enables sustainable practices, like finding the perfect location for a solar farm, from her account. She also shares new pathways the company is creating for clean energy and AI-powered sustainability.
It’s clear Google executives are in lock-step with their internal communications and content teams, and play an essential role in shaping their public narrative and steering attention toward their company roadmap.
The play: Though building an executive communications program on social can be a risk, the greater risk is zero executive presence on social at all. Even if leaders only repost existing brand content with a thoughtful message, that still helps companies stay ahead of and shape news stories, while multiplying reach and increasing employee engagement.
Take a cue from Google and create a posting calendar for your executives where they reshare existing content tied to their function. Suggest articles they should share and tie their posts to internal milestones.
Hilton: Pulling back the curtain on culture
For a well-established brand in the hospitality industry like Hilton, the need for a strong executive presence on LinkedIn might not be obvious at first. The brand is already widely recognized globally (they even have a celebrity spokesperson in the family). But as recruiting employees in the hospitality sector becomes a larger priority, so too does the need to strengthen their employer brand.
Hilton’s Chief Marketing Officer Mark Weinstein frequently posts content using the brand hashtag #EveryJobMakesTheStay, an ode to the Hilton ethos that every employee plays an important role in providing best-in-class guest experiences.
Having leaders like Weinstein rally around recruitment and retention efforts—even indirectly—reinforces Hilton’s positive culture. His posts build upon stories in the media about Hilton’s partnerships with organizations like the U.S. Committee of Refugees and Immigrants, and underscores the brand’s commitment to investing in people.
The play: Building an indelible employer legacy is one of the most pressing reasons to kickstart or expand your executive communications program. No matter your sector, showing prospective employees what daily life at your company is like is key to hiring and keeping world-class talent.
Global spotlight: Telstra’s CEO is on the frontlines
Telstra is Australia’s largest mobile network, building, operating and fortifying telecommunications connections around the country. The brand’s CEO, Vicki Brady, shares scenes onsite while crews build network infrastructure. Like in this post, where she talks about the sacrifices those on the frontlines make and how their hard work translates to strengthening intercity fiber networks.
Through posts like this, Brady demonstrates her empathy for both the brand’s customers and employees. She proves Telstra’s commitment to providing reliable service as weather patterns become more extreme, and the appreciation she feels for the crew members who spend weeks away from their loved ones on the job.
She also shares reflections from sitting down with customers to learn more about their needs—especially those in remote places.
Telstra’s commitment to providing top-tier service and connectivity reflects in their earnings projections, even as they navigate tricky economic headwinds.
The play: Executives don’t just play a role humanizing your brand, they also humanize your customers and employees. As Brady illustrates, making people feel seen can go a long way. Consumers and team members are more than a number, and executives who reflect that on social earn their trust.
From the board room to the feed
That concludes this month’s installment of the PPR. Stay tuned for next month’s edition, where we’re rounding up brands we haven’t been able to scroll away from in 2024. In the meantime, remember these key takeaways:
Post Performance Report Takeaways
Executive advocacy humanizes your brand. Your company seems more trustworthy and relatable when leaders share their authentic selves.
Amplifying existing brand messages is a great starting point. It can be difficult to get executives on board with posting regularly. Giving them a low-lift way to do so still extends reach and generates attention for major updates.
Social allows leaders to shape public narratives and reinforce company culture. Executives can use social content to align public perception with their corporate goals—a move that helps them win over consumers and potential employees alike.
And if you see a social post or campaign that deserves to be highlighted, tag us @sproutsocial and use #PostPerformanceReport to have your idea included in a future article.
If you’re still posting manually to Instagram, you’re spending too much time on repetitive tasks that could easily be automated with scheduling tools.
Learning how to schedule Instagram posts in advance frees up your social media team to focus on more important tasks, like building an Instagram marketing strategy, creating quality content, analyzing performance and engaging with your audience in real time.
In this article, we’re going to talk about the different ways you can schedule your Instagram content, the benefits of doing so and a few great scheduling tools to consider in your techstack.
Can you schedule Instagram posts?
Absolutely! There are several ways to schedule Instagram posts:
We’ll walk you through each method in the next few sections.
But first, let’s talk about why scheduling is so important for brands on Instagram.
According to our Social Media Productivity report, 63% of marketers feel that manual tasks hold them back from doing high-impact work. But with the right social media management tools, 59% find they have more time to get things done.
Think about it: when you’re not scrambling to post content manually or setting alarms for optimal posting times, you can focus on what really matters—creating unique, compelling content and building authentic connections with your followers.
Now, let’s look at the different ways you can schedule Instagram posts in advance.
Quick note: Scheduling is only available for Instagram Business or Creator accounts (not personal accounts), so make sure you check your account type before diving in.
How to schedule Instagram posts from the Instagram app
After years of users asking for it, Instagram finally added in-app scheduling near the end of 2022. Users are able to schedule up to 25 posts per day and up to 75 days in advance.
Keep in mind, only Instagram Business and Creator accounts have access to this feature. Personal profiles are unable to schedule content.
Follow these steps to get started:
Step 1: Open your Instagram app and tap the + at the bottom of the screen or swipe the home feed to the right to create a new piece of content.
Step 2: Select Post or Reel, depending on the type of content you’re creating.
Step 3: Either take a photo or record a video using the in-app camera or upload one from your camera roll.
Step 4: Add any text, stickers, music, effects, etc., then add your caption.
Step 5: Tap Advanced Settings at the bottom of the screen.
Step 6: Toggle the Schedule this post option on, then select your preferred date and time from the menu that appears.
Step 7: Go back to the previous screen and tap Schedule.
Keep in mind, scheduling within the Instagram app prevents you from cross-posting to other accounts, such as a Facebook profile or Page or even Threads. If you’d like to schedule and cross-post to other accounts, explore the next two options.
How to schedule Instagram posts from Meta Business Suite
You can also use the Meta Business Suite to schedule your Instagram content. First, connect your Instagram Business Account to your Facebook Page so you can access both from the Meta Business Suite.
Step 2: Specify which Instagram account you want to share your post or reel to. It may also include your Facebook Page—it’s up to you whether you also want it to post to your Facebook Page or only to Instagram.
Step 3: Upload your media, then write out your caption. Be sure to include your mentions and hashtags (you can even save hashtags to reuse in your content). You can even geotag a location if you wish.
Step 4: Click on Schedule, then select your preferred date and time. Click Active times to access a popup showcasing some of the upcoming times that your audience is active.
Step 5: Once you’ve selected your time, click Save then click Schedule.
How to schedule Instagram posts using Sprout Social
Scheduling Instagram posts natively is straightforward, but how about when you have a larger social strategy across multiple platforms to plan and schedule?
With a dedicated social media publishing tool like Sprout, you can do so much more. Cross-posting, team collaboration and permissions, in-depth analytics—the list goes on.
We make it so easy to schedule all kinds of Instagram posts, including single posts, Reels, Carousels and Stories. Whatever you want to upload, simply finalize your content and schedule it on desktop or mobile. You can also use Sprout’s Instagram grid planner to visualize how your scheduled posts will actually look on your profile.
Follow the steps below to learn exactly how to schedule Instagram posts using Sprout.
Step 1: Connect your Instagram profiles to Sprout Social
The first thing you need to do is log in to Sprout Social and link your Instagram profile (If you don’t already have an account, sign up for a free 30-day trial).
From the dashboard, click Connect a Profile and select Instagram from the different options. Then, follow the on-screen instructions to easily connect your Instagram profile.
Quick tip: Have more than one Instagram profile? Connect them all. Sprout lets you manage and schedule posts to multiple accounts from one dashboard. In fact, you can also link your other social profiles, including Facebook, Twitter (X) and LinkedIn.
Once you’ve linked your profile, click Publishing in the left menu to open Sprout’s social media calendar. You can view this as a list, week or monthly calendar.
Next, it’s time to choose the image(s) or video to post. If you’re not 100% sure what you should publish, check out our in-depth guide on Instagram post ideas.
You can directly schedule posts or leave notes by clicking through the spaces in your calendar. This keeps you organized and gives you a bird’s eye view of your content strategy.
Step 3: Compose your Instagram post
Hover on your calendar to schedule a post on a specific day, or click the blue pencil/paper icon in the top right corner of your screen to create a new post.
Choose the Instagram account you want to publish to and specify the type of content you want to schedule—post or Story.
At this point, you can start composing your post. Start by writing a compelling caption for your content. You can also add relevant Instagram hashtags or tag users in your caption.
Sprout pro tip: Use our Enhance by AI Assist feature to generate more caption ideas and speed up your creative process. If you’re not sure what to post about, Enhance by AI Assist can help you create content based on a draft you input into the Compose box. If you’re looking to change the tone of the content (think: confident, friendly or professional), try Suggestions by AI Assist to align captions with your brand’s tone of voice
Now, upload your visuals. There are several ways to do this in Sprout.
You can upload an image(s) or video directly from your computer or mobile. Another way is to choose a visual from the Asset Library. This is helpful if you already have shared media uploaded on Sprout, such as company or product photos.
Upload images directly from Canva
If you don’t have any premade assets to upload and want to create beautiful Instagram posts on the spot, our Canva integration can save the day.
To create and export images directly from Canva, click Upload Media in the compose window and select Design on Canva from the drop down.
Log in to your existing Canva account on the screen that pops up or create a new one in a few minutes. Then, select a template, customize it and click Export to Sprout when you’re done. Easy!
Step 4: Select your preferred date and time
Scroll down in the Compose box to the When to post section. Choose your preferred date and time. You can also specify the time zone if your audience is located in a specific region.
Alternatively, select Optimal Send Times to see data-driven recommendations when your audience is most likely to see your content. Our ViralPost technology suggests the best times to post based on your historical engagement data for maximum reach opportunity.
Step 5: Stage your post for scheduling
After your content is edited and approved, you can click Schedule to add it to your calendar.
Other scheduling options in Sprout are to Draft, Queue or Submit for Approval. Let’s take a look at each option:
Draft: Not sure if your post is ready to go live quite yet? Want to create multiple “backup” Instagram posts for the future? Draft is a great spot to park your unfinished content or items that still need approval.
Queue: The Sprout Queue is ideal for edited posts ready to go live—especially if you’re not sure when to post your content. When you queue your Instagram posts, Sprout picks the best time to publish within the window you specify.
Submit for Approval: Choosing an approver ensures your content is properly edited, timely and on-brand. Select specific approvers to review your content before it goes live. This option is perfect if you have or plan to establish a social media workflow.
Benefits of scheduling Instagram posts
Businesses have begged for scheduling features on Instagram for years. But why are so many marketers eager to queue up their content? Below are some of the biggest benefits of scheduled Instagram posts.
1. Develop a more comprehensive and consistent content strategy
Food for thought: Different types of content (think: carousels, images, Stories and Reels) all receive different rates of engagement. This means brands need to diversify their content strategies and not just post the same type of content over and over.
When you schedule posts on Instagram, you give yourself time to actually assess your content calendar, identify gaps and opportunities, and gather the various assets you need to create fresh, compelling content.
Scheduling also enables you to stay consistent with your posting strategy, whether it’s one daily post or multiple posts a day. This helps keep you top of your followers’ minds (and feeds) and also gives you a boost with the Instagram algorithm.
2. Allows for more real-time engagement with followers
If nothing else, scheduling Instagram posts can free up some serious time in your schedule. That means more opportunities to interact with followers and reply to comments.
Even the best Instagram scheduler can’t do the legwork of building relationships with customers. When you stick to a social media post scheduler consistently, you create more time for dedicated customer engagement.
3. Better time management means increased productivity
Think about the effort that goes into creating Instagram posts or campaigns beyond writing captions and editing images. There’s also tagging accounts. Adding locations. Checking hashtags. And that doesn’t even scratch the surface.
Creating Instagram posts last-minute is a recipe for burnout. When you schedule Instagram posts in advance, you can batch your time and be more productive. For example, you could write all your captions in one sitting or edit a week’s worth of images at once.
This helps your brain stay focused instead of constantly switching between different types of work. The result? You get more done in less time and craft more meaningful posts.
From organic and paid social to email and beyond, all of your channels should be on the same page in terms of creatives, landing pages and promotions. This creates a better customer experience.
Through social scheduling, you ensure that your posts fire off at the right time. If you’re using a social media management tool such as Sprout Social, you can actually sync all of your social channels (think: Instagram, Facebook and TikTok) so you don’t have to publish manually or in real-time.
5. Encourage collaboration and brainstorming
Again, scheduling encourages brands to begin working on posts well in advance.
This means marketers and colleagues have time to partner on messaging and creative assets.
For social teams and brand marketers looking for feedback or approval workflows, collaboration and Instagram scheduling go hand in hand. Coupled with a social media approval process, it’s a cinch to get multiple sets of eyes on your content before it goes live.
Tips for scheduling posts on Instagram
We’ll say it again: You can’t just queue up your posts months or weeks in advance and expect your Instagram to grow on autopilot.
Below are some key considerations for brands looking to leverage Instagram scheduling.
1. Optimize your post timing to maximize engagement
A nice added bonus of scheduling is that your business isn’t beholden to “business hours.”
Although these numbers aren’t the be-all, end-all of follower activity and vary based on your time zone, they’re eye-opening in terms of when the average Instagram user is active:
Marketers using Sprout social as their Instagram scheduler can increase engagement with our ViralPost algorithm that optimizes post timing. Rather than guess or decide when to post via trial and error, you’ll know exactly when to post, based on real follower engagement data.
2. Take extra care when crafting your captions
It’s no secret that Instagram captions represent valuable real estate when it comes to engagement.
They shouldn’t be treated as an afterthought. For each post, consider:
Which hashtags are you using? How many? Are they in your first comment?
Do you need to tag any accounts?
Did you write a strong call-to-action?
How does this caption compare to your most recent one(s)?
Much like your content strategy needs to be diverse, the same rings true for your Instagram captions.
When you schedule posts in advance, you have time to put your captions under the microscope and ensure there’s some variety. Likewise, you can confirm that you’re using the right Instagram hashtags and aren’t missing any key details before your post goes live.
3. Keep a close eye on your content calendar
Scheduling based on a defined content calendar encourages both variety and consistency in terms of your posts.
As you queue up your posts, ask yourself:
Are we hitting the appropriate publishing frequency?
Is there enough variation in our content schedule?
How are we promoting this content to encourage engagement?
Have the appropriate stakeholders reviewed this post before it goes live?
The answers to all of the above ensure more thoughtful, goal-driven posts that are poised to perform well. Below is a quick snapshot of what a content calendar looks like in Sprout:
4. Block off time to engage with customers
Despite popular belief, scheduling Instagram posts doesn’t make your presence more “passive.”
Quite the opposite, honestly.
Yet again, scheduling frees up your schedule to interact with customers in real-time.
Mind your notifications and make sure your comment section never gathers cobwebs. Be proactive and make a point to respond to social customers ASAP for the sake of satisfaction and loyalty.
In addition to Instagram scheduling, Sprout aggregates messages from all your social networks into a singular Smart Inbox that you can use to filter and categorize messages, while also allowing for real-time collaboration between your team. No message goes unanswered and you’ll also avoid response collisions.
5. Know when to hit “pause” on your scheduling
Whether due to a brand emergency or a bigger crisis management effort, sometimes you need to put a stop to your scheduled content.
Failure to do so could come off as inauthentic or result in otherwise poor engagement when your followers’ minds are elsewhere. For example, publishing promotional content during certain holidays, on somber occasions or in the wake of tragedies could result in adverse affects on your brand reputation.
This speaks to how Instagram scheduling is so much more than putting your brand on autopilot. Sprout has built-in features to pause scheduled posts and resume them when the time is right.
Instagram scheduling tools to use
Third-party tools can make Instagram scheduling even easier than the in-app tool. Additional apps allow you to schedule content to multiple social media platforms at once, offer more features and can help with your overall social media management, from automation to analytics.
Here are three tools you might consider.
1. Sprout Social
Sprout Social is a comprehensive social media management platform that allows users to schedule and publish content across various social media networks including Instagram. It provides a visual content calendar for planning and organizing posts and offers analytics to track post-performance and engagement. Sprout Social also includes features for social listening and engagement allowing users to monitor mentions and conversations about their brand.
2. MeetEdgar
MeetEdgar is a social media scheduling tool that focuses on automating content recycling and evergreen content. Users can create a library of content categorized by topic and schedule posts to be automatically shared and reshared across their social media channels including Instagram. MeetEdgar aims to help users maintain a consistent social media presence with minimal ongoing effort by automatically filling their content calendar.
3. SocialBee
SocialBee is another social media management tool designed to help users plan content across multiple platforms including Instagram. It offers features like content categorization, a visual content calendar and post-performance analytics. SocialBee also emphasizes content variation with options to customize posts for each social media platform, ensuring optimal messaging and format for different audiences.
Learn how to schedule posts on Instagram today
If you want to build a better Instagram presence and free up more time in your busy day, you need to start scheduling.
Doing so might seem simple, but making the most of Instagram scheduling means understanding the key details of any given post and how to best engage followers.
With the tips above and a tool like Sprout, you can create a compelling content calendar that does exactly that. Sign up for a free 30-day trial and check it out for yourself.
