{"id":8851,"date":"2021-02-01T16:05:23","date_gmt":"2021-02-01T21:05:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ceros.com\/inspire\/?p=8851"},"modified":"2021-10-05T15:01:53","modified_gmt":"2021-10-05T19:01:53","slug":"what-is-engagement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ceros.com\/inspire\/originals\/what-is-engagement\/","title":{"rendered":"What is Engagement and How Is It Measured?"},"content":{"rendered":"<span class=\"rt-reading-time\" style=\"display: block;\"><span class=\"rt-label rt-prefix\">Reading Time: <\/span> <span class=\"rt-time\">3<\/span> <span class=\"rt-label rt-postfix\">minutes<\/span><\/span>\n<p>Ask 10 digital marketers what the goal of their next campaign is, and they\u2019ll probably all respond with some version of \u201cincrease engagement.\u201d But what do they <em>really<\/em> mean by that? Are they after something more than just page views? Is it the quality of the interaction\u2014the amount of time the audience spends visiting, the number of posts that they click on\u2014that matters most?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The<a href=\"https:\/\/theonlineadvertisingguide.com\/glossary\/engagement\/\"> Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB)<\/a>, a trade body focused on online advertising, defines engagement as \u201ca spectrum of consumer advertising activities and experiences\u2014cognitive, emotional, and physical\u2014that will have a positive impact on a brand.\u201d And while that\u2019s a fairly useful definition that broadly encompasses any type of interaction a person has with content\u2014likes, comments, retweets, shares\u2014it only scratches the surface of what forms engagement takes and why it matters so much.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Every year, companies spend millions to create impressive digital content for the sake of engaging with the people who matter most: their customers and evangelists. According to Harvard Business Review, not even the U.S. State Department is above the fray\u2014it <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/federal-eye\/wp\/2013\/07\/03\/ig-report-state-department-spent-630000-to-increase-facebook-likes\/\">reportedly spent $630,000<\/a> from 2011 to 2013 to garner Facebook likes and sway people\u2019s perception of Uncle Sam.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yet, it\u2019s not out of vanity that companies interact with their audiences online. &#8220;Word of mouth&#8221; is still our strongest form of marketing\u2014even when it happens online\u2014and content is the catalyst that gets the conversation started. Each interaction is a meaningful moment and personalized experience distinct from the often impersonal nature of the internet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style='position: relative;width: auto;padding: 0 0 62.16%;height: 0;top: 0;left: 0;bottom: 0;right: 0;margin: 0;border: 0 none' id=\"experience-5f2c7bc26c2c1\" data-aspectRatio=\"1.60869565\" data-mobile-aspectRatio=\"0.97560976\"><iframe allowfullscreen src='\/\/view.ceros.com\/ceros-marketing\/get-industry-report?heightOverride=460' style='position: absolute;top: 0;left: 0;bottom: 0;right: 0;margin: 0;padding: 0;border: 0 none;height: 1px;width: 1px;min-height: 100%;min-width: 100%' frameborder='0' class='ceros-experience' title='Industry Report' scrolling='no'><\/iframe><\/div><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"\/\/view.ceros.com\/scroll-proxy.min.js\" data-ceros-origin-domains=\"view.ceros.com\"><\/script>\n\n\n\n<h2>How is engagement measured?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>There are a number of metrics that quantify engagement. You\u2019re familiar with retweets on Twitter, saves on Instagram, and likes on Facebook, to be sure. Engagement metrics track things like how often a unique user visits a given web page, how long users spend on a page, how many interactions they have once they\u2019re there, which content is considered high-quality, and more. Depending on your industry, you might care about one more than the other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>At Ceros, for example, we create interactive digital experiences. Our editorial team cares a lot about the time that our audience spends with our pieces. If a story of ours has an average time on page of 20 minutes, we know we did a good job building an immersive piece that our audience enjoys exploring. If people click dive deeper in a number of sections, we know that our CTAs worked, and that we designed them in a way that invited exploration. That\u2019s success for us, but it might not be for someone else who wants to inspire quick action.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jenny Rothenberg is the former director of growth at Morning Brew, a business-oriented newsletter with over 2 million subscribers. She wrote in <a href=\"https:\/\/entrepreneurshandbook.co\/im-looking-for-writers-8b16382fc089\"><em>Entrepreneur&#8217;s Handbook<\/em><\/a>, a publication dedicated to helping entrepreneurs succeed, that her team viewed unique email opens\u2014which refers to the number of individuals that open the email\u2014as the gold standard for measuring their audience\u2019s engagement. This metric factors out the readers who open the same email multiple times, giving the team a better sense of the daily email\u2019s wider appeal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cOur goal from the onset was to build, grow, and retain a hyper-engaged audience,\u201d Rothenberg said. \u201cTo keep ourselves pushing toward that north star, we measure ourselves not on our list size, but on subscribers that are actually engaging with our content\u2014most cleanly measured by unique opens.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For other organizations looking to drive website traffic as opposed to newsletter traffic, overall page views might be seen as the most fundamental metric of success. That number acts as an indicator of just how many people are out there hitting your site or content\u2014so we might presume that the more views you get, the better your site is. But no metric is perfect\u2014page views can be manipulated to show desirable results without any of the underlying success.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Pages per session is also an important metric\u2014it shows that your site did more than simply offer a solution for the reader\u2019s initial search, but piqued interest enough for the reader to explore more information on your site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, to many in the software industry (and surely to any salesperson), the absolute most important metric of engagement is form submissions. That\u2019s when a website visitor requests a product demo or agrees to speak with a member of the sales team. These forms are the basis of inbound leads for most SaaS sales divisions because they pair prospective clients with knowledgeable colleagues who can answer their questions. It\u2019s the job of the overall marketing team to keep people engaged with content on the site enough to want to reach out for a more meaningful connection. Keep form submissions flowing and marketers become the heroes of the workplace.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ultimately, engaging content entices visitors to take the next step in their customer journey and hopefully solve their problem with your organization\u2019s presumably fantastic solution. Without it, organizations are flying blindfolded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.sethkingwriter.com\/\">Seth King<\/a> is a writer and editor based in Boston.<\/em><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"myclass\">What do marketers mean when they talk about chasing engagement? We look at a few metrics and explain why some might be more important to you.<\/div>\n<p><!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":8860,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>What is Engagement and How Is It Measured? - Ceros Inspire<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What do marketers mean when they talk about chasing engagement? 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