Social media glossary

Engagement rate

Engagement rate is the percentage of people who interacted with a post (likes, comments, shares, saves) relative to its reach or your follower count.

Reach

Reach is the number of unique people who saw your content at least once.

Impressions

Impressions are the total number of times your content was displayed, including repeat views by the same person.

Organic reach

Organic reach is the number of unique people who saw your content without paid promotion.

Click-through rate (CTR)

Click-through rate (CTR) is the percentage of people who clicked a link or call to action out of those who saw it.

Conversion rate

Conversion rate is the percentage of people who completed a desired action — like a signup or purchase — after clicking through.

Vanity metrics

Vanity metrics are numbers that look impressive but don’t reflect real business value, like raw follower or like counts.

KPI (Key Performance Indicator)

A KPI is a key metric chosen to measure progress toward a specific social media or business goal.

Share of voice

Share of voice is your brand’s portion of the total conversation in your market compared to competitors.

Reel

A Reel is a short-form, full-screen vertical video format on Instagram and Facebook designed for discovery.

Story

A Story is a full-screen vertical post that disappears after 24 hours, used for casual, timely updates.

Carousel

A carousel is a single post containing multiple swipeable images or slides.

Short

A Short is YouTube’s short-form, vertical video format, comparable to Reels and TikToks.

Caption

A caption is the text accompanying a social media post that adds context, story or a call to action.

Hashtag

A hashtag is a keyword prefixed with # that groups content by topic and aids discovery.

Content pillars

Content pillars are a small set of recurring themes a brand rotates through to stay consistent and on-message.

Evergreen content

Evergreen content stays relevant and useful long after it’s published, unlike timely or trend-based posts.

User-generated content (UGC)

User-generated content (UGC) is content created by customers or fans rather than the brand itself.

Social proof

Social proof is the psychological effect where people trust something more when they see others using or endorsing it.

Brand voice

Brand voice is the consistent personality and tone a brand uses across its social media communication.

Call to action (CTA)

A call to action (CTA) is a prompt that tells your audience the specific next step to take, like “Sign up” or “Learn more”.

Social listening

Social listening is monitoring social media for mentions, keywords and conversations about your brand, competitors or industry.

Sentiment analysis

Sentiment analysis classifies social mentions as positive, negative or neutral to gauge how people feel about a brand or topic.

Social media algorithm

A social media algorithm is the system a platform uses to decide which content to show each user and in what order.

Social media scheduling

Social media scheduling is creating posts in advance to publish automatically at set times across one or more networks.

Auto-publishing

Auto-publishing is when scheduled posts are published automatically by a tool, with no manual step at posting time.

Content calendar

A content calendar is a schedule of what you’ll post, on which network, and when.

Cross-posting

Cross-posting is publishing the same or adapted content to multiple social networks.

Best time to post

The best time to post is when your specific audience is most active and likely to engage — which varies by account, not a universal hour.

Social media automation

Social media automation uses software to handle repetitive tasks like scheduling, publishing, reporting and first-draft content.

ROAS (Return on Ad Spend)

ROAS (Return on Ad Spend) is the revenue generated for every unit of currency spent on advertising.

CPM (Cost Per Mille)

CPM (cost per mille) is the cost of 1,000 ad impressions.

CPC (Cost Per Click)

CPC (cost per click) is the average amount you pay each time someone clicks your ad.

Boosted post

A boosted post is an existing organic post promoted with ad spend to reach more people.

Retargeting

Retargeting shows ads to people who have already interacted with your brand, such as past visitors or engagers.

Lookalike audience

A lookalike audience is a new ad audience built to resemble your existing customers or best engagers.

Community management

Community management is engaging with your audience — replying to comments and messages, and nurturing relationships across social.

Content repurposing

Content repurposing is adapting one piece of content into multiple formats or posts for different networks.

Approval workflow

An approval workflow is a process where posts are reviewed and signed off before they’re published.