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How to Use Twitter Analytics: Hashtags, Followers, Demographics


TJ Kiely

Sep 14, 2023

Using X, formerly known as Twitter, to its fullest potential isn’t just about crafting the perfect 280-character Tweet. It’s also about understanding the people your original Tweets reach. You can learn a lot about who those people are with Twitter analytics.

Like other social networks, X/Twitter builds social media analytics into its platform to help users track their performance. You can access a Twitter analytics dashboard that showcases various marketing metrics that are important for marketers to keep on top of. Let’s face it – every photo, quote, or video you post can have an impact on your brand. So using a Twitter analytics platform is the best way to choose every keyword, hashtag, and Tweet wisely, attract the right type of follower, and get the results you came for.

To learn more about your content performance and who your X/Twitter audience is, look no further than Twitter analytics. Let’s explore what analytics for Twitter can tell you and how to use those insights in your social media marketing and specifically in your Twitter marketing strategy.

Table of Contents:

What Can Twitter Analytics Tell You?

Twitter account home page.

The built-in X/Twitter analytics app offers platform-specific insights into your audience and content. You can track key Twitter stats and metrics to make data-driven decisions about your Twitter marketing and branding.

Examples of Twitter KPIs:

These KPIs can be accessed with a Twitter analytics platform, and provide essential context to inform your strategy on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Twitter analytics data is available for business and personal X/Twitter accounts. It’s free to use, and its data can help you create better campaigns without the guesswork. 

How to Access Twitter Analytics

To access Twitter Analytics, you’ll first need an X/Twitter account. You can then go to analytics.twitter.com and log into Twitter. This should take you straight to your Twitter analytics dashboard.

The easy-to-read dashboard breaks down your insights into several categories:

Report Card

The report card gives you a high-level overview of your Twitter performance. Here you’ll find your top-performing Tweets and a summary of your monthly activity.

Twitter Report Card KPIs include:

  • Top follower (the person with the most followers who started following you)
  • Top mention (based on engagements)
  • Top media tweet (your best tweet that includes a photo or video)
  • Growth metrics compared to the previous period

Tweets Activity Dashboard

Twitter activity dashboard.

The Tweets Activity Dashboard shows you individual Tweet performance. See how many impressions each Tweet received, how many times it was retweeted, and how many times people liked and replied to it. You also have the option of separating your promoted tweets from your non-promoted ones.

You can also view averages for several Twitter KPIs, including:

  • Engagement rate
  • Link clicks
  • Retweets
  • Likes
  • Replies

You can export your findings into a .CSV file and adjust your date range to look at a broader or smaller scope of metrics.

Video Activity Dashboard

If you’re posting videos to Twitter, you’ll gain separate insights for those on the Video Activity Dashboard.

View metrics like

  • retention rates
  • view rate
  • video completion rate

for all your tweeted videos.

To access this page, click the More tab at the upper-right corner of the analytics page and choose Video from the drop-down menu.

Campaign Dashboard

You’ll find useful metrics and data on the campaign dashboard if you’re running paid Twitter ads. See metrics like impressions, results, engagement rates, and cost per result.

Conversion tracking metrics measure your advertising ROI by tracking actions people take after engaging with your ad on X, formerly known as Twitter. For instance, if a customer leaves Twitter to go to your website, you can see whether they signed up for a newsletter, made a purchase, or took some other action.

Similar to the video dashboard, you’ll access campaign metrics by clicking the More tab at the top of the analytics page.

Business Insights Dashboard

Twitter business additional resources page.

For businesses using Twitter, you’ll have a separate Twitter analytics dashboard showing personalized business insights. This dashboard is often overlooked because it’s separate from the other dashboards. To access it, go to the Twitter for Business section under Advertising > Analytics. At the bottom of the page, click the Visit Yours Now button under the Business Insights Dashboard header.

Instead of numerical data, this dashboard gives you spelled-out insights based on your Twitter data. These are often tips for improvement and suggestions for your next best actions.

How to Use Twitter Analytics

The X/Twitter analytics platform can be immensely beneficial if you know which social media metrics matter. Some Twitter metrics will be more important to you than others, depending on your goals.

We suggest starting with the following KPIs and growing from there:

Twitter Impressions

Impressions refer to the number of people who viewed your Tweet. When paired with engagement metrics, you gain a better understanding of how compelling people think your content is.

For example, if impressions are high but engagement is low, then it might be because your hashtags, content, or CTA need some work.

Tip: Learn everything about Twitter impressions and reach.

Top Tweet

Your top Tweet is direct insight into what your audience loves most.

Knowing your top Tweet (and other high-performing content) can help you build on that success and give your X/Twitter audience more of what they want.

New Followers

This is an important metric in your Twitter follower analytics. The new follower count gives you an idea of whether your audience is growing month over month. Consistently adding new followers is a good indication that people find your content interesting and/or valuable.

Followers Lost/Gained

This metric represents the number of followers you gain or lose over a specific time period. Month by month is a popular view.

Similar to tracking only new followers, the lost/gained perspective can help you see if you’re attracting more people than you’re losing. A high number of unfollowers could mean you’re not hitting the mark with your audience.

Top Followers

X/Twitter success isn’t just about your brand – it’s about the people your brand connects with. Your top followers are your biggest fans. They can help you get your content in front of more eyeballs, which can lead to higher engagement and faster audience growth. These followers might be prime influencer opportunities, too!

Engagement Metrics

Engagement metrics can be a lot of things: likes, retweets, hashtag clicks, replies, follows, and more. Collectively, engagement represents the interactions people have with your Tweets. That’s the whole point of tweeting – you want people to engage with them! If they’re not, then something clearly isn’t working for you, and you need to adjust your approach.

You can dial deeper into each of these metrics on each of your Tweets. Having a holistic view of engagement rates can help you see at a glance which Tweets are performing well and which ones aren’t.

Technically, link clicks fall under the engagement rate category. But this metric deserves a spotlight of its own because it’s a direct reflection of how interested your audience is in your offering.

A high number of link clicks could mean there’s strong interest in your product, service, or event you’re promoting.

What Are The Best Twitter Analytics Tools?

Twitter’s native analytics are pretty powerful on their own, as they should be. They’re directly connected to the platform and offer a basic view of your audience and performance.

However, for a more well-rounded perspective, we recommend pairing the X/Twitter analytics app data with the following third-party tools and platforms:

Meltwater

A screenshot of the Meltwater social media analytics tool Engage displaying data about audience location and Twitter analytics demographics.

Meltwater’s comprehensive social intelligence and media monitoring platform helps you harness analytics for Twitter at scale. Powered by AI technology, Meltwater uses social listening to take the guesswork out of higher engagement.

Twitter follower analytics show you who is talking about to help you craft content that speaks to them. Find top influencers in your niche who can become brand advocates and top followers. Manage entire campaigns and measure the ROI of each one from a single Twitter analytics dashboard. Easily discover user-generated content that you can repurpose in your marketing. 

Most importantly, Meltwater helps you understand your X/Twitter audience with insights from across the web, not just X, formerly known as Twitter. Get a 360-degree view of your target customers to help you build a thriving Twitter community. Meltwater makes it easy to get more from your Twitter audience analytics by empowering you with more social data.

Plus, Meltwater works across all social media platforms, including Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and more. Centralize your entire Twitter marketing strategy with an all-in-one platform and get up-to-the-minute insights.

Tweepsmap

Tweepsmap Twitter Analytics

This AI-driven follower analysis tool helps you capture real-time Twitter insights across trending topics. Find connections between followers to create a “map” and build your community. X/Twitter users can filter by location to learn more about their target audience. This Twitter analytics app also shows you the best times to tweet based on your audience and can even schedule tweets for you in advance.

Mentionmapp

Mentionmapp Twitter Analytics

Mentionmapp turns your analytics for Twitter into user-friendly visuals. See who is leading conversations on X/Twitter to find potential influencers, hashtags, and followers. You can also see the depth of engagement among Twitter users and gain a better understanding of your followers.

Tweepi

Tweepi Twitter analytics

Tweepi also uses AI to remove some of the heavy lifting from your marketing team. Set up Tweepi with your chosen hashtags and followers, then Tweepi searches for the best tweets and users to engage. It’s a helpful tool for growing your audience with targeted, relevant tweets.

Track My Hashtag

Track My Hashtag Twitter analytics

One of the most popular purpose-built Twitter analytics tools, Track My Hashtag gives you instant insights into X/Twitter hashtag analytics. Track any hashtag or keyword in real-time to see how many people are using it or clicking on it.

You can also fetch historical Twitter hashtag data and analyze your competitors’ hashtags. You can sign up for a 5-day free trial, with paid plans starting at $49 per month

RiteTag

RiteTag Twitter analytics

Not sure which hashtags to use on X, formerly known as Twitter? RiteTag hashtag tracking tool conducts hashtag analysis on your behalf, making it a must-have tool for your Twitter strategy. Ritetag can come up with a branded hashtag and provide ongoing Twitter hashtag analytics and tracking. It can also suggest hashtags for text posts and images.

If you’re looking for free hashtag tracking tools, RiteTag isn’t it. But it does offer a low monthly price point and gives you access to other products in the RiteKit family.

Getting More from Twitter Analytics with Meltwater

Whether you’ve been Tweeting for years or are brand new to Twitter, there’s always room for improvement. Learning how to use analytics for Twitter is a great place to start because it gives you no-nonsense insight into your performance.

Adding Meltwater to your social media strategy brings those analytics into context, allowing you to do more with your findings. It’s not just about seeing those surface-level numbers, but also about learning how you can make those numbers work for you.

Learn more when you request a demo using the form below!

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