Is your Instagram marketing strategy working? If you don’t know the answer, you need to look into one of the most important social media metrics: engagement rate.
However, this figure isn’t always on your analytics dashboard, and just knowing engagement rates is not enough to improve your content. You need to know what targets to hit with your Instagram posts.
To really win the Instagram game, you need to calculate your engagement rate properly and benchmark your performance against the industry–this tells you whether you’re getting ahead or falling behind.
In this article, I’ll talk about how to calculate your Instagram engagement rates, what a good or ideal engagement rate is, and how to find out your competitors’ engagement rates on Instagram, as well.
Hopefully, you take away insights that you can apply to your content plan right away. Let’s get started.
What is an Instagram engagement rate?
An engagement rate is a measure of how many of your followers interact with your content. Interactions on Instagram can be any of the following:
- Likes
- Comments
- Shares
- Saves
A high engagement rate also signals to users that your brand is trustworthy because people are responding to your content.
The following can be counted as engagement, too, but Instagram doesn’t group them under post interactions on your Instagram Insights page.
- Poll responses
- Direct messages
- Clicks on links
Take note that views are not in themselves an indicator of engagement. Engagement rates reflect how well your audience is responding to your posts, if they find it valuable or enjoyable.
Why should you care about your Instagram engagement rate?
Your engagement rate is a performance indicator of your Instagram marketing. The higherthe rate, the more your audience is connecting with your posts.
But an engagement rate is not just simply a barometer of content performance. High engagement rates have benefits for your brand.
- Have more visibility: When more followers interact with your posts, the algorithm is more likely to think that your posts should be viewed by more people. That makes your posts more likely to appear on a user’s Explore page.
- Gain more followers: As a result of the previous benefit, your posts will be shown to a larger and warmer audience. A larger audience leads to more people viewing your profile and checking your other posts or even following you.
- Enhance your reputation: A high engagement rate also signals to users that your brand is trustworthy because people are responding to your content. It’s a form of social proof because people take cues from other people. More comments and likes translate to more credibility.
How to compute your Instagram engagement rate
The basic way to compute your Instagram engagement rate per post is through the formula:
Engagement Rate by Followers = Total Interactions on a Post / Total Followers x 100
Then, after getting the individual engagement rates, get the sum of the engagement rates of all your posts. Then divide that figure by the total number of posts.
Average Engagement Rate = Total Engagement Rate by Post / Number of posts
Alternatively, you can replace Total Followers with Total Reach. Like so:
Engagement Rate by Reach = Total Interactions on a Post / Total Reach of the Post x 100
What is a good engagement rate on Instagram?
Instagram pages with 1000 or fewer followers have higher engagement rate requirement than accounts with 10,000 or 100,000 or a million followers.
That’s because as your total number of followers increases, your engagement rates will decrease–not every follower will be able to see, let alone interact, with your posts.
Also, smaller accounts, such as those of microinfluencers, tend to have more involved followers than medium-sized accounts.
Accounts with anywhere between zero to 5,000 followers will have an ideal engagement rate of ten to twenty percent.
Meanwhile, top brands on Instagram (whose follower counts run into the thousands or even millions) will have one percent as an ideal engagement rate.
Brands with 5,000 to 10,000 followers should aim for five to ten percent, while brands with 50,000 followers and below should aim for anywhere between three to five percent.
Engagement rate targets also vary by industry. According to a Hootsuite report, these are the ideal engagement rates per industry:
Consumer goods and retail
Instagram Reels: 2.1%
Instagram: 1.8%
Dining, hospitality, and tourism
Instagram: 1.9%
Instagram Reels: 1.7%
Finance
Instagram: 1.8%
Instagram Reels: 1%
Healthcare, pharma, and biotech
Instagram: 1.6%
Instagram Reels: 1.3%
Media and entertainment
Instagram Reels: 2%
Instagram: 2%
Overall (all industries)
Instagram: 2%
Instagram Reels: 1.9%
You also need to consider your competitors’ engagement rates to find the ideal engagement rate for you.
How to track your competitors’ engagement rates on Instagram
You can do the same formula mentioned above to determine your competitors’ engagement rates. However, there is a better way.
Use Panoramata to track your competitors’ Instagram engagement rates. It can track your competitors’ Instagram data in real time, which means you can always see the most accurate figures.
It computes their engagement rates for you automatically so all you have to do is check, compare, and benchmark your performance.
And you can even track competitors with multiple Instagram accounts and compare different competitors’ Instagram accounts against each other on one platform.
On top of those features, you can also monitor how your competitors’ engagement rates change over time, month over month.
You can also access your competitors’ Instagram content in one place and do the following for easy analysis:
- View the Instagram post or play the post (if it’s a video) on Panoramata
- See the engagement rate of each post
- View the number of likes and comments for each post
- Save (bookmark) a post to a list for future reference
- Sort an Instagram account’s posts by most likes or most comments
- Search for posts containing specific keywords (for example, Black Friday or buy one get one)
- Track follower growth
- Track posting frequency
And that’s only the tip of the iceberg. You can do even more on Panoramata and track more creatives and marketing strategies.
- Landing pages
- Social media ads
- Display and search ads
- Email newsletters
- Email automations or flows
- SMS
- Content calendars
- Tech stacks
- Products
- SEO
- Industry benchmarks
Tips for improving your Instagram engagement rate
Knowing your engagement rate is just the preliminary step. You also need to create a strategy using the information you now have. If you’re satisfied with your engagement rates, just keep doing what you’re doing and monitor those metrics regularly.
However, if your engagement rate needs a lift, try these tips:
- Create high-quality posts. This is the foundation of great engagement rates.
- Interact with your audience by replying to comments and story replies.
- Comment on other people’s posts.
- Spy on your competitors and see what posts are performing well for them, then replicate those posts.
- Post regular Instagram stories and don’t be afraid to add polls.
- Publish reels or short-form video content.
- Consider feedback from your audience and use it to improve.
- Experiment with different formats, styles, tones, and post times.
- Keep monitoring your competitors to observe changes in your industry and spot opportunities.
Boost Instagram engagement rates with competitor tracking
Remember that engagement reflects how well your audience connects with your content, making it a powerful indicator of your content's value and appeal.
By consistently calculating your engagement rate, and benchmarking against industry standards and competitors, you can enhance your visibility, gain more followers, and build a stronger brand reputation.
Start applying these insights and track your competitors today to transform your Instagram presence. Get started with Panoramata and sign up now for free.
Discover your competitive strengths and take advantage of opportunities with our free SWOT analysis template. If you’d like to learn more about Panoramata, book a demo with us or take it out for a spin by signing up here.
FAQs
What counts as engagement on Instagram?
Engagement includes likes, comments, shares, and saves on your posts, with other interactions like poll responses and direct messages also contributing to overall engagement.
Why is my Instagram engagement rate important for my brand?
A high engagement rate signals to Instagram's algorithm that your content is valuable, increasing its visibility, helping you gain more followers, and enhancing your brand's credibility.
How can I improve my Instagram engagement rate?
You can improve your engagement by creating high-quality content, actively interacting with your audience, experimenting with different post formats like Reels, and regularly analyzing competitor performance.
