How to measure engagement in Twitter: advancing a metric

Purpose As social media are essentially different from traditional media, due to their social networking structures and egalitarian nature, conventional media metrics are not appropriate. Social media networks have nevertheless become another communications channel that companies use to achieve their marketing goals. Even though the measurement of marketing constructs in social media is elusive, a comprehensive means of measuring engagement is proposed for a successful social media site: Twitter. The paper aims to discuss this issue. Design/methodology/approach A measurement for customer engagement based on conceptual reflections is presented in the context of Twitter. Findings A new environment fostered by internet obliges companies to manage social media accounts and to assess engagement with company brands. To do so, companies need to analyze engagement trends by means of a metric, helping them to design an appropriate engagement strategy. The proposed metric provides much needed insight for companies to fine-tune their engagement strategy. Moreover, a means of calculating engagement from the parameters that Twitter makes available to the public is also proposed. Research limitations/implications The metric for engagement in Twitter that is proposed in this paper will be the starting point for future improvements through a conceptual and empirical discussion on this issue. Originality/value This is the first proposal specifically designed for Twitter, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, for measuring engagement.