Facebook Analytics Guide 2024: How To Analyze & Use Your FB Data

You still haven’t started using Facebook Analytics, have you? 

Could it be because you don’t understand it? Or perhaps you don’t know how to set it up in the first place.

Maybe you don’t see why you should be using another Facebook analytics tool. You have Facebook Insights anyway. 

We totally get it.

But, here’s the thing.

You’re missing out on the huge potential to make your ads more successful and reduce your ad spend, or even make what you’re currently spending bring you more value. 

The truth is, Facebook Analytics will completely change the way you do business.

While Facebook Insights does a fairly good job to help you understand the value of your Facebook Page, Facebook Analytics goes a step further to measure actions taken in the News Feed and how they affect actions on company websites, apps, and brick-and-mortar stores.

No more need for a handful of different analytics tools to monitor your Facebook Page, websites, and apps. Now you can access all that data on one dashboard. 

Still, feeling doubtful? We’ve prepared this guide to help you understand why you need Facebook Analytics in your life and how to master this powerful tool.

Read on. 

What is Facebook Analytics?

Facebook Analytics is the updated social media reporting tool that groups together all your Facebook pages, pixels, and apps to give you a complete picture of how users interact with these platforms over time. 

For instance, you can see how audiences on your Facebook page and Facebook pixel overlap or connect.

In other words, you get to see how your Facebook audiences interact with your website as well as how your website audiences interact with your Facebook Page. This is because Facebook Pixel is a core component of Facebook Analytics. 

Facebook Analytics makes it easy for marketers to track the results from organic and paid ads across multiple devices and sessions. It makes monitoring and reporting very easy, which means it can also come in handy while building a Facebook marketing campaign.. 

And here’s the best part; it’s FREE!

All you need is a Facebook page and pixel. 

Facebook Insights vs. Facebook Analytics

You’re probably already familiar with Facebook Insights which give you a report on your Facebook Page performance in terms of engagement and audience demographics. 

Facebook Insights and Facebook Analytics, though both analytics tools are completely different. 

Facebook Insights is just for your page and lives within your Facebook Page, whereas Analytics is mainly for paid ads and lives within your Facebook ad account. 

Facebook Analytics gathers micro-level data from your Facebook Page and Facebook Pixel to show you how someone interacts with your page and website over time. 

So for instance, you can see how many people commented on your Facebook post, viewed your landing page, and then made a purchase. 

Facebook Insights, on the other hand, relates to Facebook Page reach, post’s performance, and other micro-level statistics confined to your Facebook Page.

How to Use Facebook Analytics

For most marketers, the hardest part of using Analytics is setting it up. But worry not, we’ll take you step-by-step, and you’ll be a pro by the end of this guide. 

If you’re already using Business Manager, you’re already one step ahead. 

To get started, head over to your Business Manager account. Then navigate to the Analyse & Report Menu and select Insights:

Please note that for your Analytics dashboard to work, you need to install the Facebook Pixel. Facebook Pixel shows you who gets to your website by interacting with your Facebook content.

It allows you to see how your Facebook ads drive visitors to your website and what those visitors do when they get to your website. 

This information is important because it enables you to measure visitor engagement. 

You are also able to compare the number of leads you get versus the cost of the ads for that page, so you’re aware of how much it costs you to acquire a lead. It also grants you the ability to see what call-to-action buttons attract your visitors the most so you can use them more. 

The Pixel will also show you the shopping cart activity. Are people leaving items in their carts or completing the purchase process?

To find The Facebook Pixel, go to Ads Manager and click on “Pixels”. The installation process is simple, and Facebook walks you through each step required. 

Once you install the Pixel, give it time to run. Then, your dashboard will populate with your analytics data.

At the top of your dashboard, you’ll see the number of new users, unique users, and your retention rate ie. the percentage of people who return to your site. 

You can see the number of active users you’ve had in the last 24 hours and your best traffic sources under Growth Metrics.

Another important step after creating your Pixel is to customize your Event Source Group (ESG). This allows you to see analytics from all your assets (Pages, websites, and apps). 

To create your event source group, choose the option in the top right-hand corner:

Next, name your event source group and choose the apps, pixels, and pages you want to be included in your reports. Follow the setup as mentioned. Now, your dashboard will be all set up.

Using Your Dashboard

No matter how amazing your campaign is, you need to analyze your Facebook ad performance so that you’re fully aware of how it’s performing and what needs to be improved. 

Facebook Analytics is the holy grail of advertising on Facebook. The tool will present you with loads of data from your ads. 

To get the most out of Facebook Analytics, there are three main components that you must fully understand.

Let’s take a closer look.

1. Funnel Analysis

The first important insight available in the Facebook Analytics tool is Funnels. 

To see the Funnels dashboard,

• Click Funnels on the left side of the Facebook Analytics page.
• Then click on the ‘Create Funnel’ button.
• As you add a funnel step, a drop-down menu will give you options including conversations, messages sent, page views, post reactions, add to cart, etc. You can add all the options you think are relevant to you. 
• For the Funnels dashboard to work, you need to make sure your Facebook events are set up properly in Pixels. 

Add all the relevant events. 

Why are Funnels so important?

With this feature, you are able to track your users’ journey from the moment they first interact with your asset until they reach your desired end goal. 

For instance, you can track a user from the moment they like your business page, like a post, click on a link, visit your website, add an item to their cart and finally make a purchase. 

Let’s take an example to understand this better:

For this business, 36.9% of the people that commented on their Facebook page went on to view their website. 10.5% of these then purchased their product. So 3.9% of people that commented decided to buy from the site.

Reports from Funnels will help prove the value of engagement on your Facebook page because you’re able to tell if comments and likes on your Facebook page result in users going to your website and ultimately converting.

You can take advantage of what is working within your funnel. 

Say the more people view your Facebook Page, the more they purchase. You can then create an ad to purposefully increase your page views. 

On the other hand, if you have many people visiting your page, but very few of them are adding your product to their shopping cart, then something is missing.

You need to give them an incentive to add items to the cart such as discount codes, personalized product offers, etc. You’re also able to see at what point in the funnel are people dropping off. 

Are they not clicking on your links? Maybe you need a better call-to-action. 

Or perhaps they’re leaving immediately after landing on your website. If so, you may need to reassess your landing page content. If they drop off after they add the item to the cart, you can create a follow-up email sequence to find out why that’s the case.

2. Customer Lifetime Value Analysis

The second powerful report on Facebook Analytics is Customer Lifetime Value.

To set it up, select Lifetime Value from the left-hand menu, then decide whether to include All Users (anyone that interacted with you) or Paying Users (only those that made a purchase).

Why is Customer Lifetime Value important?

Facebook changed its system and now users see more content from friends and groups and less content from pages. This means that you need to use ads to get more people to see your content in their feeds. 

This has made the ad space very competitive and now costs more to acquire leads. 

Each lead needs to be of high value for you to get a high return on investment.  You want each customer you acquire to engage on the long-term with your brand. 

You also want to focus on warm leads and not just cold leads because warm leads are more likely to convert into customers. Most businesses tend to concentrate on new customers and forget existing customers.

A customer may have bought a product from you, but that doesn’t mean their journey ends there. They are still useful to your business. There are many ways to increase a customer’s lifetime value to your business.

By looking at reports generated by Customer Lifetime Value, you can see how much a customer is worth to you over the course of several months.

With this feature, you can see how Customer Lifetime Value corresponds to changes you make in targeted ads, promotions, and so on. Not everyone who sees your ad will become a customer immediately. 

Some people may want to interact with your brand several times before they make any purchase. Customer Lifetime Value allows you to see how a user’s value increases over time. 

With this data at hand, you’re able to tell which users to spend more ad money and effort on because they will bring more value to your business. 

3. Revenue

The third very important Facebook Analytics insight is Revenue. 

To set it up, choose a date range and then click on the Revenue option from the menu.

The revenue report is quite great for Facebook audience insights. You can see the number of people who make a purchase and their age and gender breakdown. 

This helps you understand the people who are making the most purchases, therefore, helping you to make your Facebook ads even more targeted. This way, you are able to make the most out of your ad spend. 

No dollars end up going to waste. 

Create Custom Dashboards

Facebook Analytics allows you to create a customized dashboard so that you can slice and dice your data in all sorts of ways and go as specific or in-depth as you want. 

For instance, you can create a dashboard that compares specific events, specific groups of users (by age, gender, lifestyle, interests, etc.), different segments of users, etc.

You can also segment your reports into custom time windows, such as days, weeks, or months. Custom dashboards allow you to create well-targeted marketing campaigns so that you can achieve your desired goals. 

To create custom dashboards, use the pin option in the top right-hand corner to pin a report and save it to a chosen dashboard.

Use Facebook Analytics Data to Inform Your Marketing Campaigns

Data is useless if you don’t use it. 

You will only get real value from Facebook Analytics if you use the data you generate to make informed decisions for your business. The beauty of data is that it shows you what is working and how to keep it working. It also shows you what is not working and how to turn it around. 

A Facebook ad campaign may not bring you the conversion success you were hoping for. With Analytics, you are able to tell why that’s the case and what you can do to improve the ad campaign. 

You can also use Analytics to retarget people who may not have been convinced to become customers the first time around. You can do so by addressing the issues that stopped them from becoming customers and then retargeting them with another campaign. 

You also get to see which assets are working the best for you. For instance, most people may be converting after messaging you on Facebook and getting a response. 

Then, you can maximize on this by using Messenger chatbots to automatically engage people who like your page. 

Data is a marketer’s gold mine and it can be the difference between a successful brand and an unsuccessful one.

That’s why clever marketers will use Facebook Analytics and other useful social media analytics tools such as Keyhole to monitor their campaigns.

Take time to explore and understand Facebook Analytics, examine your reports in detail and see your marketing campaigns reach heights you’ve never seen before! 

We’ve also taken the time to build out an infographic that you can quickly refer back to – if you ever need to quickly glance at information on Facebook Analytics, here it is:

Let Keyhole Empower Your Facebook Analytics

In case you don’t know, Keyhole is a real-time conversation tracker that provides social media, keyword, and hashtag analytics for Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other platforms. While Facebook insights only reveal metrics of your brand, Keyhole presents you with detailed analytics reports for any business page. 

• Track any public page
• Spy on your competitors and analyze their performance 
• Monitor Facebook hashtags and keywords
• Know how your audience feels with sentiment analysis
• Use personalized recommendations to grow engagement and follower count
• Create custom reports with vital metrics

The best part is the tool isn’t just limited to Facebook. You can also find profiles from top social media platforms and get detailed, actionable insights. Get started for free and scale your presence on social today!

Related Articles:

10 Facebook Metrics For Brands And Businesses To Prioritize [+ Tips To Grow Them!]

Stanley’s Social Media Strategy: Influencer-Driven Marketing Reinvention