At AMZG, we’ve seen it happen time and time again: a client comes in excited because their last post hit 50,000 impressions. Big numbers feel good. But after years of managing social media for brands that actually want to grow, we’ve learned to ask a different set of questions. Not just how many, but who, what kind, and so what.

Here’s how we think about social media metrics: the ones we obsess over, and the ones we refuse to celebrate without context.

The Numbers We Actually Care About

Saves

When someone saves your post, they’re telling the algorithm something important: this is worth coming back to. It’s a deliberate action that signals genuine value. On platforms like Instagram and TikTok, saves carry serious algorithmic weight and are one of the strongest indicators that your content is landing with the right people.

Learn how to create content worth saving and sharing here. 

Shares

Shares are your organic reach engine. When someone shares your content, they’re putting their personal reputation behind it. That’s word-of-mouth at scale. Key benefits:

• Extends your reach without spending more
• Brings in higher-quality followers
• New audiences arrive with a built-in endorsement from someone they already trust

Not sure where to start with building an audience worth sharing to? Our Social Strategy Guide walks you through defining your target audience and messaging from scratch.

Engagement Rate per Impression

Engagement rate per impression (total engagements divided by total impressions) tells you how compelling your content actually is to the people seeing it. Why it matters:

• Shows what percentage of viewers felt strongly enough to act
• Cuts through inflated impression counts to show real content performance
• Benchmarks accurately against industry standards and your own past content

Not sure what a good engagement rate looks like? We broke it down here. 

What We Don’t Celebrate Without Digging Deeper

Impressions

Impressions can look incredible on a report. But alone, they tell us almost nothing actionable. Before celebrating, we always ask:

• Is this the right audience? A post can hit 100,000 impressions and still be reaching people with zero interest in your product or in the wrong geography. 
• Are they doing anything? Visibility without action doesn’t move the needle. High views with no saves, shares, or clicks is flattering but empty. It’s also worth knowing that Instagram recently changed how it counts views.

We use impressions as a directional signal, not a success metric.

Raw Engagement Numbers

“This post got 2,000 likes!” sounds great until you see the account has 800,000 followers. That’s a 0.25% engagement rate, which is well below average. A few things to keep in mind:

• Engagement without the rate attached strips out all the context
• Not all engagement is equal: genuine comments and conversations outweigh emoji reactions or giveaway entries. And increasingly, the most meaningful engagement isn’t happening in the comments at all. 
• Chasing the number without understanding its composition leads brands to optimize for the wrong things

Targeting the right audience changes everything. See this first hand in how our targeted strategy led to a 370% increase in an email list for one of our clients! 

The Bottom Line

At AMZG, we build reporting around signals that actually predict growth: saves, shares, and engagement rate per impression. And there’s a reason we focus on saves and shares specifically — engagement is going private, and these are the metrics that still tell the full story. 

Big numbers feel good in a presentation. The right numbers help you make better decisions next week. That’s what we’re here for.

Want to know how your current social metrics stack up? Get in touch with the AMZG team.