--- title: "Do a social media audit" seoTitle: "Social Media Audit: How to Run One Step by Step" description: "Run a social media audit in an afternoon: inventory every account, read the numbers that matter, size up competitors, and turn it into a content plan." category: "guides" subcategory: "agency-growth" emoji: "🔍" order: 1 datePublished: "2026-08-23" dateUpdated: "2026-08-23" --- A social media audit is a structured look at every account a brand owns: what exists, what's working, what's inconsistent, and what to do next. Agencies run one at the start of every client engagement because it turns "we should post more" into specific, defensible recommendations, and it usually takes an afternoon rather than a week. ## How to run a social media audit Work through the steps in order and the audit builds itself into a report. ### 1. Inventory every account List every profile the brand has, including the forgotten ones. Check each network directly rather than trusting memory, because abandoned accounts with outdated branding turn up in almost every audit and they're the fastest wins on the list. ### 2. Check the profiles themselves Look at each profile as a stranger would: handle, bio, profile image, link, and pinned content. Consistency is the test, since a brand that's @brandname on Instagram and @brand_official_2019 on TikTok with different logos is leaking recognition at every touchpoint. ![A public Instagram profile viewed logged out, the way a stranger sees the handle, bio, link, and grid](/img/help/social-media-audit/instagram-profile-check.png){width="1940" height="1840" display="970"} ### 3. Read the numbers that matter Follower growth, reach, and engagement over the last 90 days tell you which platforms deserve the effort. Connect the accounts to a [social set](/help/social-sets-explained) and Pallyy's [analytics](/help/understanding-your-analytics) put follower growth, reach, impressions, and per-post performance in one place per network. ### 4. Find the posts that earned their place Sort recent posts by engagement and study the top ten. Format, topic, timing, and caption style usually share a pattern, and that pattern is the seed of the new content plan. The **Best time to post** heatmap adds when the audience is actually online. ![Pallyy's best time to post heatmap showing engagement by day and hour](/img/help/best-time-to-post/best-time-heatmap.png){width="1520" height="1000" display="760"} ### 5. Size up the competitors An account doing 2% engagement means nothing until you know the competitors do 1% or 4%. Add the brand's main rivals with [competitor tracking](/help/competitor-tracking) and compare followers, engagement, and posting frequency against real market numbers rather than gut feel. ### 6. Turn findings into a report Write up what you found: the account inventory, the consistency fixes, the numbers per platform, the top-performing content patterns, and the competitor picture. For a client audit, a [custom report](/help/client-social-media-reports) exports the analytics side as a PDF to sit alongside your recommendations. ![A custom report's builder sidebar with the report period and Instagram widgets toggled on](/img/help/client-social-media-reports/report-builder.png){width="580" height="1840" display="290"} ### 7. End with a plan, not a diagnosis An audit that ends in observations gets filed; one that ends in a plan gets acted on. Translate the findings into posting frequency per platform, content formats to double down on, and [queue times](/help/queue-scheduling) matched to the heatmap. ## The audit checklist Run down this list per platform and you've covered the whole job: - Account exists, credentials known, and access is secured through roles rather than shared passwords - Handle, bio, profile image, and link are current and consistent with the other platforms - Follower growth over the last 90 days, and whether it's accelerating or stalling - Reach and engagement rate, compared against at least two competitors - Top ten posts by engagement, and what they have in common - Posting frequency, and how it maps to when the audience is online - Comments and DMs: answered, ignored, or answered too late - One recommendation per platform: grow it, maintain it, or retire it ## Download the audit template The whole structure above is ready to fill in as a PDF: account inventory, profile checks, platform scorecards, competitor comparison, and the 90 day plan. [Download the social media audit template](/downloads/social-media-audit-template.pdf) and reuse it for every brand you audit. ![The first page of the social media audit template, with the account inventory table and profile consistency checklist](/img/help/social-media-audit/audit-template-preview.png){width="1588" height="1010" display="700"} ## Frequently asked questions ### How often should you run a social media audit? Quarterly is the working rhythm for most brands, with a full audit at the start of any new client engagement. The quarterly pass is quick because the structure already exists; you're updating numbers and checking drift, not starting over. ### How long does a social media audit take? An afternoon for most brands, once the accounts are connected and the data is in one place. The first audit takes the longest because of the account inventory; every audit after that reuses it. ### What tools do you need for a social media audit? You need the analytics for each platform in one place, a way to compare against competitors, and somewhere to write it up. Pallyy covers the first two with per-network analytics and competitor tracking, and the report can be a document, a deck, or an exported PDF. ### Should the audit come before or after the proposal? Before, when you can get access. A proposal built on audit findings quotes the client's real numbers back at them, which is far more convincing than generic promises. Our [proposal guide](/help/social-media-proposal) covers that handoff.