Are You Engaged Yet?

Are digital platforms using the best tools for success?

Some time ago a colleague and I were discussing, with some exasperation, a particular instance of user feedback we had received from a review of a platform we were both working for. 

It was the perfect user case for a community platform: the user had found and established a series of meaningful connections through the platform, and the group, the ‘community’ which formed had been meeting regularly ever since.

Why the exasperation? With all the solutions and methods for collecting, analysing and communicating user data within the platform, we had a total of zero metrics that could track this user story. 

Of course, this frustration was only held at a professional level. We are contracted to not only make these user stories occur as frequently and successfully as possible as managers of a digital community platform, but communicate these successes effectively to those who fund the project.

At a human level, we were of course very pleased. The platform we manage had provided an individual with a positive experience. This is exactly why we are in this line of work.

The sense of irony, however, remained. This platform is a community platform, but we are unable to track the success of the community. 

Why is this?

Because what we are tracking through analytics is ‘engagement’. And as it turns out, for a platform whose mission puts the actual users first in its priorities for success, the commonly used metrics for engagement reveal very little about meaningful user experience.

What is Engagement?

What do you ‘do’ on a digital platform? There is a lot of jargon surrounding the ‘value’ you may get from a digital platform, and the different ways they can be used. 

But I mean the real mechanics, the actual ‘doing’ bit. What do you do?

Personally, I scroll. Sometimes I might ‘like’, ‘friend’ or ‘follow’. Hell, let’s throw in a comment. Once or twice a year, maybe I’ll make an event for a birthday or New Year’s.

Chances are, this is what you do too. In fact, I know this is what you do. How? Because what else can you do?

Ok, yes, there’s messaging. Maybe you manage a group or ‘community’ page of some kind. But ninety-plus percent of the time, this is what we all do on digital platforms. 

These actions, these functions, are the tools of ‘engagement’. Easily quantifiable, they are best suited to metrics that reveal user ‘growth’, i.e more users regularly visiting the platform, and what causes a user to ‘react’ in some way, which invariably is something they care about.

What’s the Problem?

Name five digital platforms that don’t have the above features ingrained in their design. Okay, maybe five is too many. Three? One?

Don’t worry, I couldn’t either. 

All digital platforms are inspired by the major social networks. And why wouldn’t they be? These platforms are incredibly successful, used daily by billions of people. It would only make sense.

But these platforms aren’t built for the average ‘user’. They are businesses which sell data to advertisers.

What metrics suit a business that sells data to advertisers? There are two in particular:

• How much data have you got? And will there be more in the future?

• Is this data useful for advertising? Can I identify specific demographics and market segments? Can I identify what they want and care about?

It is for these metrics specifically that the ‘react’ button, the comment, and the endless amount of scrollable material was created. 

For Facebook, this is great! They tick the boxes of these metrics absolutely. As does Twitter, LinkedIn, Google, TikTok, you name it. 

But for the platforms that are focused on the users themselves benefiting from the platform, building a space that doesn’t demand their attention but offers meaningful interaction, it seems to me a shame that we can’t be a little more imaginative in what a digital space for this purpose could look like.

The truth is, it is incredibly difficult to measure human social interaction. But if there is one lesson I have learned in my experience with digital platforms, it is that the ‘success’ of a platform as defined by its growth of regular and longer use by more people is not synonymous with the ‘success’ of an individual’s or community’s lived social experience. 

Should those who fund digital platforms begin to recognise this distinction, we may be able to start to imagine platforms, and metrics of success for them, that truly benefit those who use them.