Facebook provides page owners and administrators with detailed analytics and insights into how users are engaging with their Facebook pages. One of the key metrics available is watch time, which shows how long viewers are watching videos posted to your Facebook page.
What is Facebook watch time?
Facebook watch time refers to the total amount of time people have spent watching videos that have been posted to your Facebook page. It includes both live and recorded videos. Watch time is measured in minutes or hours. A longer watch time indicates that viewers are more engaged with your video content.
Facebook calculates watch time by tracking how long each individual viewer watches your videos. It then aggregates this data to determine your total watch time across all videos on your page over a given time period. Higher watch time signals that you are posting content that resonates with your audience and keeps them interested. It is a key metric that Facebook uses in determining how widely to distribute your video content.
Why is Facebook watch time important?
There are a few key reasons why Facebook watch time should be an important metric for page owners and admins to track:
- It indicates how engaging your video content is. Higher watch times mean you are creating content that resonates with viewers and keeps them watching.
- Facebook favors pages with higher watch times in its News Feed algorithm. Pages with more engaging video content get shown to more people.
- Longer watch times allow you to insert more mid-roll ads into videos, increasing monetization.
- High watch time translates to more impressions and reach for your videos, helping grow your audience.
- YouTube also looks at Facebook watch time metrics when recommending videos to users who have connected their accounts.
In summary, optimizing for greater Facebook watch time can help increase your reach on both Facebook and YouTube, earn you more money through mid-roll ads, and build a larger, more engaged audience over time.
How can I view my Facebook page’s watch time metrics?
To view your Facebook page’s watch time metrics, you need access to Facebook Insights. Insights provides detailed analytics on your page’s content and audience. Here are the steps to access watch time data:
- Go to your Facebook page and click on “Insights” in the top menu.
- In the left sidebar, click on “Videos”.
- At the top, change the time range to the period you want to analyze.
- Scroll down to the “Video Views” section. Here you’ll see total watch time for the selected period.
- You can toggle between viewing total watch time or average watch time per video.
- Click on individual videos to see watch time for each one.
In the Insights video dashboard, you can also filter by video type (live or recorded), examine traffic sources for views, see demographic data on viewers, and more. Diving into these metrics can provide valuable insights to optimize your video strategy.
Tips for increasing Facebook watch time
Here are some tips to help boost watch time for your Facebook videos:
- Hook viewers right away – Start videos with strong opening hooks showing previews of exciting content to come.
- Keep videos concise – Ideal length is 1-3 minutes. Stretching videos risks losing audience interest.
- Add captions – Captions make videos accessible and increase watch time by keeping viewers’ attention.
- Include power graphics – Text overlays, animations and other graphics add high visual interest.
- Leverage data – Study your audience demographics and viewing habits to create tailored content.
- Promote your videos – Share videos across social channels, run ads and encourage viewers to share.
- Analyze competition – See what video types and lengths perform best for similar pages.
Using watch time data to optimize video strategy
Regularly monitoring your Facebook video watch time metrics in Insights provides key data to evaluate and optimize your video strategy. Here are some ways to act on these learnings:
- Identify your best performing video types and lengths based on higher watch times.
- Double down on video content styles that resonate most with your audience.
- Experiment with new video formats and subjects to find additional high-interest areas.
- Look for certain demographics that engage more with videos to tailor content.
- Analyze traffic sources to see which promotion channels drive the most views.
- Find ideal video ad length by comparing performance of different durations.
- Set watch time goals to motivate continual optimization and improvement.
Optimizing based on watch time data will keep your audience more engaged, improving all your video metrics over time. So be sure to monitor these analytics regularly and act on the insights.
Watch time metrics for Facebook Live videos
For Facebook Live videos, watch time metrics work a bit differently than for recorded videos:
- Watch time is calculated only for the live broadcast, not for subsequent views of the archived video.
- The metric shown is Peak Concurrent Viewers – the maximum number of people watching simultaneously during the live stream.
- This metric gives insight into the reach and engagement of your live video in real time.
To increase peak concurrent viewership for Facebook Live videos, go live consistently, promote heavily leading up to scheduled streams, engage viewers in real time, and leverage high-interest topics your audience cares about.
Using Facebook’s Creator Studio for additional watch time insights
In addition to Facebook Insights, page owners can connect their account to Facebook Creator Studio for even more detailed analytics on their video performance. Creator Studio provides data including:
- Average percentage of each video watched
- Heat maps showing most rewatched segments of videos
- Viewing device types and operating systems
- Demographics including age, gender and location
- Traffic sources and shares
- Comments and reactions
Creator Studio connects directly to your Facebook account to pull in-depth analytics you won’t find in standard Insights. The platform provides robust data to fine-tune your video strategy for maximum watch time and engagement.
Using watch time data to identify underperforming videos
Watch time statistics can also help you identify videos that are underperforming so you can optimize future content:
- Look for videos with below-average watch time for your page. This signals less engaging content.
- Check if certain video styles or topics always have poor watch time. Consider changing approaches.
- Compare videos with your highest watch times to see what is resonating.
- For Live videos, look for consistently low peak concurrent viewership as a red flag.
- Keep testing new topics and formats to replace underperforming content types.
Regularly checking for videos with low watch times compared to your averages will highlight areas for adjustment in your content creation and promotion strategies.
Using benchmarks to evaluate Facebook watch time
It can be useful to compare your Facebook watch time metrics to published industry benchmarks. This gives you context on whether your numbers are hitting certain standards or need improvement. Some benchmarks for Facebook watch time include:
- Videos under 60 seconds should have over 50% average watch time.
- 1-2 minute videos should have over 60% average watch time.
- 3-10 minute videos should have over 70% average watch time.
- Pages with over 100,000 followers should aim for at least 100 hours of total watch time per month.
Check your watch time data against benchmarks like these to evaluate the engagement and quality of your video content compared to wider industry standards.
Tools for tracking and managing Facebook watch time
While Insights provides Facebook’s official watch time statistics, third-party social media management tools can also help track and benchmark your metrics. Some popular options include:
- Hootsuite – Social media management platform with Insights integration.
- Sprout Social – Tracks watch time and surfaces optimization opportunities.
- Simply Measured – Analytics suite with watch time reports and comparative benchmarking. Now part of Sprout.
- Rival IQ – Tracks watch time and other in-depth video analytics.
- Socialbakers – Marketing suite includes watch time tracking and competitive benchmarking.
- Quintly – All-in-one platform with watch time optimization tools.
- Talkwalker – Social analytics with video and watch time metrics.
Third-party tools like these provide additional options for monitoring, comparing, and optimizing your video watch time performance beyond Facebook’s built-in analytics.
| Video type | Length | Watch time goal |
|---|---|---|
| Short-form video | Under 60 seconds | Over 50% average watch time |
| Long-form video | 3-10 minutes | Over 70% average watch time |
| Live stream video | Any duration | 100+ peak concurrent viewers |
This table summarizes benchmark watch time goals for different Facebook video types and lengths that you can reference to gauge your performance.
Conclusion
Facebook watch time is a critical metric reflecting how engaging your video content is for viewers. Monitoring total and average watch time in Insights, setting goals, optimizing to increase watch time, and comparing against benchmarks will help you create more captivating videos.
This will lead to greater reach, more motivated viewership and increased monetization from mid-roll ads. Regularly analyzing watch time data provides the insights needed to build an effective, audience-driven video strategy on Facebook.