So far in this three-part series of posts about measuring the success of ad campaigns on Twitter, we’ve looked at the most important metrics you need to pay attention to and how to build an analytics framework.

In this third and final part, we’re going to look at the third-party tools you can use to complement Twitter’s own analytics data.

Analytical tools

The following services all offer free – or partly free – tools for analysing your Twitter account. Here’s how they breakdown according to their primary purpose:

Find influencers

Twtrland is the tool for analysing other users to discover their area of expertise, interests and level of influence – you can search by keyword and then filter the results by influence, location and (with paid-for accounts) skills. Twtrland is primarily used to help you find new people to connect with and offers the following information:

• Tweet analysis: including distribution, engagement per 100 Tweets, popular keywords.
• Follower analysis: broken down into top followers and followers per country.
• Links to similar people
• Free account limitations: only the first 50 results can be viewed, and the Skills filter isn’t available.

Analyse Twitter by topic or keyword

Foller.me is a general-purpose – and currently free – analytical tool that excels when it comes to getting metrics about conversations other people are having on Twitter. Just type in the username you wish to profile and click ‘Analyze’. You’ll see a progress bar appear – be patient as the account in analysed. Once complete, you’ll gain access to the following stats:

• Basic info: key account information, plus some basic stats including the number of times the user features in a list, plus their total number of Tweets, followers, following and a Followers ratio.
• Topics, hashtags and mentions: this is where Foller.me earns its corn, using a tag cloud to reveal popular topics of conversation, plus including regularly used hashtags and a summary of users who’ve interacted with that account (click a user profile to analyse that account next).
• Tweets analysis: a look at 100 Tweets for some potentially useful information, including the Twitter client usage of that user, their most linked domains and a breakdown of Tweets according to content and interactions.
• Attitude: a look at happy Tweets versus sad Tweets.
• Time: a breakdown of Tweets according to when they were sent, hour by hour.

Analyse Tweets by time

If you’re look for time-related stats, delivered in digestible-friendly graph form, then TweetStats is the tool to use, delivering useful info about any account you wish to profile – and all for free. Just type in the @username, click ‘Graph My Tweets!’ and wait.

Once the scan is complete, you’ll get the following useful info, split across three tabs: Tweet Stats, Tweet Cloud and Follower Stats (this one takes a little longer to process, so bookmark the URL and come back 24 hours later). For more detailed information about each stat, roll your mouse over one of the bars on each graph.

• Tweet frequency: view the total number of Tweets sent per month along with average daily and monthly counts.
• Tweet timings: discover the aggregate number of daily and hourly Tweets.
• Interactions: also covered are replies and Retweets from that user.
• Interface used: this handy chart reveals what platforms the user tends to Tweet from, giving you a glimpse into how they access Twitter.
• Tweet Cloud: two straightforward tag clouds covering that user’s keywords (including @usernames) and #hashtags.
• Follower Stats: track the user’s changes in follower and following lists.

Monitor follower changes

Twittercounter offers some general-purpose stats across a range of plans, but is renowned in particular for providing stats about your follower growth over time. Available insights include:

• Follower changes: track changes in follower numbers and see how this has changed over time.
• Following statistics: compare the growth of followers to the number of people you’re following.
• Competitive comparisons: track both number of Tweets or follower changes in tandem with other users, including competitors.
• Predictive changes: Twittercounter will attempt to predict how your follower growth is likely to change over the next month. You can also set a milestone and receive email confirmation when it’s reached.
• Free account limitations: only basic stats are provided, and are infrequently updated. Upgraded plans can also monitor engagement, view unfollower lists and export stats, plus update hourly.

Analyse individual engagements

Tweetreach allows you to analyse the reach of your Tweets via reports. Enter your search term – web link, hashtag, @username or phrase – and it’ll analyse those Tweets that match your search, producing a report containing the following information:

• Estimate reach: the number of accounts the search term has reached.
• Exposure: actual Tweet impressions, divided up into a bar chart showing the number of Tweets sent by users with a certain number of followers.
• Activity: a breakdown of engagement for the search term over a set period, including number of Tweets, unique contributors and time period, plus how those Tweets were broken down according to Tweets, Retweets and replies.
• Top three contributors: according to exposure, Retweets and Mentions.
• Most Retweeted Tweets: the top three Retweets.
• Contributors: detailed breakdown of all contributors, including total number of impressions for each contributor.
• Tweets Timeline: a handy list of all Tweets included in the report.
• Free account limitations: up to 50 Tweets can be analysed per report. One-off purchases covering up to 1,500 recent Tweets can be purchased for $20, or various subscription packages (from $84/mo) are also available.

For major marketers

Simply Measured is a heavyweight when it comes to social media analysis, as reflected in its prices – $500/month for its basic Social account. This provides you with the following tools:

• Individual and multiple profile analysis
• Cross-channel analysis
• Competitive analysis and benchmarking
• Hashtag and keyword monitoring
• Customer service effectiveness
• Twitter audience analysis report: this requires a Pro account ($800/mo) and covers the last 10,000 followers.
• Free account limitations: you can access three free tools: Twitter Follower Analysis, Twitter Customer Service Analysis, and Vine

Analysis on a budget

Twitonomy offers a wide range of tools covering both your own and other accounts, including your competitors – and for just $20 a month you can gain access to its full gamut of tools. It’s simple to use: connect your Twitter account and then select the @username you’d like to analyse. Tools include:

• Comprehensive account overview: offering profile analytics, including comprehensive breakdown of your Tweeting over a set period. Also includes sections on followers and those you’re following, with one-click access to their profile metrics too.
• Followers report: get a handy, incisive look at your followers, including a breakdown of their interests, location and influence.
• Track mentions and replies: get an overview of useful stats, including most Retweeted mentions and influential users, plus visualise mentions on a map.
• List details: discover which lists you or a competitor are part of – a handy way of discovering Twitter followers and influencers.
• Download and archive: you can download your Tweets and print them for offline analysis.
• Hashtag analysis: find out what your competitors and other users are favouring with a hashtag search – also available for keywords.
• Add modules: put key stats you wish to track directly on your dashboard.
• Free account limitations: access to Search analytics for @username, #hashtag or keyword restricted. Premium accounts gain additional features such as downloading Tweets, plus get more insights and detail for all available sections: Profile, Mentions & RTs, Followers, Followings and Lists.

Explore your community

SocialBro is well regarded among marketers as offering a wide range of effective marketing tools for business. It can be used to track both individual campaigns and access more general metrics about your account and your followers. Some of its best tools include:

• Real-time Analytics: find out who’s been Tweeting in the past 10 minutes, updated in real-time. This helps you determine when people are at their most active, helping you determine the most effective times to Tweet.
• Account insights: all kinds of useful information about your account, including number of people you’ve followed who aren’t following you back (and vice versa), time zone of your followers and how frequently they go online.
• Free account limitations: access up to 5,000 social contacts in total, and plug in two accounts. ‘Best time to Tweet’ reports limited to top 100 followers. Limited community insights, follow/unfollow management included, but only limited list management tools. Advanced tools, including Tweet analytics and Twitter DM campaigns are restricted to paid-for plans only, with prices starting from $13.95/mo (our recommended package would be the Pro one at $39/mo).

Manage multiple accounts

SumAll lets you bring together all your social media accounts under one convenient roof. Its Twitter tools allow you to analyse your Twitter account as well as plug in search terms (such as #hashtags).

One of its best features is its graphing, which lets you compare multiple metrics from your personal timeline to see how they affect each other. You’ll also find a handy search tool lets you search for Tweets, Tweet reach and Retweets based on keywords.

Monitor click-throughs

There are a number of tools that can monitor click-throughs to your website from individual Tweets. Twitter has its own built-in stats, but also consider Bit.ly and Buffer. Buffer in particular can report the following useful stats:

• Total clicks: the number of actual clicks on the web link in question.
• Potential reach: the number of users who the link could have been seen by.
• Retweets, Mentions and Favourites: the number of interactions with the Tweet, including a list of people who engaged through Retweeting or Favouriting the Tweet.