Ditch Vanity: The 4 Social Metrics That Predict Revenue

TL;DR

Likes are applause from strangers. They feel good, but they rarely move money.
The marketers who win in 2025 don’t chase reach—they chase signals that predict behavior.

Avinash Kaushik’s four social metrics still run circles around every vanity dashboard:

• Conversation — Did people talk back?
• Amplification — Did they share it forward?
• Applause — Did they endorse the idea?
• Economic value — Did it drive quantifiable action?

Use these four metrics to replace social media guesswork with business math.
Social becomes strategic when we measure behavior, not vibes.

Why this matters now

Brands still brag about impressions like it’s 2014.
Meanwhile, platforms have completely changed:

• Algorithms reward behaviors, not audiences
• Discovery ≠ influence
• Views ≠ intent
• Likes ≠ trust
• And reach? Often accidental

BCG and Think with Google both show that engagement quality, not quantity, is what predicts downstream conversion.
But most dashboards still show:

• Likes
• Follows
• Reach
• Video views

None of which tell you anything about revenue.

Avinash Kaushik’s framework solves that by shifting the focus from “people saw it” to “people acted because of it.”
It’s the difference between attention and persuasion.

The marketers who adopt this framework build predictive journeys, not highlight reels.

What to do this month

• [ ] Replace your social dashboard with the 4-metrics model.
  Create a simple reporting sheet with four columns:

  • Conversation rate
  • Amplification rate
  • Applause rate
  • Economic value
    If a piece of content scores low across all four, retire it—don’t force it.

• [ ] Rewrite briefs to target a specific behavior.
  Not “drive engagement.”
  Instead:

  • “Drive conversation around X skepticism”
  • “Increase saves/shares for comparison content”
  • “Get people to click the longer explainer”

• [ ] Treat shares as currency.
  Shares = trust + relevance + usefulness.
  A single share is worth more than 100 likes. Optimize for shareability, not ego metrics.

• [ ] Use creators to lift ‘economic value.’
  Creator content often drives higher lower-funnel actions because it feels human.
  Add UTMs, landing pages, and tagged links to measure their real contribution.

• [ ] Kill content that gets attention but no action.
  Attention without influence is entertainment.
  Influence without attention is invisible.
  You need both.

Evidence & caveats

Research consistently shows:

• Shares correlate strongly with downstream intent
• Saves predict future action
• Comments indicate belief, doubt, or desire
• Clicks correlated with evaluation behavior
• And combined uplift often outperforms traditional engagement KPIs

BCG warns that metrics like views lead to overspending on low-influence content.
Think with Google shows that “micro-actions” (like saves or replays) predict conversion better than impressions.

Kaushik’s model simplifies this complexity into four human-behavior buckets.

The caveat:
Some categories don’t generate conversation naturally (insurance, B2B infra).
For those, benchmark internally and treat lifts directionally—not emotionally.

FAQs & objections

“But my boss wants reach.”
Give them both.
Report reach as distribution, then report the 4 metrics as effectiveness.
Reach without influence is noise.

“What if my industry gets low comments?”
Then optimize for amplification or applause.
Not all behaviors fit all categories, but one of the four will reveal momentum.

“Do we stop tracking likes?”
Likes are fine—but they are seasoning, not the meal.
They signal approval, not action.

“How do I measure economic value on organic?”
Tag everything.
Even simple UTMs or link stickers can show the downstream story.

“Can AI help here?”
Absolutely. AI can classify comments, cluster themes, score sentiment, and surface patterns.
But humans must interpret what the patterns mean.

The bigger picture

The social landscape is louder than ever. Creativity alone can’t save you, and reach alone can’t grow you.
But behavior?
Behavior always tells the truth.

Conversation shows curiosity.
Amplification shows relevance.
Applause shows resonance.
Economic value shows impact.

Measure these and you stop playing the algorithm’s game—you start playing the business game.
Because brands don’t grow by being seen.
They grow by being believed, shared, and acted upon.