Engagements dropped in 2024

Saw a lot of softening, but looking at competitive insights and profile benchmarks for eng. rate made me breathe a little easier. Metrics changed in meta and IG’s algorithm put a bitter focus on content getting shared. Lump those factors in with video being a higher priority and more content being sent by the minute, it’s not surprising. We don’t have to like it, but I’m focused on educating with perspective to help my execs not come to the wrong conclusions when looking at the data.

I’m seeing the same in my university’s numbers. I knew 2023 was exceptional (we had an average 8% engagement rate across all major platforms) — with FB exceeding all expectations. 2024 is looking to be half that number. Facebook and Insta engagement both dropped off, Facebook in particular. 

We saw this on our team. If you look at the breakout of channel summaries (individually), you’ll probably see “uncategorized engagements” which were largely discontinued in September 2024. So, between September and December 31st, your engagement totals did NOT include many that were tracked in 2023. Look at that total (uncategorized) for 2024 and compare to 2023. You should have another “aha” moment. 

As a side note, we saw both paid and organic engagements INCREASE for the same page while showing “less” engagements in the profile’s summary (when displaying all channels together). We noted this in our reporting with clients.  

We have had a similar surprising decline for our nonprofit; our 2023 wasn’t bad, but 2024 was rough. A 90% link click drop, 85% engagement decline, and 46% impressions decline. And we didn’t dramatically shift our strategy or anything. 

I’d been thinking it’s because our audience is leaving Meta, but then we had a great Q1 in 2025 with tons of link clicks, but no engagement. Honestly not really trusting the data, it seems odd.