In today’s world, building your online brand reputation is just as important as developing your offline reputation. Online reviews, social media, and customer experience are just a few of the factors that can influence the presentation of your brand online.
So, how do you leverage these factors to find valuable insights? That’s where social listening comes in.
Social listening is the process of monitoring your brand’s social channels for mentions of your brand, products, its competitors, and any other relevant information that can provide real-time insights to your audience and industry.
Social listening provides an opportunity for your business to analyze and respond to those important conversations within your industry and can be crucial for better understanding what your audience thinks of your brand.
It’s no wonder that 66% of marketers say social listening has increased in value for their organization over the past twelve months, according to Hootsuite.
Therefore, this valuable tool that is a great way to stay involved with clients and be proactive about brand reputation. Now that we know what social listening is and why it is important, let’s discuss the top five practices you can implement to leverage this valuable tool in your marketing strategy.
Set Your Goals & Intentions
Having a clear strategy will help with targeting your social listening tools and minimize inefficiencies in your processes. Here are some great starter questions to help you think about your business’s goals on social media.
- What conversations or trends do you want to be a part of?
- Are you trying to create more relevant content for your audience?
- Do you want to increase engagement?
Analyze the Competition
Use social listening to see what other businesses in your industry are doing and identify any potential opportunities to help your organization reach its goals. This can include discovering new sales leads, potential partnerships, and products or services.
Engage Everywhere
Listening is active! Without it, your activities are just surveillance. Be sure to check-in everywhere your brand has a presence, especially social media. This will allow you to generate input directly from customers, who want to feel they are heard. Find out their pain points, what brand aspects they enjoy, and what they actually want to see from you.
Utilize The Whole Team
Your team has a unique blend of expertise and skills that allows your company to succeed. Having the whole team on deck will allow you to effectively address any challenges that may arise and increase the value gained through your social listening efforts.
Track Everything
Social listening is a great tool to help you track and measure your brand growth. Looking at how often your brand mentions occur with related keywords, buzzwords, competitor names, product information, and more will tell you so much about the quality of your business’s online growth.
Social listening has become the number one tactic for identifying new opportunities and improving the quality of brands across social media. Many online tools and software are available to help you build your social listening strategy. It’s all about finding the one that best suits your business.
However, while that can be a lot to sort through. Another great option is hiring a social media marketing company in Santa Rosa that is trained in providing custom solutions for improving your online brand presence. Get in touch with our team today to discuss your custom digital marketing solutions at (707) 843-3714.
