The importance, benefits, and best practices of social media monitoring

Social media listening, or social media monitoring, is the ongoing process of tracking, analyzing, and responding to conversations happening on social media channels about your brand, yourself, or your industry in general. Corporations, non-profits, law enforcement, and individuals leverage social media monitoring software to inform, react, proactively manage, discover, and, more recently, prevent and predict crime and terrorism. What even are social media monitoring tools, and why use them?

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Social media monitoring – definition and overview

Social media monitoring, or social media listening, is the process of collecting and analyzing data from social media platforms to gauge trends, customer sentiment, and overall discussions happening online. Monitor social media for more than brand mentions. It includes advice on competitor tactics, measuring campaign performance, and even monitoring cybersecurity threats likely found on social media, in addition to managing online reputation overall.

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The importance of social media monitoring?

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1. Increasing brand loyalty and safeguarding your reputation.

By monitoring social media, brands can track mentions and directly communicate with customers, responding quickly to negative feedback and maintaining a positive online image.

2. Crisis management

Social media conversations can escalate into an all-out PR crisis. Through social listening, businesses can detect potential threats early and mitigate damage.

3. Customers are engaged

By doing so, companies are better able to connect with their customers, making them feel like the brand knows them and cares about their needs, resulting in increased loyalty and brand trust.

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5. National cybersecurity social media

From phishing attacks to horrific scams to rampant misinformation that impacts civic discourse, these organizations are incredibly vulnerable to cyber threats. They are able to detect these threats through monitoring and protect themselves from cybercriminals.

5. Competitive analysis

Observing competitors’ social media activities reveals valuable insights that inform business strategies. That’s where social media analytics tools help track competitor mentions, content trends, audience reactions, and shifts in messaging, enabling businesses to benchmark performance and adapt their positioning accordingly.

6. Legal protection and compliance

Smart monitoring helps companies keep up with the regulatory compliance that’s increasingly required to avoid leaks of sensitive consumer data and the lawsuits they may invite.

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Social media monitoring benefits: Take social media monitoring to the next level.

Moreover, social media platforms are treasure troves of data that can help monitor businesses to detect issues before they arise, provide real-time customer commentary, and find opportunities in the market. What benefits can businesses expect from a robust social media monitoring program?

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Reputation control

By responding to complaints or concerns raised in public forums, businesses can help mitigate negative sentiment and make positive outcomes from potentially millions of dollars lost in pissed-off customers, keeping customers happy, and turning haters into fans.

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Brand awareness and brand advocacy

Another fantastic benefit of social media monitoring is the ability to find opportunities to engage in conversations that you’re not directly mentioned in. By sharing this nuanced brand perspective, companies have an opportunity to earn brand awareness and encourage virality.

Customer experience survey

An unstructured customer feedback system gives companies real-time insight into where they are failing customers, which will help them to improve customer experience and product roadmap improvements.

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Competitive insight

Taking a look at competitors’ social media can uncover gaps in their presence, tune businesses into their competitors’ strengths and weaknesses, and allow companies to adjust strategies and fill holes to seize the opportunity.

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Lead generation

Social media listening can help expose new sales opportunities by discovering users who are actively seeking out a solution that a business provides, enabling companies to interact with them at the right time.

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Improve your relationship with customers.

Social media monitoring can provide insights into Voice of Customer (VoC) analytics, so businesses can more accurately align experiences with customer expectations.

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Best practices for monitoring social media

To really unlock the potential of social media monitoring, businesses need to adopt these best practices:

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1. Specify specific goals

Identify clear monitoring goals, such as understanding customers' needs, researching competitor behaviors, or spotting market trends. Once you’ve established these goals, simply having clear goals in place will give you a North Star of what you’re trying to accomplish, what your focus of efforts and resources are, and will give you the ability to choose the right metrics to measure.

2. Decide on the platforms you want to use

Monitor channels where your target audience is most active to ensure the greatest efficiency with your resources and the biggest wave.

3. Narrowing your focus 

Find the terms that are relevant to what you want to share. Chief among these, though, will be your master keyword list – targeting your brand name, lines of business, direct competitors, larger industry trends, and then finally what your customers are searching to learn more about. Stay tuned to this list to continue to keep pace with rapidly changing market conditions.

4. Monitor your brand mentions

Brand mentions monitoring is a treasure trove of brand perception intelligence that’s invaluable for sharpening your efforts to serve customers better, improving or innovating your products or services in reaction to negative feedback, or fueling positive perception, or aligning customer perception with reality.

5. Engage your followers in conversation

Getting involved in your community in an active and authentic manner creates a foundation of support and long-term loyalty. No matter what kind of feedback you receive, respond quickly to show that you're engaged, responsive, and appreciative.

6. Take inspiration from opponents

Competitor research by analyzing competitors’ social media activities not only helps you see what’s working, identify open space within the market, and avoids errors that many are making.

7. Dive into market dynamics

Stay up-to-date with your industry's trends, consumer tastes, and market evolution by tracking market trends. Make sure your plan is developed in the right context and keeps you relevant and competitive.

8. Utilize social media listening software

Native social analytics on social platforms are limited to fundamental insights. Using specialized social media monitoring tools, you can analyze social media traffic and build customized reports, allowing you to use your social monitoring efforts more efficiently and effectively.

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Conclusion

Social media monitoring now stands as an essential practice for brands, businesses, organizations, and individuals who wish to maintain their relevance and visibility within the rapidly evolving social media landscape. Monitoring social media can protect brands from reputational threats, nurture customer loyalty, discover content opportunities, and maintain market leadership. Brands by use effective social media monitoring tools alongside best practices can secure relevant insights, which enable them to utilize their recent successes for continuous business advancement.