Welcome to the next issue of Marketing Playground.
This month, let’s talk about social media and how to use it and relevant technology to your advantage.
By now, you know how important it is to have a strong and consistent online presence, including presence on a variety of social media platforms. These are important communications channels brands can use to reach potential customers and express their brand voice. But don’t forget, people also use social media to express themselves.
In this issue of Marketing Playground, we’ll examine how social media posts can alert businesses to customer issues that need attention, express overall customer sentiment about a brand or product, and inform ongoing company strategy and what the most innovative companies in the world are doing to aid them in this area. Before we dive in, it’s important to understand the difference between social monitoring and social listening.
- Social media monitoring: watching social media channels specifically for messages directly related to your brand or products and responding to those messages as appropriate.
- Social media listening: improving campaign strategy by assessing the full spectrum of conversation around your industry, your brand, or any topics relevant to your brand.
Almost two-thirds of marketers agree that, in the last year, social listening has become more valuable to businesses. (Hootsuite)
Benefits of social monitoring and listening
Both of these processes should be ongoing efforts. Social monitoring helps your brand engage with customers in real-time. An average of 54% of people between the ages of 18 and 54 have a more favorable view of brands if they respond to comments on social media. (Microsoft) A more engaged brand is also likely to have more engaged customers.
Social listening, on the other hand, can help inform your larger brand strategy. It can provide insights on public sentiment about:
· Your brand
· Competing brands
· Your products or competing products
· Recent company decisions
· Current events and trending topics
Proactive social listening allows you to act in a crisis with minimal delays. Sudden spikes in social media activity or decreases in public sentiment should be triggers for your public relations team to find the source and address it.
Social listening does not have to be limited to customers or potential customers; employees use social media, too. Employee social media can influence your company culture by revealing your employees’ values, needs, and potentially attitudes about any company decisions.
A recent survey showed that social listening provides trustworthy information to marketers. In fact, 89% of respondents rate the quality of the data they have access to from social listening as high or very high. (Social Intelligence Lab)
Weighing the pros and the cons
When working in a customer- or client-service business, you learn very quickly that people go online to talk about your brand when they are either very happy or very unhappy. You’re unlikely to find a variety of lukewarm opinions on social media. The majority of posts you’re likely to capture will either be raves or roasts. And it is through these that you can learn the most important factors in any business strategy: what you’re doing right, and what needs your immediate attention.
At C&A Digital, we leverage the most sophisticated technology available today to monitor social media and online activity for our clients. It monitors keywords real-time and identifies changes, spikes, negative activity, etc. It can also be used to monitor the competitive set for our client brands. These days, brands have to protect themselves and be aware of how innovation can help protect their brand and organization. Get in touch to learn more.
Until next time, thanks for coming to play.
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