Social Media Listening

As many experienced marketers know, the first step to any great marketing strategy is to know who your audience is and what they want! Unfortunately, it’s not always clear exactly how businesses can gather this information seamlessly and accurately. In a recent blog, we introduced four strategies that you can use to get to know your customers better. But to best prepare you to dive into the world of customer insights, we’re starting a new blog series about how you can get to know your unique audience! In each “Getting to Know Your Customers” article, we’ll take a more in-depth look at a strategy that you can use to learn about your current customers, your target audience, and how best to reach them. On today’s agenda, we’re diving into the fascinating topic of Social media listening.

What is Social Media Listening?

Social listening is the act of tapping into social media channels to observe what people are saying about your brand, your products, your industry, and your competitors. Social listening can be completed at varying levels of intensity. For example, you may wish to only track mentions of your brand, or you might also track hashtags, keywords, trending content, and so much more.

To learn about how to implement social listening strategies, check out these helpful articles from Hootsuite and Hubspot.

When is Social Media Listening Useful?

When it is done effectively, social media listening can provide a wealth of information about your audience, your brand perception, and your industry. It can help you to engage with your customers, identify opportunities for growth, and stay informed about the latest news and trends. In addition to helping you stay one step ahead of changing consumer preferences, social listening can help you to feel more connected to your customers: you will get to hone in on your target audience and learn more about them, and they will appreciate hearing from you when you participate in online conversations!

A Few Tips

1. Be patient

As you embark on your social listening journey, remember to be patient and remain open to adjustments that may improve the quality of the data you are receiving. Successful social media listening can require a lot of trial and error as you identify the right keywords, conversations, and channels to track that will yield the most valuable insights for your business.

2. Be careful of information overload.

The internet is an overwhelming source of information, and not all of it is useful. When tapping into social media resources, you can end up with way more data than you know what to do with, and it can be difficult to turn that into useful insights. It’s important to narrow down the topics, keywords, or areas you want to focus on to avoid becoming overwhelmed. There are also many online tools available to help you process information gathered from social media listening.

3. Remember the context.

One really great thing about social media listening is that by tracking online conversations that are already happening, there is little risk of exposure to certain biases. Consider, for example, if you had asked your customers to fill out a survey. It is common for some people to provide positive feedback on surveys, even if they don’t feel positive (or vice-versa). If you offer an incentive as a thank you for completing a survey (e.g. a $5 gift card or free promotional item), people may also choose to take the survey even if the questions are not applicable to them in order to receive a reward. The good thing about social listening is that you are simply tapping into conversations that people are already having about topics relevant to your business, so there is less concern that people might simply be ‘telling you what you want to hear’.

However, it’s important to remember that those who turn to social media to express their feelings about a product or a brand may not be representative of your entire audience. There is some concern that social listening sometimes identifies the loudest, most polarized opinions. After all, people who do not feel strongly about a product are much less likely to feel a need to take to social media and share their experiences. Take the things you hear with a grain of salt, and use your best judgment when examining online conversations.

How Can I Use Social Media Insights to Develop a Targeted Marketing Strategy?

Social media listening is a fascinating strategy for learning about your customers, and as the online world is constantly evolving, so, too, are the tools available for companies to tap into the wealth of insights that social media platforms provide. With the right strategy, social media listening can help you to identify who your target audience is and what their interests and pain points are. You will be able to understand exactly the best way to reach them with targeted marketing campaigns and promotional products tailored specifically for them. You’ll be able to stay on top of trends in your industry and track sentiment towards your brand and its competitors. If all of this sounds great to you, well, that’s because it is!

If you’re inspired to give social listening a try for yourself, good luck on your journey to turning social media posts into valuable insights! Make sure to check back soon for the next installment in our series on Getting to Know Your Customers.