Businesses can benefit from social media listening in many different ways. Social media is usually a great source of consumer information but can sometimes impact your business negatively. This can be true in instances when customers criticize your services or products. Any business needs to build a solid following and reputation on social media. Unfortunately, things are not always plain to see, and that’s where social listening comes in. The last thing any company wants is to become popular for all the wrong reasons like scandals, bad customer service, and all other reasons that may result in negative social media mentions.
Table of Contents
Applications of Social Media Listening
1. Improving on Products
Through feedback posted on social media by consumers, you can determine the shortcomings of your services or products. You can also tell the strengths of your company by listening to the social media conversation that is related to your business or products. By using social media listening software such as NetBaseQuid, you can constructively use these conversations to guide future product enhancements or even new product developments.
2. Improving Customer Service
Social listening has been popularly used to improve on the customer service offered by brands. Nowadays, social media has become the place where we all go to rant about poor services and give praise to companies offering great customer services. Consumers find it easier to post their reviews on their experiences with a company’s customer service on social platforms than call the call center agents to address their concerns.
4. Generation of Sales Leads
Apart from helping you serve your current customers better, social listening can also go a long way in helping you discover new ones. By tracking several types of keywords such as brand name, products, industry terms that relate to your product and specific product features, you can develop leads on potential customers who have an interest in the kind of products you offer. Consumers generally tend to ask for online recommendations before making purchases.
4. Protecting Brand Reputation
Social media platforms harbor vast amounts of fake news. A brand can easily fall victim to these numerous fake news mongers. However, with social listening, you can protect your brand reputation by responding quickly to any fake news about your brand. As a business, you can prevent a brand reputation crisis by offering fast responses to fake comments or reviews about your products.
Social Media Listening Vs. Social Media Monitoring
The two terms represent two entirely different strategies despite them being often used interchangeably. As the name suggests, social media monitoring involves tracking and responding to brand mentions on social media. It encompasses following conversations on social media that relate to your business or products. To better understand your product’s position on the market, it is important to follow what consumers have to say about it attentively. Social monitoring differs from social listening because the latter goes further to analyze the information obtained from tracking online conversations. The difference between the two isn’t just semantic.
Unlike social monitoring, social listening is proactive. Social media monitoring is usually termed as reactive because it is the consumers who make the first move of giving their opinion about a product. The brand then swoops in to address the concerns. On the other hand, social listening develops the data collected from social media conversations into glean insights that can be used to develop long-term strategies.
About NetBaseQuid
NetBaseQuid is an essential software package designed specifically for market researchers, brand and product managers, and advertisers. It offers a range of tools that can be used to establish what consumers are saying about a brand. Through NetBaseQuid, businesses use social media tools to leverage on brand marketing and promotion.
