An effective social media marketing strategy involves much more than just marketing. To be a truly social business it is important to listen carefully as well. By learning how to use social media listening to understand customers needs, businesses can find out a lot about their market and even improve their customer service.
Listening to learn
One of the primary reasons brands should be using social media listening (also know as: social listening and social media monitoring) is to learn what people are saying about the brand online. People are talking about your brand on social media and in blogs whether you are listening or not. By taking simple steps such as setting up Google alerts or monitoring hashtags and mentions, businesses can get a broad overview of what’s being said.
Meeting the market
Understanding the behavior and desires of your clients and prospects will help ensure that your offering is in line market expectations. Through careful social media listening businesses can even identify gaps in the market and develop new products and services accordingly.
Customer service
Customers now expect social media customer service. By monitoring brand and product mentions in social media businesses can improve customer service, address any concerns and be available and present when the customers are ready to do business.
Some free tools
There are more social media listening tools out there than you can poke a stick at. Here are some popular free tools to help understand what’s being said out there:
Social Mention ~ This is one of the most powerful and helpful free social listening tools around.
HootSuite ~ Great for tapping into relevant conversations and keeping track of hashtags across multiple social platforms.
RiteTag ~ Now integrated with Twitter RiteTag is a great way to analyze hashtag use and measure results.
Omgili ~ Use this tool to search forums, blogs, discussions and message boards about any topic or brand.
Google Alerts ~ Get brand, industry and even product mentions emailed to your inbox daily.
If you make listening & observation your occupation you will gain much more than you can by talk. ~ Robert Baden-Powell #quote
— Matt Crawford (@SocialStratMatt) March 5, 2014
Conclusion
Too many businesses are focused on using social media to promote what’s important to them. Social media also presents an amazing opportunity to get in touch with what customers actually need and want. Understanding how to use social media listening is crucial for developing trust and building relationships. Want some ideas about how to use social media listening to connect with your customers? If so please CLICK HERE or leave a comment below or on the Facebook page. Please be social and share this post to help your friends, followers and circles listen carefully to what their customers have to say on social media. Thanks for reading and sharing. See you back here next week.
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Image credit [Ky Olsen]
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