Social Media Monitoring Tools

Social media is now a vast advertisement platform for many businesses. Therefore, it is vital to observe and analyze how your target audience expresses itself across social media. By analyzing your target audience like this, you can spot trends and quickly react to changing market conditions. Social media monitoring tools allow you to track and evaluate your brands’ social media image and keep track of your competitor’s social media presence. With countless new posts published, commented on, shared, or liked every minute, social media is a massive resource to market yourself or your business on. By learning about your target audience and competitors through social media, you can adapt your social media strategy to attain better results. We will discuss some of the best social media monitoring tools available for you to use to keep your social media strategy effective.

Social Media Platforms

Before we get into the social media management tools, let’s look at social media itself. What are social media platforms, and what platforms does social media management cover? Social media management covers the following platforms:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• YouTube
• Pinterest

Let’s start with the most popular social media platform of all time, Facebook.

Facebook

Facebook is the pioneer of today’s social media algorithm. It has started the rise in the usage of social media and made it famous throughout the world. Facebook is a huge social network with more than a billion daily active users. 

Facebook has a crucial history with social media management. Even though companies lately understood the power of social media, they started to make an appearance on Facebook first. As for Facebook accounts of major companies, answering the comments of the customers or people who are interested in their products were considered as something different. It is because major companies usually would not return to the complaints and feedback. However, doing so in social media accounts such as Facebook changed things, and they saw the potential in being active on Facebook. 

Facebook truly contributed to social media marketing. Facebook offers a wide variety of ads and content. It is possible to share photos, videos, texts as advertisements. One other good feature of Facebook is groups. They are one of the best feedback sources for companies. For example, the marketing department of a car brand may look for the groups of their models on Facebook and see how the owners are talking about it. In fact, some brands intervene in these groups. 

Nowadays, Facebook is losing its impression. The trend supports other social media platforms. However, Facebook, as a company, invests in most of these companies. One of them is today’s popular platform Instagram. 

Twitter

Twitter is a unique social media platform. Unlike any other, it focuses on the news and the statements of popular and important people. Twitter has around 330 million monthly active users. This number may not be high as other social media platforms, but Twitter holds a more serious image of being a social media platform. 

Many statements from leaders in the world are made on Twitter, and the platform has proved its significance regarding these statements. Twitter may not offer the same reach as Facebook; however, it provides you access to users that engage with brands daily. 

Like on other social platforms, brands took their place on Twitter as well. It is a great platform for making viral advertisements. If brands could catch the trend on Twitter and use it for their interests, they could be successful and become a trending topic themselves. 

Instagram

Perhaps today’s most popular platform is Instagram. With more than a billion monthly active users, Instagram is a huge social network. What is special about Instagram is its short but entertaining content. Of course, nowadays, it is possible to add longer content to Instagram. In 2018, Instagram introduced its new feature called IGTV. Here people can watch videos longer than a minute and add videos up to 60 minutes. 

Instagram is widely used in terms of marketing. The ads on Instagram are not the greatest because it is possible to skip them very easily when looking at Stories. However, what is good about it, you can promote your business account to related people and gain many possible customers. It is also possible to sell items with price tags. 

In 2012, Facebook saw the potential future of Instagram and bought it for $1 billion. It was a smart move, considering the rise of Instagram while leaving Facebook behind. 

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is one of the unique platforms on the internet. It is one of the oldest social networks, and it has been around since its release. LinkedIn has more than 575 thousand users, and 260 of these are active monthly. The user number may not be as high as Facebook and Instagram. Yet, LinkedIn comes forward as a professional social media platform. 

LinkedIn has proved its significance with its features, such as finding jobs and providing feedback for companies, especially in the HR field. It is considered a professional Facebook. 

Having a LinkedIn account is a must for major companies. They make their announcements and give industry-specific news on LinkedIn, and users may follow companies. It is also quite important when it comes to B2B collaborations and marketing because companies check each other as well as people on social media. 

YouTube

Many professionals in the marketing field state that YouTube is the future of marketing. In fact, YouTube is not the future anymore, it is today. YouTube has more than a billion users, and it is possible to find almost anything. It is almost like a video-based search engine. 

YouTube offers a lot of marketing opportunities. From advertisements to informational videos, there are many possibilities to grow your brand awareness. Then there is something called ‘influencer marketing.’ This is also a marketing style that has been going on Instagram as well. However, the pioneer of it is YouTube.

YouTube is a platform where people go after the entertaining content. In order to attract attention, you should either have entertaining videos that would be creative or collaborate with YouTubers who can promote your products in compelling ways. 

Pinterest

Pinterest is all about visual content. It is possible to see any visual art here. Pinterest has more than 200 million users. It features companies with a visual focus, such as architectural manufacturers, clothing stores, and flower shops. 

Unlike any other social media platform, Pinterest features a higher female population. So it may be a platform where marketing towards women can take place.

It is a good platform for showing your products in a non-promotional and artistic way. 

What Is Social Media Monitoring?

Social media monitoring allows you to analyze and monitor brands across many social channels. You may be trying to network on LinkedIn, or sharing hundreds of posts on Instagram to get interaction. However, none of these work if you don’t acknowledge the market. Monitoring social media will enable you to compare yourself with your competitors. Another critical benefit is that it gives you the power to drive conversations about your brand on social media.

Social media is a potent tool. You can use it to engage with your customers more intimately than previously possible. Social media monitoring helps to identify trends over time. It also helps monitor your competition, making you aware of their strategy changes. Thanks to this, you can remain competitive with them as well. Using the data social media monitoring provides, you can prove your return on investments (ROI) by showing results clearly and keeping track of many other metrics to help your social media presence thrive. Engaging with your customers using social media is also a great way to build trust and respect for your brand.

How Social Media Monitoring Works

There are some specially designed tools to help you monitor social media. Some tools are known as social listening tools. These report to you about the social media buzz around your chosen phrases or topics. Social listening tools are excellent for social media managers to analyze the engagement with your brand before and after a campaign to prove the ROI of the campaign.

Some companies have combined SEO and social media monitoring software. It is to give you even more valuable tools in a single package. All of the data gathered using social media monitoring tools feed into an easy-to-analyze database. There, social media managers can evaluate any metric they want to improve. Some monitoring tools only scan one platform while others run cross-platform. After conducting analyses of the gathered data, companies can view how they are perceived online and find answers to strategic questions from the investigation. Additionally, many social media listening tools provide continuous analysis and evaluate current marketing campaigns and competitor comparisons in real-time when compared with the past results.

What Social Media Management Requires

The job description of social media management is a broad concept. There are many things you should consider when managing your social media accounts. From content management to ads, social media management is a whole other department. It is a must for major companies, especially for e-commerce websites. 

Creating Social Media Accounts

The design of your social media account is the starting point of social media marketing. All of your accounts should be accurate and reflect the design of your brand. If you manage the accuracy in your design, it would be easier for your brand’s followers to find your accounts and interact with them. It is also good for building trust because by doing this, you are clearly stating that you are the brand, and you are in charge of these accounts.

Social media design focuses on the header and the background on Twitter; header, icon, and profile picture on Facebook; Instagram profile picture and bio and such. 

The design should always be accurate when updating your accounts. 

Determining Target Audience

Analyzing your target audience and determining it is a part of social media management. Based on your SWOT analysis, you have to know how to use which social media platform. By determining your audience on social media, you will get a much better return on investment. So it is always good to know who your audience is.

Create a Social Media Strategy

Before you start your campaigns on social media, you have to develop a strategy. Mostly social media management agencies will focus on each platform differently. It is because the demography of each platform differs, therefore you would need a different approach for each one of them. 

Considering the platforms’ audience, what you need to focus on in your strategy are your goals, industry, and brand. 

First, you should set up goals for your business. What do you want to achieve? Awareness, loyalty, or increasing sales. Then you should determine what the target audience expects from your industry. For this, you can guide your audience through informative blog posts or such creative ideas that would lead them to your brand. Lastly, your brand has to have a set of standards. You should be consistent with your approach to the target audience as a brand. 

Advertising

Once you have created a social media strategy, you can now decide how to make your ads on social media. Your audience and your goals play an important role in advertising. Many brands use the same advertisement for all of their social media accounts. Yet, how successful it gets is something debatable.

Since the audience will not be the same on different platforms, it may be best to change the ads according to them. However, this will be something pricy. Yet you cannot put a YouTube ad to Instagram, because on YouTube, users have to watch at least the five seconds of the ad, yet they can easily skip it on Instagram. You can get an idea of how to advertise on Instagram from our related posts as well.

Scheduling Posts

Suppose you want your business to be successful on digital platforms. It is better to post accurately everywhere. Scheduled posts about your campaigns and announcements will create an awareness wave, and everyone following your accounts will remember your existence on social media. 

You may build a content calendar for your accounts. This way you can get a reference about your marketing strategy. 

Creating Content

The term content management has never been so important when it comes to social media. Social media management is not only about advertising, campaigns, and promotions. Creating content actually covers all of them and should be made periodically. That is why there are many social media agencies and in-house social media management departments. 

To create the best content, social media specialists work with graphic designers and copywriters. It is essential to inform the people who are working on the content projects to be accurate in every platform. Brands always have a message, and this message is determined by the marketing department in most cases. The message you are giving on social media should lead to the same intention of your company. It is also important to catch the accuracy when you are working with third-parties such as agencies or influencers. 

Responding Your Audience

Perhaps the most significant part is this. Your target audience or your customers tend to be very happy and satisfied when they get a return from their favourite or chosen brands. 

When major brands started to answer the asked questions and return their complaints, it was a major deal. Customers expect the digital zone to be an easier place to contact the companies, and it should be. 

If you want to achieve more success on social media, you should not only return to questions and complaints on social media. It is also important to create events that would include your customers. For example, Opel makes a photo context on Facebook, and Opel owners post their favorite photos of their cars. In the end, one of the photos is selected and shared by Opel. Think about the feeling of the winner when he/she sees their car on the official page of the brand. 

Analyze Results

Once you have put out a social media management strategy, you should analyze your results to get feedback and make changes in your strategies according to your target audience. If you are working with an agency, it is best to work with the one that can come up with different strategies if your performance is dropping on social media.

It is possible to see your results through some of the most common tools, such as Google Analytics and Facebook Analytics. Even Instagram offers an analytics feature for business accounts. However, it may not be the most detailed service you get. 

Social Media Monitoring Tools Examples

Here is a list of some excellent examples of social media monitoring and listening tools.

• Brandwatch
• Talkwalker
• Hootsuite
• Google Alerts
• Awario
• Buffer
• Sendible
• e-clincher
• Sprout Social
• Zoho Social
• Loomly
• Google Trends
• BuzzSumo
• Canva
• Animoto
• Todoist

Above, you can see the best tools for your business. Now, let’s analyze these tools in detail!

Brandwatch

Brandwatch targets how a brand is perceived online to help you learn and analyze all of the metrics surrounding your brand’s online perception. Using Brandwatch allows you to quickly analyze current trends within your industry and discover new opportunities and threats your brand could face. You can keep track of your saved searches through Queries. On your mention dashboard, you can see the date of the post and also on which platform it is posted. There’s also the impact score which gives you an idea about how much your post will get interaction. You’ll see faces showing the sentiment on the mention, which you can adjust by clicking on them. While searching, you can filter it by categories such as sentiment, tag, author, status, etc. You can also add multiple filters to your search.

Talkwalker

Talkwalker offers you a social listening tool capable of utilizing AI analytics to provide you with accurate real-time insights into social channels across a total of 187 languages. Featuring a quick search function, Talkwalker allows you to speedily identify content ideas and new social media influencers for you to network with. Talkwalker also enables you to analyze conversations on social media or other platforms. Afterward, you can closely get customer insight into your brand thanks to this customer intelligence. Talkwalker gives you access to critical metrics such as volume, emotion, engagement, geography, and demographics. Based on the results, you can create better content, protect your brand assets, track social campaigns and integrate this data to increase your brand’s reputation. Additionally, you can access historical data going back up to 13 months.

Hootsuite

Hootsuite currently operates in 175 countries across the globe, with an estimated 18 million users. The company focuses on helping other brands manage their multiple social media networks and improve their social media strategies. Firstly, link your multiple social network accounts and choose which categories you will be working on. You can also view your scheduled posts on the dashboard. You can simultaneously post on multiple platforms as well. Hootsuite is ideal for use as part of a team as its layout works efficiently with many team members indeed. The dashboard allows you to filter streams by posts, mentions, or updates. You can assign incoming messages to specific team members allowing for smooth collaboration and effective communication. Using the app directory, you can also install free apps that might be useful.

Google Alerts

Google Alerts monitors the internet for any mentions or your business, known competitors, or relevant information to your chosen topics. This tool is incredibly easy to use. You can spot mentions that don’t have links, detect spam before it’s too late, or expose unanswered questions. Log into a Google account and head to the Google Alerts page to begin using this monitoring tool.

Awario

Awario focuses on building brand awareness for its customers similarly. It offers social media monitoring with features like influencer marketing, social selling, and competitive analysis. To achieve increased brand awareness, users store key terms in all languages they wish to track continuously. You can type any word in the search bar and see the specified mentions on your dashboard accordingly. Hence, you can follow the news in various industries and learn what your customers and competitors say about your business. This then leads to new contacts and an increased customer base.

Buffer

Like Hootsuite, it allows you to schedule posts in multiple accounts. It works with Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. You can schedule posts even for one year. This way you can save time for you in an easy way.  Another good side of Buffer is that it offers you content suggestions. You can choose from its suggestions if you are kind of short of ideas. 

Sendible

In Sendible you can schedule posts across different platforms and integrate them with blogs and other social sharing sites.  Sendible creates organized editorial calendars, and also it reports brand mentions. This way you have the chance to respond to people asap and show your presence in the social media.  Sendible also comes with a mobile app that would send notifications about your business. 

e-clincher

With e-clincher you can do many things for social media management. Its services include:  content scheduler,  auto posting, Social inbox or social CRM,  integration of RSS feeds,  suggested content,  keywords monitoring,  influencer discovery,  analytics reporting,  URL shorteners,  campaign tracker and many more.  What makes it interesting is that it offers analytics reporting, which is very useful and time-saving.

Sprout Social

SproutSocial is one of the most usable and best social media tools. The tool is quite popular because it offers advanced publishing features to its users. Another feature that makes SproutSocial one of the best social media management tools is its deep analysis feature. You may analyze all major social media platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, thanks to SproutSocial. It is also very useful for social media marketing management.

Zoho Social

This tool stands out from other social media management tools with its all-in-one features. We may list the features of Zoho Social as follows: Advanced CRM tool Integration with all major social media platforms A free version, albeit with limited features A full version starting at $10/month payment terms It’s possible to say that Zoho is a good alternative when it comes to social media planning tools.

Loomly

If you need extensive collaboration to manage your social media channels, you are in the right spot. Loomly allows its users to add up to 26 team members. The tool also has core features such as advanced analysis capabilities and automatic publishing.

Google Trends

Do you need to be aware of all the trends on time to plan your social media posts? Google Trends is ready to give you exactly what you need. You won’t miss any trend with this completely free tool from Google. Moreover, you have the opportunity to follow the past trends periodically with Google Trends.

BuzzSumo

Another tool that may help you follow social media trends more closely. Thanks to BuzzSumo, you will be informed about the trending posts on all major social media platforms as soon as possible. Buzzsumo also allows you to analyze the performance of these trending content on a topic basis.

Canva

If you don’t want to need a designer for the posts you’ll share on social media channels, Canva is just for you. Canva may not be a social media management platform on its own but it’s very useful. You may use the tool’s dozens of ready-made templates to make your posts look more professional. The tool also has many illustrations and icons that will add a different color to your visuals.

Animoto

Animoto caters to those who need a fast video editing tool for their online marketing campaigns. Users describe Animoto as a quite fast and surprisingly simple social media tool. Animoto is one of the rare tools that can be successful in meeting the needs of video editing, especially for social media.

Todoist

Todoist is an unrivaled social media planner tool for those who need productivity in social media management. Thanks to Todoist, you can have total peace of mind about regularly posting on your brand’s social media channels.

Conclusion

Overall, there are many different social media monitoring tools available for you to utilize. These tools vary in their features and offer you a vast database of analytics created around your social media data. Social media monitoring allows you to track your brand’s performance across many platforms, allowing for in-depth analysis after a marketing campaign. These tools can also significantly increase your engagement by highlighting the types of content your target audience frequently responds well to. Hopefully, you have enjoyed the benefits of using these tools and some of their many uses on the whole. Thank you for reading.