To get your company’s social listening strategy off the ground, follow our step-by-step guide.

Establish your objectives.

• What do you hope to gain by using the tool?
• Do you want to learn more about your customer?
• How can you stay one step ahead of your competitors?
• How can you safeguard your reputation in the event of a crisis?

Determine the channels that will be monitored.

Consider your objectives and whether they can be met on the social media platforms that your target audience frequents. Any effective social monitoring tool will show you the channels your target audience is using to communicate. If your objective is to increase traffic to your website, for example, Instagram isn’t the best platform for you because you’re limited to posting a link.

Select the appropriate tools.

Below are a few more suggestions to assist you with your search.

• Consider the manner of search: Because searches can grow fairly complicated, it’s critical that you limit your results to the most relevant information. Learn how to use Boolean searches to maximize the influence that social media listening may have on your business.

• Filter in customer service: Some social media listening solutions, like Meltwater’s, come with specialized Account Managers, allowing you to get the most out of the platform – not to mention that Account Managers are accommodating in times of crisis, which you never know when it will strike!

Set up notifications

Set up notifications, so you never miss an essential social mention of your brand, competition, or industry, and you’ll stay on top of your game. You can choose to receive notifications for all mentions or only when a crisis or major trend occurs.

Analyze and compare the data from your social media accounts.

You may design a visually stunning page of insights that is easy to understand in just a few simple steps. These are what we refer to as dashboards. Dashboards for social media allow you to access all of your most essential social media analytics at a glance.

Dashboards are tailored to your needs so that you may go as high level or as detailed as you desire. This is usually determined by the person who is using the dashboard to interpret the dialogue. Your social media manager, for example, may be more interested in establishing a conversation with influencers than your CEO, which may be more interested in social media share of voice. Trending themes, media exposure, sentiment analysis, and share of voice are just a few of the data that the dashboard can look at.