A social listening tool identifies and assesses what is being said about a company, individual, product or brand on the internet, and are an effective method of maximising customer engagement with a company or product.
By using social listening tools, you can successfully examine social conversations about your brand in real-time, meaning you’ll know immediately if there’s a positive or negative change in how people feel about your brand or product. In other words, social listening tools allow you to actively engage with the consumer, to see what makes them “tick”.
Listening to, and engaging with, your audience through social listening
Listening to what users say about your services on the internet can massively help you understand what your customers want from you as a company. If you actively engage with your audience by using social listening tools, you’ll be able to see just exactly what they think about the services you have to offer. A social listening tool is therefore a great way to engage with the consumers more efficiently, and effectively.
Actively engaging with your customers in this way will allow you to see what is going well in for your enterprise – or what isn’t. Once you identify any areas in need of improvement, you can adjust your business model accordingly and develop better marketing strategies, thus increasing customer satisfaction, and potentially reeling in new customers too.
Where does your brand fit in the market?
Social listening tools are also highly effective not just in monitoring what consumers think about your brand, but they are also a great way to assess market competition.
By being able to see just what your competitors are producing in real time, and monitoring consumer conversations about your industry and your competitors, you might be able to spot a gap in the market that your brand could fill; leading to a greater influx of customers and increased consumer satisfaction, allowing your brand to stand out from the rest.
Effective problem solving
No one likes a hard sell, and trying to use this method to engage with potential new customers may in fact have the opposite intended effect and turn them away from your business. In other words, it’s important not to barge into social conversations and try to force someone to engage with your product or service.
However, by utilising social listening tools, you are able to discover genuine questions and dialogues about your industry on social media networks. By knowing these questions and customer concerns, you are then presented with an opportunity to introduce your product or service to consumers, and share your expertise, without having to force your product down the throat of the consumer. By engaging with potential customers in this way, by using effective social listening tools, you will be able to forge a unique relationship with the consumer, and potentially convert them into a new customer.
The importance of social listening
Social listening tools vastly help businesses to understand the conversation surrounding their brand and the products and services on offer. They provide valuable consumer data that companies can use to gauge brand understanding and improve their products and services. As we have seen above, they offer unique and efficient ways to maximise engagement with consumers that, crucially, will assist in fine-tuning the business model and acquiring new customers.
