Once you have a social strategy in place, the heart of good social networking is in refining that strategy to be sure you’re making the best possible use of your social resources. The trouble is that there’s no easy answer to how to boost your social prowess: the exact steps you should take will vary depending on your business needs and the interests of your social fanbase. But no matter what that answer is, you can find it by doing more social listening.
You might think of social listening as simply watching your mentions and comments to keep up with what your fans are saying directly to you. However, listening can go well beyond that to look at mentions of your brand or products that aren’t directly addressing you, discussions about the industry your brand is a part of, and discussions about your brand’s competitors.
Though this can involve collecting and analyzing a great deal of social data, the insights you glean can be valuable to your entire company — and if you’re looking to take your social networking plan to the next level, taking your social listening beyond brand mentions can help you get there.
Perfecting Your Social Strategy With Listening
What your customers (and potential customers) are talking about on social will help you hone your social plan in several ways, by tapping into relevant conversations they’re already having. Knowing about these conversations can help you provide relevant social or other marketing content — which gives you the opportunity to address common questions or concerns before you’ve even been asked.
If you already have the right content or product available to address the needs of your followers, adding that information to the social conversation can help convert potential customers to actual customers.
Jumping into a conversation that wasn’t directly about your brand — say, …read more
Source:: Sprout Social