Twenty years ago, the dot-com bubble was still expanding and social listening did not yet exist. That’s how quickly digital marketing strategies have evolved and will continue to evolve.

With so many frequent changes, how do small business owners keep up with social media and various trends? You can start by knowing the difference between social media monitoring and social media listening and how they can be advantageous for your business.

Social Monitoring vs Social Listening

Most businesses today, regardless of size, do social media marketing in some way. From creating content that drives brand awareness and audience engagement, social monitoring and social listening are two different things that will benefit your business.

Social Monitoring

Many businesses monitor their social media channels, watching for comments and mentions from customers, responding to online reviews, answering direct messages and so forth. The process of monitoring your business’ social media accounts on a micro scale is social media monitoring.

Social Listening

Social listening requires a bit more digging and analysis to look for patterns in social media activity relating not only to your particular brand but also the industry as a whole.

Social listening delves into the sentiment and trends, both positive and negative, relating to how customers are talking about your company, the products and services you offer and the industry you’re in.

How Can Social Listening Benefit your Business?

Like most forms of marketing, producing and publishing a steady stream of relevant content across multiple channels does not happen without cost and time. An ongoing social listening strategy will reveal what types of content perform well for your brand and what types of content perform well for your competitors. This will help you gain insight and draw analysis that could shape your long-term strategy and improve marketing decisions.

Enlisting in a social listening tool will help you set up and monitor your social media listening strategy. Instead of always manually searching through social platforms, a listening tool will flag substantial changes, trends or disruptions relating to your brand, competitors and specific search queries you set up ahead of time.

At Spring Green, our support team guides your social media strategy, creating content and publishing it to social media on your behalf. We’re also here to help you handle your company’s reputation management by responding to comments, direct messages and reviews with your oversight. Because social media is an integral part of marketing, we’re always staying on top of trends to ensure your brand is seen and engaged with online. Learn more about the ongoing digital marketing support we offer our franchise owners.