The Dos and Don’ts of Social Media Monitoring: Best Practices for Businesses

When we mention social media monitoring, we view it as the process of keeping track of your brand’s mentions throughout the internet. Whenever you conduct a social media campaign, it’s important to know that it has reached the target audience, and to check for that; we use social media monitoring tools.

While social media monitoring helps companies know that people are talking about them, they can take it further and implement the social listening process for better results.

boy and girl enjoying successful social media monitoring - dart hitting bullseye target

However, when we talk about social media marketing, it’s all a hit-and-trial method with no fixed structure. A process that works for your competitors might not give fruitful results for your brand. That’s why developing your own strategies and learning throughout the process is essential.

But, there are certain do’s and don’ts that all companies must follow and maintain the decorum of social media guidelines. You, as a company, should not put out certain things on Twitter or Instagram just for the sake of engagement. 

To avoid making such mistakes, we have collected some of the most sought-after rules that each and every brand, irrespective of their popularity and social media presence, should follow. Besides, if you are just starting out, these guidelines will serve as Holy Grail for your company. 

Things You Should Implement In Your Social Media Monitoring Strategy

When we talk about the do’s and don’ts of social media tracking, the focus mainly goes on the negative part of the conversion. But, there are several things that you can implement in your social media tracking strategy to achieve your goals.

1. Devise a Proper Strategy

smiling girl devising a proper strategy on laptop while analyzing charts, with a man pointing to the charts on a board

Before starting on social media, ensure you have a proper social media strategy for your campaigns. A solid social media marketing strategy will give you a structure, a plan to follow and focus entirely on your brand’s upcoming services or products.

With a social media marketing plan, you will be able to reach your target market easily and achieve the goals that you have set. Besides, each marketing campaign will require a different approach, as social media trends keep changing, and you need to act according to the changing trends to get a good audience.

2. Be Available On All Platforms

boy with loudspeaker and girl working on laptop with social media icons including Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram in round circles on mobile screen - be available on all platforms

When we talk about social media, it’s all about being available on social media platforms. But don’t make the mistake of pouring all your energy and content into one specific platform, as doing so will make you lose a major chunk of potential audience on other platforms.

As per the current scenario, brands must be present on all social media platforms to reach the target audience available on each platform.

However, when you post on other platforms, make sure to tailor your content as per the social media platform. Posting the same content everywhere might not give you desired results.

Though you can post content that revolves around a primary topic but has different formats on each platform. By doing so, you can target the audience on each platform and gather insights on important metrics.

3. Understand Your Audience

girl holding laptop and indicating circular portraits of two men and two women - understanding your audience

The main agenda of social media listening is to understand your audience and take it a level up. Social media monitoring lets you know people are discussing your brand, products, and services.

You can take up this opportunity and use it to understand your audience better. See whether they are talking good or bad about your products. With the help of social media listening, you can understand your audience better.

The sentiment analysis feature of Websignals can help you understand and gather new customers. The social media mentions tracking tool can fetch data regarding your brand’s mention, industry-related norms, and other similar keywords, along with sentiments under each mention.

Websignals analyzes the sentiments of users who mention your brand’s name or industry-related keywords so that you can understand what they are talking about. Besides, social listening will also help you understand whether the campaign is garnering positive results or if there are some loopholes that need to be fixed.

4. Post Regularly

red loudspeaker on mobile device surrounded by social media icons - post regularly for optimal social engagement

Posting regularly helps you maintain consistency and attracts your target audience eventually. Though it might seem tough initially, you will get good engagement and conversions after some time. 

Posting inconsistently not only messes up your brand’s image but also deviates your target customers from your social media handle. 

Besides, social media algorithms work in twisted and complex ways, and if you post irregularly, the algorithms will come to you. The result? Your posts will be stuffed down in the deep ocean of social media.

To avoid such circumstances, make sure that you post consistently. Even if you do not have much content, re-share posts of customers who have reviewed your products, though make sure to ask for their permission before posting. You can also repurpose old content and modify it for upcoming campaigns.

Regular posting states that your brand is present 24*7 on social media and is ready to help customers and resolve their queries. Moreover, it ultimately drives the engagement rate, and conversions start picking up pace.

For starters, you must post daily on Twitter, as people are always active on the platform. LinkedIn is also a platform that requires regular posting, as it consists of founders, CEOs, and basically, everyone from the corporate world and regular posting might get you some good clients.

When it comes to Instagram and Facebook, posting every alternate day will do the trick. It will give users enough time to engage with the posts and share them with their friends. However, make sure to always try new methods, as the algorithm changes every day, and you need to figure out ways to reach your target audience without any hurdles.

5. Engage With Customers

business professionals engage with customers by sealing a deal: man in suit and woman in formals shaking hands

While you are out on social media posting content related to your services, industry, products, and relatable content, do not forget to engage with your customers. To do that, you need to create content that has the engagement factor in it.

For example, you can create quizzes or riddles based around the services you provide or anything similar that will get the audience talking. Once they start talking about your posts, you must also engage with them. Reply to their comments, post a thank-you note when they re-share your posts, and so on.

Besides, engaging with your audience gives you an upper hand in understanding their problems and any loopholes they might have discovered while using your services. You can take up this information and solve them with the product development team.

Engaging with customers also puts your brand’s name in a good light. It shows that you are willing to talk to your customers and help them out in a professional way.

6. Analyze Data Metrics

boy using magnifying glass to analyze data metrics on graph, girl studying graph while working on laptop

Social media management is not all about posting content and hoping for engagement. You also need to collect the data from each campaign and analyze them to discover the results and work on the mistakes. Proper social monitoring analysis also unravels upcoming trends that can be helpful for the team in various ways.

Besides, with proper analysis, you can understand all the good and bad things about each campaign and use them for future purposes.

Things You Should Avoid While Being On Social Media

Though social media is a fun platform to engage more personally with customers, promote your brand, and do tons of things, there are some limitations, especially for companies. When you are present on social media, make sure that you do not make these mistakes, as it can make a huge scar on your brand’s name.

1. Deleting Negative Reviews

boy deleting negative reviews by disposing letters from cartoon box into full dustbin of documents

Let’s be honest: there’s not a single brand that hasn’t got a negative review. It is quite normal for brands to get negative reviews, but what’s not acceptable is deleting those reviews from your social media handle. Why? That’s because the internet never forgets, and other users will notice it eventually.

Most of the negative comments are from users who could not get hold of your services or faced some problems during the process. In such cases, respond to them immediately and ask your customer service team to tend to their issues. 

Most users will delete the comments after the issue is resolved or write a note of thanks under the comment. It’s a win-win situation for both you and the customer.

2. Not Responding To Queries

girl holding a file with a concerned expression, possibly due to not responding to queries

Customers often post queries or their doubts on social media. If you find any doubts or queries related to your service or industry, it’s best to respond as soon as possible. 

Why? That’s because there’s a high chance that most people might have the same doubt, and with your solution, all of their doubts will be cleared.

Moreover, if you answer a query that’s related to your industry, there are chances that the user might become your client. 

Websignals can help you a lot here. The social media tracking tool can fetch data from all over the internet, based on the keyword you enter, and provide results in one dashboard. Whether the query is from Reddit, Quora, Facebook, or any other platform, our advanced social media monitoring tool will present them all in one place. You can easily respond to them from the dashboard, eliminating the need to log into the digital world. 

3. Using Too Much Automation

two cranes with a robot in the center using too much automation

Since automation came into view, it has brought tons of benefits. There are several tools that help digital marketers in easing up their load. For example, automating repetitive SEO tasks, creating outlines for blogs and email templates, and much more.

But using too much automation, especially on social media, can do more harm than good. Using an automated bot to post on your social media handle or reply to users is a wrong move. There have been cases where bots have posted irrelevant and unethical content that has caused the company a lot of backlashes.

If your target audience gets a whiff that a bot is replying to their queries or automation is used for posting, they stray away from the brand. 

The main reason why customers connect with brands on social media is that they can share their queries and complaints and have a person from the team handle them, not a bot.

4. Not Acknowledging Mistakes

worried and sad red-shirted man in black pants and matching red shoes standing beside a chart depicting a downward trend while not acknowledging mistakes

It’s quite common to make mistakes, but when you don’t acknowledge them, the problems start. There have been scenarios where brands made blunders on social media, but the ones that stood up and acknowledged their mistakes are still here, while others faded.

Ignoring or not acknowledging your company’s mistakes, like recent marketing campaigns, a wrong comment on politics, or anything similar, can bring a lot of backlash to the brand image.

After making a mistake, the best thing to do is acknowledge it, apologize to your customers for the blunder, and assure them that the company is working on it and will solve the problem as soon as possible. By doing this, it would assure your customers that you are not dismissing them, and they will remain loyal to you.

5. Posting Without Proofreading

girl examining content with magnifying glass, man highlighting circle, and woman pointing to marked area in file - perfect example of posting without proofreading

One of the biggest mistakes companies make is posting content on social media without proofreading. Before posting anything on the internet, even if it’s just a meme, make sure that you proofread it. Doing so ensures that there are no grammatical mistakes, some ulterior meaning, or anything else. Proofreading helps you go through the post through the audience’s eyes so that you can detect mistakes that brands normally don’t see. 

While social monitoring might seem tedious, an advanced social media listening tool like Websignals can make the job easier for you. With its premium features, you can understand your target audience better, conduct effective competitive analysis, and learn new tactics that might help you in the long run.

We hope that this article was of help to you.

See you soon!

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