How to Use Social Listening to Increase Brand Awareness

For B2C and B2B companies alike, brand awareness remains a top priority for marketing campaigns. A 2017 survey by Advertiser Perceptions found the top three marketing challenges included reaching potential customers in a meaningful and compelling way, as well as getting the attention of one’s target audiences.

Why Increase Brand Awareness?

Breeding familiarity is integral to:

• Shortening sales cycles,
• Expanding market share, and
• Establishing a long-term position as an industry leader

Why Monitor Social Media?

Without the right data, brand awareness campaigns become little more than a shot in the dark. How do companies know they are reaching the right audience on the right channels?

Social media monitoring can help marketers increase brand awareness in four ways:    

• Create top quality content based on key trends and issues
• Identify new prospects to advertise to
• Create target audience profiles for advertisements based on customer profiling
• Identify the most relevant influencers and businesses to partner with
• Hold contests and giveaways on the “best” social media platform

Discover the top 20 KPIs for your social media ROI.  

1. Create Top Quality Content Based on Key Trends and Issues

Content is one of the best ways to increase brand awareness, as it shows a brand’s ability to listen, innovate, and stay on top of trends. The fresher and more relatable the content, the more shareable it is; this helps brands to reach a wider audience.

How?

Build your content strategy around:

• What influencers in your industry are talking about
• Viral trends your target audience is engaging with
• Common topics in the period leading up to major events and holidays your brand can participate in

Case Study

The content team for a B2C electronics manufacturer wanted to increase brand awareness with customers beyond the technology space. They shortlisted a list of lifestyle influencers and analysed their social media postings to find the most discussed topics online. Using these insights, they then created a content strategy to connect their brand with these topics, allowing them to reach out to customers in the lifestyle community.

2. Create Target Audience Profiles for Advertisements Based on Customer Profiling

Brand awareness is not just about reaching a wider audience. It’s also about reaching the most relevant people who have the highest chance of converting. By understanding who your potential audience are, and targeting advertisements towards them, brands can focus their marketing efforts on reaching these high potential customers.

How?

Creating the right target audiences depends on marketers defining their key customer profiles accurately. This can be done by using social media monitoring to:   

• Analyse online reviews and conversations,
• Pinpoint customer wants and concerns, and
• Detect the socio-demographic characteristics of whoever is posting these reviews

Case Study

A finance company in Asia were looking to expand their brand awareness and market share via targeted advertisements on social media. Using social media monitoring, they were able to detect key behavioural trends among their target audience. The information was vital in building custom audiences to which the advertisements were delivered; this helped them reach and convert high potential prospects.

3. Identify the Most Relevant Influencers and Businesses to Partner With

Beyond using owned content to increase brand awareness, brands can leverage relevant influencers and companies that have a sizeable following. Collaborations like these allow brands to build a prestigious or trendy image with both their existing customer base, as well as that of their partners. The trick is to identify the most relevant one for the brand.

How?

For influencers,

• Analyse their posts on social media - are the topics aligned with your brand?
• Analyse their followers base - what are the socio-demographic characteristics?
• Calculate the potential reach based on the size of their following, and their engagement rates

For brands,

• Analyse their online reputation - would your brand benefit from aligning with them?
• Analyse which influencers and brands they have partnered with, if any
• Analyse their customer base - is this the audience you want to reach out to?

Case Study

Through social media monitoring, an international group of alcohol brands discovered a popular singer mentioned one of their brands in his songs. The group seized the opportunity to sponsor his events and create content specifically for his fans. This led to increased sales and brand awareness with a previously unexplored demographic.

4. Hold Contests, Giveaways and Live Events on the “Best” Platform

Last but not least, contests, giveaways and live events are a proven way of increasing brand awareness and followers in a short span of time. The low barrier to entry alone is a great motivator for people to engage with your brand.

How?

Before launching your contest or giveaway, find out: 

• The leading social media platform by conversational volume used by your target audience
• The leading social media platform by audience distribution amongst your target audience

Case Study

A computer and phone hardware and electronics company discovered their target audience was shifting from video repository platforms like YouTube and Vimeo, to specialised live-streaming sites. With this in mind, the brand invested more effort in using platforms their customers were using to cover events, thus allowing them to gain more traction with their target audiences.  

In Summary

Social media is rich in insights on how you can increase brand awareness, from optimising content, to maximising reach and identifying the right partnerships to leverage.

Find out how you can gain access to real-time insights. Schedule a demo with our social media experts today!