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Seeing what people are talking about on social media is a great way to learn about their hopes, fears and struggles. For brands, social listening can provide valuable insights that a consumer survey or focus group might miss.
“It’s a technique to spot trends, identify emerging topics and explore audience interests,” said Brandon Boatwright, an assistant professor at Clemson University. “It’s a tool for detecting potential issues and monitoring competitors.”
As helpful as social listening tools may be, it’s also easy for PR pros to get bogged down in the amount of data they can generate.
In a learning module hosted on Ragan Training, Boatwright outlines the main metrics a PR pro should focus on, with one important caveat.
The caveat: Boatwright notes that while sentiment analysis can provide a good temperature check of where consumers stand on any given topic, it’s not always reliable due to the nuance and complexity of language.
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