If you’re not on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or other social media sites —and believe it or not, many people are not!—you may be missing out on some very important conversations. Some of these conversations may be about you!
When we worked with a client recently, we did some quick online research, and they were shocked to find how many discussions about their product, relative to their competitors’ products, were taking place.
Some were good, some were not.
Monitoring Your Mentions
Domino’s Pizza gained notoriety several years ago (to their chagrin!) because of a couple of employees messing around with the food (which later proved to be a hoax) who posted a video of their purported exploits on YouTube. By the time Dominos could respond—48 hours later—there were in excess of 450,000 views of that video, not including whatever pass-along impacts there may have been.
What are people saying about you, your company, and your products and services? If you don’t know, it’s time to find out. Word-of-mouth has evolved exponentially with the advent of the Internet and social media.
Managing the Chatter
In the “old days,” you talked to the neighbor over the backyard fence or at the barber’s or beauty shop to share information. The impact was significant, but relatively minimal compared to what can happen today. A disgruntled employee, customer, neighbor, or activist can instantly generate messages and images that have the potential to be seen by hundreds of thousands of people around the world. Some of these messages gain traction and credibility—some don’t.
Where and how can you monitor and manage these mentions? There are a wide range of options, from enterprise-level monitoring tools to simple do-it-yourself (DIY) options like setting up tracking streams in tools like Hootsuite or Sendible, to setting up Google Alerts to monitor mentions.
Knowing what’s out there is the first step. The next step is deciding if/how to join in the conversation. These are strategic decisions that are best discussed with in-house communication staff or other communication experts.
The beauty of the Internet and social media is that people around the world can engage in open, online discussions for everyone to see.
That beauty can also be a beast.
About Us
Strategic Communications, LLC, works with B2B clients to help them achieve their goals through effective content marketing and management with both internal and external audiences. We work with clients to plan, create, and publish high-quality, unique content. Whether on- or offline, or both, we’ll help you achieve desired results at reasonable rates.
In addition to content creation, we specialize in helping B2B clients raise awareness and drive website traffic through a strong LinkedIn and X presence.
(Strategic Communications is certified as a Woman-Owned Business Enterprise through the Wisconsin Department of Administration.)
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(Strategic Communications is a Qwoted affiliate. Right now, it’s the only app/product we’re an affiliate of. Why? Because in our work, we find it to be the most reliable for finding and vetting sources that are relevant to the work we’re doing, and for reaching out to journalists and reporters to get PR for ourselves and our clients. Highly recommend!)