Just read "social listening is a simple addition to your team's marketing strategy" and I almost spit out my tea.

Social listening is vital, yes. But if you want it to be meaningful, it's far from simple. Just like any other research or social media strategy.

Show me someone who bought software because their boss said "you should do social listening," but didn't add any time, training, or human resources to get it done, and I'll show you wasted money and a disappointed boss.

Social listening demands a strategic approach.

"But it's so easy to know sentiment!"

First, you must collect the right data--don't miss important context, and don't include a bunch of irrelevance or spam.

Then you must know how sentiment is categorized.

Then you must know what org objective you've mapped sentiment to.

And then you're just getting started. Nine times out of ten a sentiment chart pulled out of a tool that "just does everything for you" is worth about as much as the paper you're going to print it on.

You could make bad decisions based on bad data and then you're no better off.

TLDR:

Social listening as a strategic part of your marketing strategy is RESEARCH, not something you just bolt on with software.

It requires expertise and care, just like any other research, if you're going to make decisions based on it.

So you can either hire + train, or...

If you're in #HigherEd, work with @CampusSonar. We exist because this data is incredibly value to universities, but difficult to extract and analyze with any level of accuracy and confidence.

It's all we do, so you can rest assured we do it right.

/steps off soap box