Listening to what they’re saying on Social media

Here are two do-it-yourself approaches to social media monitoring -- to discover what online audiences are saying, who are the relevant influencers, and where you might engage your audiences.

Quick Snapshot  (One hour or less)

If you have an hour or less -- right now-- to devote to monitoring the conversations online that matter to you, I recommend this approach:

Step 1.  Gather

1. •Social mention
   

2. •Google Blog Search
   

3. •Twitter (Advanced) Search
   

4. •Facebook Search
   

5. •YouTube Search
   

6. •Flickr Search
   

Step 2.  Aggregate and Sift:

1. •Google Reader -- Save the searches as “feeds” and add them to Google Reader (Facebook and Flickr searches, unfortunately, can’t be added) -- where you can sort them into folders, star and tag those that might tell you something about the five Ms -- and more specially especially where they are online, who are their key online influences, what are they saying about you/your issue/program, what questions/topics are most on their miind, and what conversations might you be able to engage in?
   

Step 3.   Analyze

1. •Record and analyze your findings:
   

2. •The Target Map
   

3. •(for reference) Social Technographics Profile tool
   

4. •(for reference) social technographics ladder.jpg
   

5. •Social Media Conversation Map.doc (as pdf)
   

Ongoing Monitoring (30 minutes or less per day)

If you can spend about 15-30 minutes per day monitoring what’s being said -- and you prefer to run everything through an RSS reader -- I recommend this simple approach.

Step 1.  Gather

1. •Google Alert
   

2. •Tweetbeep
   

3. •Google Reader or your email program
   

Step 2.  Aggregate and Sift:

1. •Set up alerts from Google (comprehensive) and Tweetbeep to be sent to either Google Reader or your own email.  Sort the daily search feeds using folders and other means -- looking again for about the five Ms -- and more specially especially where they are online, who are their key online influences, what are they saying about you/your issue/program, what questions/topics are most on their miind, and what conversations might you be able to engage in?
   

2. •
   

Step 3:  Analyze

1. •Record your findings on:
   

2. •The Target Map
   

3. •Social Media Conversation Map.doc (as pdf)

Resources

1. Stratcom
   

2. Organizational Goals
   

3. Audience
   

4. Communications Goals
   

5. Messaging
   

6. Strategy and Tactics
   

7. Metrics

Selecting the best audience(s)

There are two questions to consider -- though I’m afraid no formula or even truly objective way of making this choice:

1. 1.Which audiences can have the biggest impact on achieving your organizational goal?
   

2. 2.Which audiences can you realistically reach and move, given your time frame, budget and other constraints?

Profiling YOur Selected Audiences

However you define your audiences (demographically, psychographically, or otherwise), make sure you try to answer the five Ms:

1. 1.Motivations:  What do they need, want, desire?  What’s keeping them up at night?  What questions are they asking?  What are their dreams, aspirations?
   

2. 2.Messages:  What kinds of messages resonate with them?  What kind of tone, voice works with them?
   

3. 3.Messengers:  Whom do they trust?  Who influences them in their personal life, at work, online, in other media?
   

4. 4.Media: What kinds of media do they read/watch/use/engage with?  Do they engage in online communities?
   

5. 5.Moments:  When are the best seasons, months, days, times of day to reach them?

Social Media Listening Links

1. •Beth Kanter’s “How to set up a listening post on Twitter”
   

2. •Andy Beal’s “8 Essential Social Media Monitoring Tools”
   

3. •Mashable’s “5 Terrific Twitter Research Tools”
   

4. •ReadWriteWeb’s “The Future of Social Media Monitoring”
   

5. •Mike Manuel’s “How to Create a Social Media Monitoring Strategy”
   

6. •Kat French’s “Quick ‘n Dirty Guide to Setting Up Social Media Monitoring”
   

7. •Kat French’s “Quick and Dirty Social Media Monitoring: Intermediate Edition”
   

8. •Beth Kanter’s “ROI of Listening: Red Cross”
   

9. •Barry Hurd’s “Social Media Demographics”

Other Audience  Links

1. •“What we know about Army families” (2007)
   

2. •Army demographics (2008)
   

3. •Nascar Demographics
   

4. •ESPN Sports fans demographics