How To Monitor Your Brand On Social Media FOR FREE!

Social media is changing our world and the way we do business. Period. Even if you don’t believe me, you better be keeping an eye out for what people are saying about your brand online. A valuable reputation can be torn to shreds in record time if you ignore something that goes viral. (For example.. check out my blog about Dominos and how their social media strategy has COMPLETELY changed after a viral video melt-down.) By reacting to customers and engaging with them on the good, the bad & the ugly, you have a better chance of turning the tides. (Yep… I’ve got an example of this too. Check out my blog on how American Airlines Tweets Good Customer Service.)

So, how can you easily listen to what people are saying about your brand if you don’t have a social media strategy or the budget for a social media team? Well, here are five easy and FREE ways to do it:

Google Alerts: You can set up alerts for key words (for instance your brand name) within minutes & they’re delivered to your email inbox. Easy peezy!

Twilerts: A simple way to monitor tweets about your brand. Like Google Alerts, Twilerts emails you results of your search terms.

Tweetdeck: LOVE this tool! You can set up search columns for terms, twitter hashtags and groups. (Hint: I not only search my clients but also their competition!)

Social Mention: This is also one of my faves b/c it gives you real-time social media search & analysis. It aggregates information from many social media platforms.

Addict-o-matic: A real-time social search engine where you create a custom page on the latest buzz on any topic on just about any social media platform.

Let me just warn you: these are the tools I like THIS WEEK. Lol.. things in social media change almost daily. For instance, I used to use the free tool backtype all the time to analyze social media reach. Well, now it’s been acquired by twitter so the backtype website isn’t working right now. But I’m sure we’ll see the benefits soon on the twitter platform.

Now that you know HOW to monitor your brand, you may be asking WHAT to monitor. Here’s a list:

Your Company Name (even misspellings & twitter handles)

Your Competition’s Name (even misspellings & twitter handles)

Company Domains

Products and Services

Names of Key Employees (including twitter names)

Industry Terms/Keywords

Conferences, Events and Hash Tags

Also, if you want something more indepth, you’ll need to pay for it. I personally use the twitter management tool Tweet Big, but there’s also Social Oomph, Trackur, & HootSuite. Each of these offer bells and whistles the free ones don’t. So, feel free to check them out and see if they’re worth the money for you. In the meantime, don’t overlook the freebies.

I know I listed a lot of stuff here. DON’T GET OVERWHELMED! I just want to give you an idea of everything you CAN monitor for FREE. The bottom line? Listening to real time conversations about you, your competitors and your industry can keep you not only in the “the know” but can help you provide great customer service AND help you protect your brand.