If you’re not monitoring your brand mentions online, you’re missing out on a huge opportunity to connect with potential customers.
Seventy-nine percent of people say that user-generated content highly impacts their purchasing decisions. That means that if your company isn’t paying attention to what’s being said about it online, it’s losing out on a lot of potential business.
Tracking your brand mentions is only the beginning. You also need to respond to negative feedback quickly and professionally. Doing so can protect your company’s reputation and ensure accurate and positive information about your brand. Plus, you can gain valuable backlinks from websites that mention your brand.
So how do you go about monitoring and tracking social mentions?
There are several tools available to help you track your brand online. This article will divide them up into two categories:
- 1. Social Media Monitoring Tools
- 2. Website Monitoring Tools
We will go through some of the most popular options in each category, so you can decide which ones are right for your company. Some even offer free trials, so read on to find the perfect way to see who’s talking about your brand.
Social Media Monitoring Tools
There are some great social media monitoring tools available, including:
1. Awario
If you’re looking for a great tool to help you monitor your brand mentions, Awario is an excellent option.
With Awario, you can track brand mentions on social media networks and any website. You can also quickly and efficiently respond to brand mentions without leaving the application. Plus, Awario’s Reach metric provides you with more information about your commenter’s level of influence.
Awario offers a free 14-day trial, so you can try out all of the platform’s features before you buy. The most affordable option is the Starter Plan, which costs $19 per month. Other options available are the Pro, Enterprise, and Custom Plan. The tool’s most popular plan is the Pro Plan, which costs $69 per month.
2. Hootsuite – Not Just for Social Media Posts
While most people know Hootsuite as a social media management software, it can also be used for more than just publishing content. You can use it for brand monitoring.
Hootsuite Insights allows users to track their brand’s social media engagement and mentions across the internet – and all in one place.
The tool enables you to track specific phrases, keywords, and hashtags across all of your social media streams, including Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter.
These streams load in real-time, meaning that you can quickly discover brand mentions and be there to respond immediately. You can also respond to messages on Twitter and other social networks from within the app itself.
Users can create a free Hootsuite account and add up to three social media platforms. However, for those who wish to monitor their brand mentions on a more professional level, the Hootsuite Insights Pro plan starts at $9.99 per month.
The pro plan includes 100 social media streams and other great features such as message assignment and advanced scheduling.
3. Social Mention
If you’re looking for a free and easy-to-use tool to help you monitor your brand mentions, Social Mention is a great option.
This tool scours social media networks and collects data from platforms like Digg, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter. With a specified keyword, it quickly finds all mentions of that particular word related to your brand. It then provides insightful visuals so you can better understand discussions and interactions effortlessly.
It presents you with a list of mentions about your brand, but that’s not all. It also provides data about your brand’s strength, which is how often your company is being discussed on social media, as well as sentiment, passion, and reach:
- sentiment – the ratio of positive to negative mentions
- passion – how likely it is that someone will repeat the mention
- reach – the measure of influence
These sentiment analysis insights allow you to see how your brand is faring online and what people say about it. You can use this information to protect your reputation and ensure that all information about your company is accurate.
Social Mention is free – you don’t need to create an account or register. Enter your brand name and hit search. Sort results by time frame or source. Be sure to check out Social Mention the next time you need to monitor your brand mentions online!
We tried Social Mention for the keyword “online marketing,” and this is what we found:
Overall, it seems that people are discussing “online marketing” in a positive light.sentiment is 63% positive, 17% neutral, and 20% negative. The top three keywords associated with “online marketing” are “social media,” “marketing strategy,” and “SEO.”
The top three sources are Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.
As you can see, Social Mention provides valuable insights into online conversations related to your brand. This information can be used to protect your reputation and ensure that all information about your company is accurate.
4. Mention
If you’re a company owner who wants to keep an eye on what’s being said about your business online, you’ll need a platform to assist you with that. Mention is one platform that allows you to monitor your brand’s mentions in real time across several social media sites. You may also utilize the app to respond straight from it.
Mention makes it simple to collect data and produce reports, which you may share with your coworkers. The program also employs influencer scores to provide you with an indication of the commenter’s level of influence. You can then enter the keywords, URLs, or organizations you wish to monitor.
Mention has a free 14-day trial, so you can test it before deciding whether it’s the right platform. There are three pricing choices if you choose to continue using Mention – Solo, Starter, and Company:
- Solo is $29 per month and is best for individuals.
- If you have a small business, Starter is the best package for you. For only $99 per month, you are entitled to 5,000 mentions.
- Company is a custom program suited to larger companies and agencies and varies in price.
While we like the idea of Mention, we do have a few reservations about it. First and foremost, you have to pay to use the platform. That’s not such a big deal if you’re running a large company that can afford it. But for small businesses or individuals, that monthly fee may be prohibitive.
Second, we’re not thrilled with the idea of having to share our login information with Mention. That means giving them access to our social media accounts, which we’re not entirely comfortable with.
Overall, we think Mention is a valuable tool for companies who want to keep tabs on their online presence. We say go for it if you can afford the monthly fee and don’t mind sharing your login information.
5. Talkwalker Alerts
Talkwalker Alerts is a free tool that allows you to monitor the web for mentions of your brand, product, or competitors.
You can set up alerts for specific keywords and receive an email notification whenever there’s a new mention. You can also add multiple email addresses so that more than one person can receive the alerts.
What we like best about Talkwalker Alerts is that it’s a great way to stay on top of your online reputation. By monitoring your brand mentions, you can protect your reputation and ensure that all information about your company is accurate.
Simply enter the keywords you want to track and your email address to get started. You can create an alert and receive notifications whenever there’s a new mention.
Extras such as demographic data add to Talkwalker Alerts’ versatility. If you pay for Talkwalker Alerts, you’ll get access to the premium features of its Social Media Analytics and Monitoring Tool, which include brand mentions in real-time. You may not only track brand mentions online with this tool but also monitor 30,000 brand images and gain access to two years of historical data.
Mentions occur in real-time, and one of the finest aspects of the premium service is that it allows you to compare your business against other industry competitors.
The only downside of Talkwalker Alerts is the price. Upgrading to the premium service will cost around $700 per month. You can request a free demo if you want to try the premium service before committing.
Now, let’s move on to tools that monitor your brand on websites.
Website Brand Monitoring Tools
Although some of the tools above can be used to monitor your brand on websites, they’re not specifically designed for that purpose.
For website brand monitoring, we recommend the following tools:
6. Google Alerts
Google Alerts is a free tool that allows you to monitor the web for mentions of your brand, product, or competitors. You can set up alerts for specific keywords and receive an email notification whenever there’s a new mention. You can also add multiple email addresses so that more than one person can receive the alerts.
With Google Alerts, you’ll receive notifications whenever your company is mentioned anywhere on the Web. It’s completely free to use and takes just seconds to set up.
Furthermore, you may create numerous alerts to track anything from your company or industry’s keywords. (Of course, you can also keep an eye on mentions of your rivals.) However, there is a limitation: don’t become too alert-happy and risk being overwhelmed by messages. When setting up your alarms, be selective; not all quantities are created equal.
We use Google Alerts daily and find it to be an invaluable resource. It’s a great way to stay on top of your online reputation and ensure that all information about your company is accurate.
7. SEMRush
SEMRush is one of our go-to tools here at BlakSheep Creative. Not only is it an incredibly powerful SEO tool, but it also has a handy little feature called the Brand Monitoring Tool.
The Brand Monitoring Tool allows you to track your brand mentions across the web and receive notifications whenever there’s a new mention.
But it doesn’t stop with just brand mentions. You can also use the Brand Monitoring Tool to track your competitors. Simply enter their domain name, and you’ll get a report of all the places they’ve been mentioned online.
Here’s a little trick that we use:
Once we see a mention of our brand (or the competition’s), we look at the page it’s on. Then we reach out to the site owner and let them know we’re happy to provide more content for their readers (assuming it’s a good fit).
This is a great way to get your brand in front of new people and get valuable backlinks from high-authority websites.
Bear in mind that SEMRush is pricey – with the entry plan at $119 per month. But if you’re an SEO-minded business owner looking for an all-in-one SEO tool, it’s well worth the investment. Plus, their customer service is hands-down the best around. And they have an incredible reputation management platform that you can use to monitor your brand on review sites.
Well, there you go. There are some of the best brand monitoring tools that we recommend. We use quite a few others (like Sprout Social and Zoho Social), but we left them off the list due to their price, complexity, or lack of features.
Do you have a favorite brand monitoring tool that we didn’t mention? Let us know in the comments below! And be sure to follow our blog for more helpful tips and tricks.
Conclusion
In today’s digital landscape, proactively monitoring your brand’s online presence is more than just a good practice—it’s a necessity. Curious about the depth of impact reviews can have and the role of authenticity? Delve deeper with our in-depth guide on “Authenticity in Online Reviews & Combatting Fake Feedback.”
Using the tools discussed, you’ll be poised to address both praise and critique swiftly. So, why delay? Begin your monitoring journey now, and if assistance is required, BlakSheep Creative is just a call or click away. We’re dedicated to your success and always eager to assist! What are you waiting for? Start monitoring your brand today! If you need help, visit our social media pages or contact us at BlakSheep Creative. We’re always happy to help!
