7 Steps to Selecting a Social Media Monitoring Tool

With the amount of hype and plethora of information on social media monitoring, the selection of a social media monitoring tool can seem like a daunting task. It doesn’t have to be, as long as it’s understood that there is absolutely no silver bullet here and the tool is only a part of your social media strategy.

Having been through this selection process in a number of client projects, here are few steps to (hopefully) make it a bit easier to follow:

1. Research. Arguably, each tool tends to focus on different ends of the market (e.g. small to medium ventures vs. large enterprises vs. agencies monitoring multiple brands) and may follow different approaches (e.g. monitor everything social media vs. focus on specific groups of influencers), therefore it’d be good to do some upfront research (that includes price points as well because there is variance there too). Don’t be afraid to talk to vendors about what you are trying to do; they are usually very helpful, but remember it’s a new paradigm, so no one can have all the answers on a plate.

2. Plan. Before trying the tools, set a clear plan on what you want to achieve. Define this plan around a real-world situation for your organization, not around some hypothetical case (actually most vendors’ case studies are based on very high profile searches that generate tons of social media activity, this might not be realistic for your organization’s scope). It’s easy to get lost in the vast amount of social media data that’s out there, so having a well-defined goal with measurable objectives and pragmatic tactics to achieve them is what you should always start out with.

3. Evaluate. Although not much comparative information is available to size up one tool next to another, almost all vendors offer some type of free sandbox account or trial version or live product demo, so this is something to definitely benefit from before making a decision on what tool to pick. Set up multiple trials in parallel for the same plan to be able to evaluate the capabilities of each tool side by side but always keeping your plan and goal from #2 in mind.

4. Adapt. When evaluating the tools, spend some time initially and keep revising regularly to fine tune the configuration of your search profiles (in terms of keywords to include/exclude as well as sources to filter in/out). It is clear that these tools require some adapting to effectively monitor a specific industry by making sure they get to know the most influential social media outlets. This makes a great difference in the amount and relevancy of the results you will be getting back from the tools (and from any search tool for that matter).

5. Oversee. Don’t forget that the data and reports coming out of the tools do require human processing and oversight to become truly useful and actionable when trying to meet real business needs (in this case, your plan and goal from #2). Actually, there is a great post by Matt Dickman on how to execute a listening plan that builds this point to full extend. This is becoming a more and more important factor in the sense that now that you start having social media monitoring data, what do you do with it? Depending on your objectives, the types of engagement will differ, but ultimately, certain processes are common for whatever you are trying achieve, for example you will always need to:

• Identify internal or external resources that can engage on social media.
• Set up a workflow to communicate opportunities and engage properly and timely.
• Plan and execute engagement actions and track follow-ups.
• Etc.

6. Measure & report. Regarding comparative monitoring performance among the tools, there may be certain case studies (see Ken Burbary’s post and an older post of mine), but there is no conclusive evidence that one tool does better than another for certain media types. In any case, you should track measurements and generate reports for each tool to be able to make your final decision. Your metrics should refer to your plan and goal from #2, but may extend to cover potentially new areas that you have uncovered while using the tools and can be valuable to your organization.

7. Diversify. Lastly, I would recommend using at least a couple of tools to make sure you get different angles in your monitoring efforts. Maybe a mix of paid and unpaid tools like, for example, Radian6 or SM2 coupled with Google Alerts, Social Mention, and/or Twitter Search.

Lastly, one final note: The social media monitoring space is already getting crowded with existing players and new entrants and more are coming, so it might seem overwhelming at first to try to try to pick a product or service to use – btw, you may get an almost full list of all the tools at Ken Burbary’s wiki. That won’t change any time soon. Expect new vendors to try to find their niche by specializing on certain types of uses and integrating with other analytics technologies for more sophisticated functionality. Also, expect more M&As and consolidations before few sizable players settle down (think Microsoft and Google among others). So, you may want to take that into account if you are getting ready to commit to a tool.

Technorati Tags: listening campaign, Social Media Monitoring, social media tools

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