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Monitoring the Impact of COVID-19 on Brand Sentiment (and Why You Should)

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monitoring the impact of covid 19 on brand sentiment and why you should

The COVID-19 pandemic has had major impacts on virtually everything that we do. We’re working from our homes, alongside our kids in virtual school classes, while shopping malls are emptied out, and even going for a walk can feel somewhat unsafe.

Logically, COVID-19 has also impacted what people talk about, with pretty much every conversation you have these days now referring, in some way, to the situation. For marketing and communications pros, that’s also meant a re-think in focus. How do you continue maximizing brand exposure amid such an event? Should you even be looking to continue advertising during a pandemic?

The true answer is that there is no answer – no one knows, for sure, how to best respond because no one’s ever operated in such an environment before.

For some brands that have chosen to reach out with messages of empathy, those efforts will help them maintain connection with their audiences, yet for others, who maybe take a different path, either by choice or due to the impacts, their messaging could backfire, and cause significant reputational damage.

Which category will your business fall into – and has consumer sentiment about your business changed already?

That’s where monitoring brand sentiment comes in.

Here are some tips on how to get a pulse of audience response, and what you can then do to manage the situation.  

1. Listen to what the Internet says about your brand

First, in order to get a sense of audience sentiment, you need a social listening tool to monitor mentions of your brand across the web. I recommend Awario (disclosure: I am on the Awario team), Brandwatch, or Talkwalker for this purpose.

These three tools are specifically beneficial in this respect because they each include a sentiment analysis element, which will break down your various brand mentions into ‘positive’, ‘negative’, and ‘neutral’ listings. 

sentiment bumble

It’s worth monitoring your sentiment charts for spikes, and to respond to each in kind. A spike in negative mentions signals could point to an upcoming reputation crisis, while a spike in neutral or positive mentions could mean that people are talking about your brand more than usual.

Keeping tabs, in either case, can help you to maximize any opportunities for improvement.

2. Monitor the impact of COVID-19 on your brand

Ideally, your social listening tool will pick up every topic and every conversation about your brand. But if you’re interested in digging a little deeper, and honing your efforts onto conversations that combine your brand and mentions of COVID-19 specifically (or, indeed, your brand and other specific issue), you’ll need to take your monitoring efforts to the next level.

For this, you’ll need a social listening tool that has a Boolean search capabilities. In short, Boolean search is a manual type of search query which enables you create more complicated parameters, including additional logic operators, such as AND, OR, which can facilitate more specific requirements.

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Using these additional qualifiers, you can build search strings that sift the key mentions from the rest, automatically sorting through the broader stream to pick out the main points you need to know about.

This can help you improve your strategic approach to a situation like COVID-19, as it enables you to stay updated with the latest mentions of your business in relation to this specific scenario.

3. Respond to negative mentions ASAP

Now that you have a listing of all your brand mentions in relation to the issue streaming in, and separated into positive and negative mentions, you can take the next steps, starting with the most important element: the negative mentions.

Negative mentions are the ones most likely to lead to adverse consequences for your company, but research shows that people are generally appreciative of quick, active responses, and getting onto these posts and comments fast enough can enable you to turn negative sentiment around, and avoid broader damage.

You should look to respond to complaints and negative comments as soon as you see them. This also shows that you care about the opinions and problems of your audience, which can help to establish further connection. 

4. Respond to influencers’ mentions

Ideally, you’ll be able to respond to all mentions, both positive and negative, in a timely manner, as required – but depending on how many mentions you see, and the time you have to commit to the task, that won’t always be possible.

If your capacity is limited, it’s worth taking note of the mentions from the most influential users, as their experiences can have a much bigger impact on your overall brand sentiment.

Again, this is not the ideal, and you don’t want to be in a position where you have to prioritize responses based on follower counts. But logically, when you’re managing your time, this is the place you should consider looking, particularly in the case of a negative mention that you want to dilute before it becomes problematic. 

5. Check your media coverage

Knowing your reputation among your customers, target audience, and social media users is vital, however, when we’re talking about serious reputation failures (as well as serious reputation successes), mass media is where the big shifts will occur.

Social listening tools can monitor a broad range of online sources, in addition to social platforms, including personal blogs (which can be extremely popular) and major news sites.

If your business is getting mentioned in major publications, you need to know about it, and active social listening, combined with sentiment analysis, will help you stay on top of this big mentions – and early notifications in this respect could end up being invaluable, dependent on the situation.

Wrapping-up

The COVID-19 pandemic is unpredictable, and scary, for various reasons. Situations like this can leave people feeling out of control, fearing for everything at once, and assuming that you’re already taking care of your personal, physical health, it’s worth also paying attention to your brand’s health as well.

Being aware of how the situation can impact the perception of your brand will enable you to act wisely, and avoid common mistakes. 

Socialmediatoday.com

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How Automation Is Reshaping The Industry

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How Automation Is Reshaping The Industry

Krishan Arora is CEO & Founder at The Arora Project, a globally recognized leader in crowdfunding & scaling high-growth ventures.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming the marketing industry. As an agency owner myself, I can see in real time how the landscape is shifting under our feet. As businesses seek to reduce costs, increase efficiency and improve their marketing strategies, they are turning to AI-powered marketing tools to automate many of the tasks previously done manually.

One of the most significant areas is in the field of data analysis. AI-powered tools can analyze vast amounts of data quickly and accurately, providing insights into customer behavior and preferences that can inform marketing strategies. This includes analyzing customer data from social media, search engines and customer reviews. By automating this process, businesses can reduce the need for human staff to analyze data manually, saving time and money.

Chatbots—computer programs designed to simulate conversation with human users—are also AI tools and can be programmed to respond to customer inquiries, provide product recommendations and even process orders. This tech is becoming a popular option for companies looking to expedite the handling of customer inquiries.

When it comes to marketing, there’s been an emergence of AI tools that can help automate processes around content generation. This includes developing social media posts, email marketing campaigns and even video content. AI-powered tools can generate content automatically, based on preset parameters, reducing the need for human staff to create each piece of content manually. This can help businesses save time and money while ensuring their marketing content is still high-quality and on-brand. In our agency specifically, we use AI tools to help create incredible marketing copy with just a small input of text and to help create strong brands, logos and presentation design files with ease and at scale. These have helped us boost productivity and results, and I highly encourage other teams to adapt to this revolution.

Aside from impacting tasks within the marketing role, AI tools are also affecting the workforce in terms of job skills. As businesses adopt more AI-powered marketing tools, I believe they will increasingly be looking for staff with skills in data analysis and machine learning. As a result, traditional marketing roles, such as copywriters and graphic designers, may become less in demand, while data analysts and machine learning experts become more sought after.

Marketing teams that adapt to using AI in their workflows will have a significant advantage over those that do not. I don’t think this technology will replace humans altogether. What I think will happen is that there will be two cohorts of marketers: one that uses AI to increase productivity and results, and one that does not. Those that do not will have a hard time keeping up with the AI-boosted marketing teams.

As businesses continue to adopt AI-powered marketing tools, it is likely that the trend of role restructuring and new opportunities will continue. However, it is also important to note that AI is not a silver bullet for all marketing tasks. There are still areas in each of these categories where human staff is essential, especially when it comes to developing creative concepts and building relationships with customers.

In conclusion, the use of AI in marketing is transforming the industry. As businesses seek to reduce costs and improve their marketing strategies, they are increasingly turning to AI-powered marketing tools to automate many of the tasks previously done fully by humans. This is leading to job losses in some areas but is also creating new opportunities for workers with skills in AI and machine learning. As AI-powered services continue to evolve, businesses and workers alike must adapt to these changes to stay competitive in the market.


Forbes Agency Council is an invitation-only community for executives in successful public relations, media strategy, creative and advertising agencies. Do I qualify?


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Twitter Will Begin Removing ‘Legacy’ Blue Checkmarks from Next Week

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Twitter Will Begin Removing ‘Legacy’ Blue Checkmarks from Next Week

Get ready for the next phase of Twitter 2.0’s subscription revenue push, with the platform announcing today that ‘legacy’ blue checkmarks will begin being revoked as of next week.

As per the above tweet, Twitter’s hoping to boost Twitter Blue and Verification for Business subscribers by prompting them to start paying for their blue tick instead.

Twitter’s also alerting blue tick account holders with this in-stream notification.

That could see some legacy verified accounts paying up, bringing in a few more Twitter Blue subscribers – though the amount that are going to revert to Verification for Business, which costs $1,000 per month, will be far less.

But if Twitter wants to reach its target of 50% of its revenue coming from subscriptions, it needs to take action, because right now, according to analysis, Twitter Blue has around 450k subscribers, which equates to only 0.12% of Twitter’s total user base.

In order to generate 50% of Twitter’s total income, Twitter needs around 24 million users to sign up to the program. So while Twitter Blue is set to bring in more money for Elon and Co. (around $11 million per quarter to be exact), it’s nowhere close to being half of the platform’s intake, which, based on its last revenue report, would be around $590 million every three months.

While it also dilutes the value of the thing that it’s aiming to sell. The problem with selling blue checkmarks, both on Twitter and Facebook, is that you’re charging users for the exclusivity, and the perceived reputational value of having a blue tick, but as soon as anyone can buy it, it’s no longer valuable in this respect.

And as more people sign up, it becomes even less valuable over time, and once Twitter removes the legacy blue ticks, that will mean that the only checkmarks left are those that are attached to accounts that are paying for it, which will make it completely worthless in this respect. At that stage, the blue check is only going to show others that you have enough money to afford it, and that you want to support Elon Musk’s mission to change how Twitter works.

Maybe that has some value in itself, and there are some aspects of Twitter Blue that some users will pay for. Though even then, Twitter’s experimenting with a new option that would enable subscribers to not show their blue tick, if they choose – because even Twitter is moving to acknowledge that it’s not the indicator of reputational or exclusivity that it once was.

And it’ll become less so from next week – while it’s also worth noting that even if every legacy checkmark holder were to sign on to pay $8 per month, and keep their blue tick, that would still only be another 420k extra subscribers, max.

And I suspect many won’t. I suspect, too, that removing the legacy checkmarks will have a negative impact, in that it will see some of those users tweet even less, because they won’t feel as aligned to the platform that has taken away that marker from their account.

This is why selling verification ticks is a flawed strategy, because its growth and expansion dilutes its own value, and undermines the concept of what it is. Sure, Meta’s trying the same thing, but even Meta staff raised this same concern (as did Twitter staff), and Meta at least offers a truly valuable aspect, in providing additional, in-person support for paying subscribers.

But even then, Meta’s approach is also flawed, because you can’t sell reputation, you can’t charge for authority or recognition.

Some will think that’s what they’re getting, but eventually, when they’re the only ones left, I think you’ll find that it’ll be much easier to dismiss blue checkmark accounts in-stream.

It’s a confused approach, which won’t become a significant revenue driver – at least not without some significant additions that are worth paying for. But Twitter’s pushing ahead either way.  

Prepare to pay up, or lose your blue tick, from next week.



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The Best Marketing Strategy Is Choosing One Tactic at a Time

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The Best Marketing Strategy Is Choosing One Tactic at a Time

Contrary to the pressure you might be feeling, you really don’t need to be everywhere simultaneously. It’s easy to become overwhelmed thinking about the seemingly endless options to choose from. Most business owners feel pressure to juggle multiple social media accounts, email sequences, public relations efforts, etc. It’s enough to leave anyone with a headache — and a loss in which direction to move.

Though some would argue that showing up in different places will help you reach as many people as possible, that shouldn’t be your end goal. To grow and increase brand awareness, it’s about reaching the right people — not all people.

If you don’t know where to start? Choose one tactic at a time. Doing one thing incredibly well is much more strategic than doing a handful of things mediocrely. 

Start with your business goals

The key word here is your. Too often, we get wrapped up in what others do. This brand is on TikTok, that brand has a podcast, and this brand has countless influencers. The problem is that none of those brands have your mission, audience, or goals. So if you develop your marketing strategy around their approach, it’s bound to fall flat.

Establish your end goal first. Then, move into what tactic is going to help you get there. All businesses are in different places — even if they’re selling the exact same things. “They do it, so we should too” isn’t the way to go. Instead, be selfish, put your brand first, and get clear on your goals before moving forward.

Different stages of business, different goals. If you’re unsure which tactic to focus on, establishing your goals will point you in the right direction. 

Startups and early stage companies

Once you have a place to send people, like a website, consider moving into public relations strategies. PR allows new businesses to move in two ways: wide and deep. You can go wide by sharing insight into your audience or industry, reaching as many people as possible. And you can go deep by offering a tactical approach to said audience or industry. 

Many entrepreneurs think social media should be their main (and first) priority, but if you want to grow quickly, there are better moves. These channels can take longer to build up, whereas showcasing your expertise through different PR efforts will help you build credibility while giving you social proof to feature on your website. 

Established companies looking for new customers

Let’s say you’re an established company with a handful of basic customers, but hoping to expand and reach new people. If you want to attract new customers, it’s time to meet them where they’re at. If you’re more B2B focused and want to reach different professionals, LinkedIn is your best bet. However, if your audience is more Gen Z-focused, TikTok is a better use of your time. 

You don’t need to be on every single platform. You only need to spend time on one, maybe two (should you have the resources) channels that your ideal customers use regularly. Then, once you have a handle on your channel(s), consider expanding to others.

Established companies looking for referrals & repeat business

There’s power in not forgetting about your current customer base. If you’re looking for more referrals and repeat business, one marketing tactic to focus on are loyalty programs. Should an image of a well-worn punchcard come to mind, know there are plenty of other forms a loyalty program can take. First-timer discounts, referral rewards, and spending points, to name a few. To convince your current customers to stick around and share the wealth with others, think about a reward or discount that would boost their loyalty.

Brick-and-mortar businesses can go with that classic punch card, while digital businesses can offer a specific percentage off for those who refer their business to someone who becomes an actual customer. PR and social media tend to get all the hype, but these internally-focused tactics can make a massive difference in the long run. The customer experience shouldn’t end with a sale. Remember to nurture those who’ve made your business successful in the first place. 

One tactic at a time

Marketing is a unique beast — one that leads to plenty of analysis paralysis (aka, when we end up doing nothing because the number of options is incredibly overwhelming). Fortunately, focusing on one tactic at a time allows us to hone in on our goals and allocate our resources accordingly. So think about your needs, bring in your audience, and choose the strategy that will help you move the needle forward.

Cover image source: allvision

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