Take a moment and ask yourself this question: “Who is the best listener I know?”  Then, ask yourself: “How do I know this?”

We queried the Intrapromote staff, who nominated their best listeners as everyone from spouses to co-workers.  There was even a vote for “My Fat Dog!” As for the second question, the majority of answers fell into the “active listening” category: body language, eye contact, paraphrasing, following up, etc.

Active listening is just as important and even more so than speaking and providing information. This is a universal truth in business and in our personal relationships.

And the same holds true in Social Media.  Are you actively listening via Social Media?  How do your current and potential customers know this?

We believe an important step in building a Social Media Campaign Strategy is to include Digital Listening & Monitoring. Whether your efforts are for Customer Care, Marketing, Sales, or all of the above, knowing how to “tune in” and actively listen is a first step to exploring how social media can benefit your company.

Consider these three simple assumptions for Digital Listening and Monitoring:

• No single monitoring tool is perfect and you will need to listen to several “channels” and may need to use more than one aggregator tool to hear the conversations.

• Your Customers are in control. Whether they are your B2C or B2B Customers, they may be speaking on different and varied channels. There are no “rules of the game” here, so it’s important to know where your customers are engaging in conversations and sharing their sentiment about your company. Equally important, is to become familiar with the influencers who are listening to your customers.

• Digital Listening and Monitoring is not limited to just your own social media efforts. Whether you are listening to build your own social campaigns or obtain information for more productive sales, or improve your business, articulate some objectives and details about what you want to accomplish and how you want to see the results. Then, share findings across your organization.

Below I’ve listed some examples of Social Platforms. If you would like additional information about a custom Social Media Strategy that includes Digital Listening and Monitoring of your brand, please contact us.

Social Platforms For Digital Listening & Monitoring

Linda is, we have to say, our customer service expert. She is one of our Renaissance Women that is willing to jump into any project (big or small) and pitch in. She has been known (once or twice or a hundred times, give or take a few) that providing an excellent customer experience is her passion. And trust us when we say she isn’t lying. Like Woah. Linda is, among other things, a life-long learner and is instrumental in a number of internal educational projects. On Above the Fold & Socially Acceptable, Linda blogs about the customer experience first and foremost. But look out! She may just sneak up on you and publish something CRAZY like a post about education or something. She’s Tricksy like that.

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