Successful professionals often promote the importance of focusing on your own company’s marketing efforts rather than those of your competitors. Sure, this is true to an extent, but–in order to stay relevant and remain successful, you should be keeping tabs on what other brands in your industry are doing. This week at #SproutChat, we discussed how to analyze your competitors and shared our tactics on how to be the business your audience chooses.
Use Smart Research to Find Your Competitors
For established industries with large brands that hold most of the market share, determining who your competitors are might not be necessary. But, for many small to medium sized businesses, smart research is crucial. Use keyword search tools and quantitative measurements on social to see who your customers are considering alongside your product or service.
Make private lists on Twitter or Facebook to easily reference what type of product updates and content your competitors are posting. Since social content is constantly updating, establishing a system to check in frequently is key. Gain insights for your own brand by noting which competitor campaigns outperform others.
A1. Who outranks you in SEO? Who is listed higher than you in Klout? #sproutchat
— Reva Minkoff (@revaminkoff) May 18, 2016
A1: It's not just an exact product match, its whoever is addressing the same market. #sproutchat
— Amy Wright (@SocialAmyW) May 18, 2016
A1: Research your market's behavior, see who their talking about on social media regarding your industry #Sproutchat
— Cooperatize (@Cooperatize) May 18, 2016
A1: Whoever is going after the same market share you are, with similar like/follower base, both numbers and quality #SproutChat
— Brad Lovett (@Brad_Lovett) May 18, 2016
A1. It's vital to find out. Your choice of competitor determines almost everything you do in your market #sproutchat http://pic.twitter.com/LZvry3V8dX
— Troy Sandidge (@Troy_Sandidge) May 18, 2016
Don’t Invest in Every Network Your Competitor Is On
Just because your competition has embraced a specific social network, doesn’t necessarily mean you should invest in it too. Consider your team’s bandwidth and budget before pursuing an active presence on a new social channel. Look at your existing audience’s demographics and habits to determine if the network your competitor is on would be a good fit for your company.
@SearcySledge 1. Walk before you run and 2. Pick a few networks to be GREAT at rather picking them all and doing them poorly. #SproutChat
— Kellie Elmerraji (@knelmerraji) May 18, 2016
A3.Just want to stress don't get too caught up in the data (or the content). Going off the norm can result in "trending results" #sproutchat
— Troy Sandidge (@Troy_Sandidge) May 18, 2016
A4: Absolutely not. You are *not* your competition. Do what works best for your brand. #sproutchat
— Recovery Brands (@RecoveryBrands) May 18, 2016
A4: Nope, you should only be on the social networks that your customers & target audience are on! #SproutChat
— Digital Fusion (@DigitalFusionHQ) May 18, 2016
Find the Value in the Data
Establish an internal workflow and pull as much data around your competitors as you can. Tools like BuzzSumo and Sprout Social can provide analytics and help provide benchmarks for your own social communities. When running any competitive analysis, go beyond vanity metrics to get a better grasp on how engaged your competitor’s customers and community really are.
Sprout’s ultimate guide on competitive analysis and Seer Interactive’s IFTTT recipes are great resources and can help your brand get started.
A5 There's this neat little button called "Reports" in @SproutSocial where you can compare stats #Sproutchat http://pic.twitter.com/7jWgppYpBn
— WP Site Care (@wpsitecare) May 18, 2016
A5: Engagement is the most important on social media. If you have a ton of followers and no engagement, something is wrong. #SproutChat
— Express Writers (@ExpWriters) May 18, 2016
A5b: Engagement builds a relationship and establishes trust between you and your audience. #SproutChat
— Express Writers (@ExpWriters) May 18, 2016
@SproutSocial A5) Number of shares is the stat I like to watch the most. #shareability #sproutchat
— JedRecord (@JedRecord) May 18, 2016
A5 vanity metrics provide dec insights, but also-is the brand engaging with followers? What is the tone of user posts/comments? #sproutchat
— Daniel Brophy (@dsbrophy) May 18, 2016
A5. Alerts are key….
I think looking beyond "followers friends or likes", # of audience buzz on you#sproutchat http://pic.twitter.com/DZU6vkDvD7— Troy Sandidge (@Troy_Sandidge) May 18, 2016
Join us every Wednesday for #SproutChat to discuss social media marketing and community building topics. Stay posted on weekly topics and discussion questions via our Facebook community. See you next time!
This post #SproutChat Recap: How to Analyze Your Competitors originally appeared on Sprout Social.
from Sprout Social http://ift.tt/1s9V1iD
via IFTTT
No comments:
Post a Comment