Businesses don’t need to solicit reviews and survey answers to learn more about their customers. The goldmine of insight they’re searching for is on social media, where consumers unleash their most unfiltered opinions and ideas. According to Meltwater's Global State of Social Media Report, 87% of marketers cite monitoring brand reputation as their top priority for social listening (2026).
This is especially true for fashion consumers and Twitter. That’s why Twitter and Meltwater teamed up to analyze millions of fashion community Tweets and learn more about evolving consumer attitudes and rising trends. Some of the questions we wanted to answer were:
- What subtopics are most prevalent in the global fashion conversation?
- What macro and micro fashion trends are emerging?
- Who are the Twitter authors leading those conversations?
- What opportunities exist for fashion brands?
We gained insights into these topics and more using Explore, our social listening platform, in conjunction with other Meltwater solutions. Beginning with more than a dozen complex Boolean queries created by the insights services team at Linkfluence, a Meltwater offering, we narrowed our searches down to English-language Tweets posted between March 2021 and February 2022.
The team identified the macrotrends and microtrends taking over fashion Twitter conversations by comparing the volume of Tweets about specific fashion subjects published in the first six months to those published in the second six months. Our resulting report, The Fashion Industry’s New Era, offers insight into the fashion industry, but its main question — what do consumers want — is universal. “The insights shared within the report provide fashion marketers and advertisers with a solid foundation they can use to build out their future marketing strategies," says Lauren Jenkins, Head of the Twitter Official Partner Program. Here’s a closer look at how we did it.
To create innovative and impactful marketing strategies, you must have a comprehensive understanding of your target audience. 'The Fashion Industry's New Era,' developed in partnership with Meltwater, taps into the hundreds of millions of conversations Twitter users had around fashion the past year to identify meaningful insights and emerging trends within the industry.
Contents
How can social listening be used for market research?
How can keyword searches and trendspotting uncover insights?
How do you identify conversation leaders?
How can social listening power sales and consumer insights?
How do you turn insights into action?
How can social listening be used for market research?
The Fashion Industry's New Era is the forward-thinking marketer's guide to the fashion industry. Read on to learn more about how we created the report and used social listening for market research. But first, here's a brief look at our methodology:
• 8.7% growth in the global fashion conversation in that time
• 5 macrotrends and 10 microtrends identified
What tools did we use?
The Fashion Industry's New Era was created using Twitter data sourced through Explore, our social listening platform. We also used two of Meltwater's consumer insights offerings: Linkfluence and Audiense.
How did we source the data?
The Fashion Industry's New Era is based on data sourced from Boolean queries, conducted on Explore, of English-language Tweets published between March 1, 2021 and February 28, 2022.
The macrotrends and microtrends discussed in the report were discovered via an analysis of mentions volume via Explore, the Twitter explore feature, additional desk research, as well as other fashion-related studies currently underway at Linkfluence. We compared keyword mention volume evolutions between the first half and second half of the 12 months measured (i.e. 3/21 to 8/21 compared to 9/21 to 2/22).
What fashion trends did we discover?
Our analysis led us to a number of rising fashion trends, including meta fashion and inclusive fashion. See the full list of trends by downloading the report.
| Technique | What it involves | Insight gained |
|---|---|---|
| Keyword Searches | Using Boolean queries to capture relevant fashion conversations at scale | Built a large, relevant dataset of social media discussions |
| Trendspotting | Monitoring changes in conversation volume and patterns over time | Identified emerging trends and spikes in interest |
| Conversation Analysis | Grouping discussions into themes and recurring topics | Revealed key topics and consumer interests |
| Influencer Identification | Tracking high-engagement accounts and frequently mentioned voices | Highlighted key influencers shaping conversations |
| Data Refinement | Iteratively improving queries to remove irrelevant data | Increased accuracy and relevance of insights |
| Insight Synthesis | Combining trends, themes, and influencer data into findings | Generated actionable insights for strategy and reporting |
How can keyword searches and trendspotting uncover insights?
With keyword searches in place, we at Meltwater dug into the data using Explore’s analytic charts. Keyword clouds and bar graphs of the top hashtags revealed the most-talked-about subjects and entities for each trend, showing us where we needed to dig further.
Keyword searches and mention tracking are straightforward ways marketers can use social listening to tap into consumer conversations and industry trends. Social listening doesn’t just tell you who’s in on conversations about your brand and market, it also shows you the topics catching their attention. From there, top social listening platforms surface the words and phrases showing up most often in their social media posts, reposts, and comments.
At times, the same keywords popping up across different conversation topics can point you to commonalities and trends across audiences, helping you find and define the different communities and personas that make up your general audience. For example, the phrase “out this listing” popped up in keyword clouds across multiple queries. They pointed us to valuable Twitter conversations about fashion resale where users were encouraging people to check out their listings.
While manually combing through individual social media posts might slowly clue you into current hot topics, social listening provides a bird’s-eye view that lets you tap into rising trends without much lift.
How do you identify conversation leaders?
While making The Fashion Industry’s New Era, we sought to understand the people and entities driving conversations around emerging fashion trends. Using Explore’s analytic dashboard widgets, we looked at the most retweeted Tweets, the most-followed Tweet authors, shares of voice by keyword mentions, and the top professions of Tweet authors in each conversation. High-level insights like these revealed the different communities driving fashion conversations on Twitter, as well as the influencers those different groups trust for recommendations, commentary, and inspiration.
We also used the platform’s timeline visualizations to pinpoint conversation spikes. Because they are dynamic, we were able to click on specific data points to see more in-depth analytics for specific days and times. That’s how we learned more about how the inclusive fashion communities rally around Twitter authors and Tweets that highlight plus-size, modest, non-Western, and accessible fashion.
Combined with geographic and topic filters and narrowed-down search terms, social listening saves essential time when it comes to scouting ideal marketing partners and influencers. By letting data — sourced directly from your audience — drive partnerships and collaborations, marketers can increase overall engagement and better align with company goals.
How can social listening power sales and consumer insights?
Social listening plays a key role in understanding the customer journey. 50.4% of internet users research brands online before purchasing, meaning brand perception is increasingly shaped by what people see and say online (Meltwater, 2026). Social listening takes the mystery out of website traffic and sales surges. Spikes in relevant keywords and conversations that match up with sales rises and dips offer valuable context that just may reveal untapped marketing opportunities. This goes double for marketers analyzing their own brands and competitive ones. The data insights social listening reveals help marketing professionals invest in and maximize ROI-generating projects and programs.
Outside of insights on sales trends, social listening extracts invaluable data for consumer insights research and compatible tools. Social media users tell the world about themselves in two places: their published posts and their profile bios; social listening picks up information from each area. Done manually, researching social media users’ bios is a time-consuming, data analysis nightmare. However, social listening platforms that are part of all-in-one suites eliminate the legwork.
We used our social listening platform, Explore, in conjunction with our consumer insights platform to learn more about the audiences of five macrotrends. The compatible platforms use easy-to-use download and upload functions to simplify the process of transferring data from tool to tool. Along with giving us a closer look at their online habits and most-followed influencers, Audiense (powered by IBM Watson) generated a deep dive on each community’s personality traits and purchase influence factors. For example, we learned that meta fashion enthusiasts are more likely to be influenced by a product’s utility than the general public when it comes to purchasing decisions.
How do you turn insights into action?
Social listening doesn’t just provide visibility; it drives performance. Companies that effectively leverage customer data outperform competitors by up to 85% in sales growth, highlighting the value of turning social insights into actionable strategy (Forbes, 2025).
Combined, the benefits of social listening point marketers to new opportunities and stronger ways of connecting with consumers. Unfortunately, many businesses don’t have the time, tools, or resources to get started. Especially for global brands, there aren’t enough hours in the day to manually keep up with, contextualize, and draw insights from every social media mention of your name — let alone those of your competitors. This is where time- and money-saving platform features, like Explore’s unlimited keyword searches and dynamic data visualizations, take marketers the extra mile.
Despite the widely recognized value of data, 50% of business decisions are currently being made without consumer insights (GWI AI White Paper, 2025). This "execution gap" highlights a massive opportunity for brands that successfully embed social listening into their daily workflows. We used the power of social listening to analyze fashion, but the methods and tools we used are invaluable across industries. Download The Fashion Industry’s New Era for our full findings, methodologies, and more than a dozen new insights for marketers.
Complete the form below to schedule a demo or take a self-guided Social Listening product tour to see how you can uncover trends, track conversations, and turn data into insights in minutes. Explore the platform at your own pace and discover how to make smarter, data-driven decisions.
FAQs about Using Social Listening for Market Research
How do you start a social listening project for market research?
It usually begins with defining what you want to learn, then building keyword queries around your industry, products, and trends. From there, you collect a large dataset of conversations and refine it over time to ensure relevance and quality.
How do you avoid irrelevant data when analyzing social conversations?
Noise is one of the biggest challenges in social listening. The key is continuously refining your Boolean queries by adding exclusions, testing variations, and narrowing your scope so you’re left with conversations that truly reflect your audience and topic.
How do you spot meaningful trends in large volumes of social data?
It’s less about total volume and more about movement over time. By tracking spikes, shifts, and recurring themes in conversations, you can identify trends as they emerge rather than after they’ve already peaked.
How can you tell which voices actually matter in a conversation?
Not all mentions carry the same weight, so it’s important to look at engagement, true reach, and consistency. Identifying the accounts that repeatedly drive conversation helps you understand who is shaping opinions in your space.
How do you turn social data into something your team can actually use?
The real value comes from synthesizing the data into clear themes and insights. This often means grouping conversations, identifying patterns, and translating findings into simple takeaways that marketing, product, or strategy teams can act on.
Can social listening really connect to business outcomes like sales?
Yes. When you compare conversation trends with real-world performance, useful patterns can emerge. For example, increased discussion around certain topics or products can often align with shifts in consumer demand or interest.
How quickly can you get insights from social listening?
Unlike traditional research, you don’t have to wait weeks for results. One of the biggest advantages of social listening for research is speed. Once your queries are set up, you can start seeing patterns and insights almost immediately, making it much faster than traditional research methods like surveys or focus groups.
Schedule a demo today to learn more about what Meltwater solutions can do for you:
