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AI adoption is no longer the challenge—trusted context is. Most organizations have AI tools, but many still rely on disconnected, stale, or unverified data, limiting the quality and trustworthiness of AI-generated outputs. Meltwater MCP brings trusted, real-time intelligence into AI assistants.

Your Best Context is Already in the Room

Today, PR teams aren’t just tracking media coverage and share of voice. They’re also measuring how their brand shows up in AI-generated answers, search summaries, and large language models (LLMs). This new LLM visibility layer is quickly becoming a critical part of PR performance.

15 Must-Have PR KPIs and How to Track Them

See how one platform can power every decision across PR, communications, and marketing.

The Meltwater Blog

Blog Topics: Generative Engine Optimization, Media Intelligence, Media Relations, Social Listening, Consumer Intelligence, Influencer Marketing

Find out how you can leverage Facebook to boost your brand's online presence and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

Facebook Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage Instagram to boost your brand's visual appeal and gain a competitive edge. Explore our category page today!

Instagram Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage LinkedIN to grow your professional network and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

LinkedIn Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage TikTok to elevate your brand with creative content and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

TikTok Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage X / Twitter to engage your audience effectively and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

X / Twitter Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage YouTube to create engaging video content and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

YouTube Blog | Meltwater

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is transforming how brands show up in AI-powered search. Explore insights, strategies, and best practices to help your content rank and resonate across conversational engines like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot.

Explore insights and strategies for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) to help your brand stay visible and discoverable in AI-powered search.

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) Blog Collection | Meltwater

Media monitoring helps organizations stay informed about what’s being said across online news, print, broadcast, podcasts, and other media channels. Whether you're tracking brand mentions, measuring PR performance, monitoring competitors, or identifying emerging trends, our expert guides, best practices, and industry insights will help you build a smarter media monitoring strategy and make more informed communications decisions.

Discover expert media monitoring guides, best practices, and industry insights to track brand mentions, monitor competitors, and stay ahead of the news.

Media Monitoring: Guides, Best Practices & Industry Insights

Every day billions of conversations take place on social media: tweets, posts, comments, blogs, reviews, podcasts, and much more.
Learn how to use social listening to make sense of all of that data.

On our social listening category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around social listening and social media monitoring. Read more.

Social Listening Blogs | Category

Business Reputation Management: What does it take to add reputation management to your marketing strategy? More importantly, how do you keep your reputation sparkly and shiny? Here’s your all-access guide to online reputation management for the long term.

On our reputation management category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around business reputation management. Read more.

Reputation Management Blogs | Category

From your brand's logo to your website, your social media presence to your customer support—these elements combined are what constitutes a brand in the minds of customers. But, there are thousands of other businesses that have a logo, website, social media presence, and website. So, how can you position your business on the market and make it stand out from the competition?
The key to success is branding & brand management!

On our brand management category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around brand management. Build your strategy and reach your goals!

Brand Management Blogs | Category

Competitive intelligence and the act of collecting competitive data can be seen as growth drivers for a company. Our guide will help you understand the concept of competitive intelligence (CI) by answering questions such as: What is the definition of competitive intelligence? How is competitive intelligence useful to organizations? What is the goal of competitive intelligence? And more.

On our competitive intelligence category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around competitive intelligence. Learn how to stay ahead.

Competitive Intelligence Blogs | Category

Let’s dive into the customer journey framework and how to optimize the process by creating a customer journey map and using metrics that matter when analyzing the customer journey.

On our customer journey category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around mapping and understanding the customer journey.

Customer Journey Blogs | Category

What Is Data Analytics?
How can I grow my business? 
How do customers interact with my newly launched product?
How do I increase the productivity of my employees?
How do I know if my marketing efforts are working?
We have just two words for you...Data analytics!

On our data analytics category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around AI and data analytics. Technical and still easy to understand.

AI & Data Analytics Blogs | Category

Public relations and media relations can add impact to any marketing strategy. It’s an opportunity for brands to grow their reach beyond traditional sales messages. PR helps to shape the image you want people to have of your brand.
So, what is PR and how do you use it? This guide shows you everything you need to know to build a strong public relations foundation.

On our public relations (PR) category page, you find all our blogs covering public relations and communications topics. Step up your PR game.

Public Relations (PR) Blogs | Category

We all know exactly what the roles of sales or accounting are in a company, right? We might even have a slight idea of what the IT guys are doing.
But there is another business discipline, that plays a crucial role in organizations, even more so during the pandemic – internal communications!
But what exactly do we mean by that, what purpose does it serve and what steps can you take to ensure you and your employees will communicate effectively?

On our internal communications category page, you find all our blogs about internal comms topics. Learn about the intranet, internal newsletters, and more.

Internal Communications Blogs | Category

As the internet has taken root in more areas of our lives — everything from entertainment to shopping to paying bills and more — traditional marketing is becoming less impactful. As any marketer knows, you need to focus on where your audience is if you want to reach them. Since the average person spends about seven hours a day online, it’s no surprise that content has maintained its hold on marketers.
Here's a closer look at what content marketing is and why it matters more than ever in our digital-first economy.

On our content marketing category page, you find blogs about content marketing topics. Learn about strategies, KPIs, tips, and more. Make your content king!

Content Marketing Blogs | Category

The rise of the influencer marketing space – today a $10 billion industry, growing 50% per year – is one of the clearest examples of how social media is transforming traditional marketing. These days having a business website, presence on social, PR coverage, and your own content isn’t enough to compete.
We'll dive into the intricacies of influencer marketing to help ensure that you're equipped with the insights needed to be successful in this space.

On our influencer marketing category page, you find blogs about influencer marketing topics. Build your strategy, find influencers, and measure results.

Influencer Marketing Blogs | Category

Have you just launched a new product or service that you want to get the word out about? Maybe you want to share with consumers why it is awesome and how it is so much better than the one your competitors offer.
Well, then, there is one thing you can't do without...Marketing!

On our marketing category page, you find blogs about marketing topics. Learn about all the different angles and types of marketing and improve your results.

Marketing Blogs | Category

In this guide, we want to give you a peek into the definition of social media management, the daily schedule of a social media manager, social media platforms to promote your business, and the do’s & don’ts of social media management.
Are you ready to begin the journey of becoming a social media superstar?

On our social media management category page, you find blogs about social media management topics. Build and manage your online community.

Social Media Management Blogs | Category

Building a following and using social media platforms to reach a wider audience requires a well-planned social media marketing strategy. In this guide, we’ll be looking at why social media marketing is so essential and how you can make it work for your business.

On our social media marketing category page, you find blogs about social media marketing topics. Learn how to get the highest paid social ROI!

Social Media Marketing Blogs | Category

In the fast-evolving realm of digital marketing and public relations, utilizing the right tools is crucial for success. Our interdisciplinary category showcases all the pertinent tools for digital marketing & PR. These tools help in enhancing your online presence and effectively reaching target groups, whether through reputation management, influencer marketing, or social media management.

On our digital marketing and PR tools category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around mapping and understanding the customer journey.

Digital Marketing & PR Tools Blogs | Category

Expanding your marketing efforts to new national markets is an exciting and critical moment for your brand. Do it properly and your company’s revenue can sky-rocket by tapping into massive audiences previously off-limits – but do it on the hoof and your international brand will most likely be strangled in its infancy.

Navigating the minefield process of localizing your campaigns to each market without any prior experience can be daunting, especially so with limited funds, but there are a few simple procedural changes marketers can make to their strategies to ensure that creative social supports international expansion. First up…

People in different countries use different social platforms. If you’re in charge of localizing your company’s social media output to new markets, your first port of call should be to work out which platforms are popular in each market – even if they’re unfamiliar to you – and which also are the best fit for your brand.

For example, you can forget about using Twitter, Facebook or Youtube to break into the Chinese market as all three have been banned by authorities. But there are always alternatives to the channels you’re used to – Qzone or Renren are massive in China.

Once you’ve worked out which social platforms will work in each country you're localising to, the next step is to spend some time truly understanding exactly what people are using these sites for; is it microblogging? Sharing videos? Private messaging? The myriad distinctions in function between each social media platform can be dizzying but the best way to get to the bottom of what a channel is all about is to ask the question: what makes this channel successful and popular in this market? Once you have the answer to that, you’re en route to comprehending the essence of a platform.

If you want your messaging to translate effectively across cultures, your content must be relevant and look native to each specific culture. Stay on top of the social and political climates in each market and you’ll avoid churning accidentally insensitive remarks into the public sphere. Remember Kenneth Cole – the best way to introduce yourself to a new market is certainly not to insult that market.

Do your research, respect societal norms and draw up a culture/style guide for each market. Anything less and your social efforts will be wasted.

Related to culture but still distinct enough to deserve separate consideration. This is more about researching the general attitude and personality of a market. When marketing to your own country this is an instinctive process, honed through years of growing up and gaining a sense of nationhood. Unless you’ve spent serious time in the country you’re creating social content for, you will not be afforded this luxury when marketing to new markets and will have to learn it from scratch.

A combination of field and desk research is vital to achieving this. Add it into your cultural style guide and consider the importance of “transcreating” – rather than simply translating your campaigns.

The scourge of every global marketer is having to work with creative that hasn’t been designed with localization in mind. Creating assets like videos, memes and infographics can be expensive enough – being lumped with a tranche of non-localisable creative that has to be made all over again for a new market is insanity; wasting time, money and resources.

If you’re rolling out a campaign across multiple markets, instruct your creative team to plan all assets with localization in mind and to do their utmost to streamline processes at every opportunity. This can be as simple as sending .psd asset templates for infographics to each localization team (rather than .jpgs which have to be edited all over again, inevitably creating unwanted variations between markets). All that planning will be worth it and make the localization process as stress-free as possible.

Don’t use Google translate (find yourself some locals)

Number one sin of localization: Google Translating your copy. I struggle to believe anybody still does but if you do, stop it, stop it right now. This article will help you understand why.

It's wise to create local teams in each country who can be in charge of adapting content to their markets. Cultural savvy is essential here — in-market linguists are best positioned to decide if a particular piece of social content is relevant to the target country, not only in terms of content but also tone. Avoiding committing cultural taboos and understanding what encourages social engagement are not two of Google Translate’s strong points – so get yourself a local.

A good alternative is using Unbabel, who offer an online translation service that combines Artificial Intelligence with Crowd Post-Editing, to provide seamless translation. These guys are actually trying to get the brands’ tone right for their translations.

Also consider applying strict version control and don’t let translators or designers copy/paste content. Subtitling apps can support translators with local market knowledge and help your brand create high quality, geographically relevant content.

When it comes to multiple market translation, social media platforms are prone to messing around with their rules. YouTube, for example, are scared of skewed view counts and have strict rules in place that marketers must adhere to – just having different subtitles doesn’t quite cut it. In China meanwhile, there is a long list of words that you are simply not allowed to use (you’ll be banned from all networking if you do).

Again, the key is to do your research, as well as continually staying on top of any developments in social media platforms’ policies.

While it’s important to tailor your content to multiple markets via segmentation, it is equally important to unify all of these markets through one global brand account – the ‘daddy’ account.

We hope these steps can help you localize social media campaigns. Let us know what you think. How are you crafting your social media strategy around the globe?

This article was written by Joao Romao from Business2Community and was legally licensed through the NewsCred publisher network.

How To Localize Social Media Campaigns

Each day brands and consumers alike leave a trail of digital breadcrumbs. When traced and analysed, this litter of online activity can be used to provide organisations with business-critical information on their audience, competition, industry trends, risks and more.

Did you know that 90% of the world’s internet data was generated in the last two years alone? This equates to 2.5 quintillion bytes of data created on a daily basis. That’s billions of individual data-points containing infinite amounts of business-critical information that can be used to inform corporate decision making.

Although we’ve seen an increase in executives leveraging alternative data (data found from outside of their company’s walls), we’re still seeing many making business decisions solely based on internal data. Even more worryingly, a study by Gartner found that 95% of leaders continue to make business decisions using intuition and significantly underestimate risks as a result.

Internal data, such as sales volumes, financial numbers, CRM data etc. is, and will remain, important. There are a bunch of companies out there, such as Salesforce and Oracle, doing a fantastic job in the business intelligence space, however, internal data looks at the past. The caveat is that it’s a lagging indicator. You wouldn’t drive a car only looking in your rearview mirror. The same should go for steering your business. You need to look ahead to spot hazards and stay abreast of the competition. Alternative data, give businesses the information advantage they need to do just that.

Mining and blending both internal and external insights helps you to stay fully informed and gain a 360 view of your company. Only then can you sleep well at night knowing you’re making decisions utilising the most complete set of data available.

During this article, I’ll walk you through the types of alternative data sources that can be tracked, as well as a handful of signals that can indicate the route to take when it comes to strategic decision making.

A treasure trove of valuable alternative data sources

Publicly available internet sources are a treasure trove for executives. When analysed, they offer insights into your ecosystem and surface threats/ opportunities in tandem. Being able to assess your company against the backdrop of the wider industry and understand the context of the landscape you’re operating in is critical for success. Here are a few examples of external data sources often monitored by the c-suite for that purpose:

Predictive insights lead to proactive business decision making

The remarkable evolution of big data technologies has led to an increase in companies creating data-driven business workflow processes, however, many execs are struggling to make sense of big data. Let’s admit, we’re drowning in it – and some companies are finding it difficult to stay afloat altogether. The truth is, executives need insights as well as data.

Advanced technology such as machine learning, natural language processing and AI are increasingly used in enterprise solutions for the purpose of making sense of big data. By converting unstructured sources into structured ones that enable Search, Alerting and Analytical capabilities, businesses are better able to harness the alternative data around them.

Perhaps one of the most promising areas in which AI helps us to make better business decisions is predictive insights. Using historical and real-time data, specially trained algorithms can look for patterns and signals which indicate what could happen in the future and alert you to real-time opportunities and threats as they grow.

Using external data, you can predict potential IPOs, growth patterns, investments and more. Extracting these trends can give you the edge you need to prepare for disruptions in the market, seize opportunities as they arise, and mitigate risks by solving business problems before they hit.

Systematically connecting the dots across different data sources instead of looking at them in isolation is vital. In doing so, companies can get to grips with casualties and surface insights used to benefit all functions of the company, from marketing, sales, R&D, HR and beyond.

Here are a few examples of signals that executives from various industries are using to inform critical business decision making.

As the saying goes, “no man is an island” – the same applies to businesses.

Each day your competitors leave behind plenty of online breadcrumbs that can be used to anticipate their next move and where your industry is heading. Competitive intelligence looks beyond financial data to provide you with an unbiased and comprehensive overview of your competitors’ strategies, company’s position in the market, customer perceptions, and rising trends to enable more proactive decision making.

Common ways businesses are conducting competitive intelligence include tracking conversation development around patent filings, R&D investments, hiring trends, and fluctuations in ad-spend with the aim of:

Predicting their competitor’s future focus areas

Defending market share from existing and emerging players

Evaluating the impact of current strategies vs how customers are responding to competitors’ strategies

A look at open job listings in competitor companies will show where they’re investing in terms of human resources and the new skills they are after. Significant discussions in the media or on social can indicate critical customer feedback, while financial changes indicate gaps in the market or new opportunities to take market share. Each of these factors demonstrates the wider position of the market and can help boards predict the impact of future decisions.

A search on the hiring trends of key automotive brands found AI giant, Tesla, to be at risk from competitor Volvo. The analysis showcases that Volvo is hiring x2.5 more engineers than Tesla and we see an uptick in jobs with Artificial intelligence, Machine learning & Virtual reality skills. Tesla should use such insights to defend their tech positioning.

News and social media information is a form of alternative data that’s growing in popularity among investors across the globe. Online media is filled with what the financial industry calls signals – or events which can indicate the growth trajectory (or lack of growth) for a particular company.

Below are just a few forward-looking signals used by investors to surface opportunities and discover potential threats since they offer a good indication of how a brand might perform when it reaches public markets.

Expanding on the above, employee turnover and mass layoffs are also indicative of the performance of a company. By tracking online news around mentions of mass layoffs (and the common job titles being let go), staff turnover, changes in leadership strategy, a new direction focus, poor company culture etc, as well as financial documents, investors are using insights to confidently plan where to part ways with their cash based on the general ‘health’ of the organisation.

From crowdsourced ideas to detailed consumer feedback and sentiment, insights drawn from alternative data are enabling product developers to get a much deeper understanding of their users and changing consumer behaviours.

The healthcare space is one example of a sector making positive strides in product development using external data. According to the Google Knowledge Graph, 1 in 20 Google searches are for health-related information. As long as a Google search remains more accessible than a visit to a doctor, there’s a good chance most consumers will continue to consult their search bar leading up to a conversation with a professional. If analysed in aggregate, this search data can be extremely helpful for healthcare professionals looking to better serve this population.

Search data gives us a micro glimpse into the public’s mindset, fears, concerns, curiosities and more. The use of such data points also helps to eliminate biases, so your teams can research and develop products that solve real problems. Leading pharmaceutical companies are also leveraging insights to inform the areas that stakeholders need further educating on, for example, side effects of particular vaccines.

The value of external data and predictive analytics has also increased significantly in the agricultural sector and is changing the culture of farming.

Platforms such as the CGIAR (Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research) and the CIAT (International Center for Tropical Agriculture) are developing models to create strategic foresight scenarios which consider the impact of climate, water resources, and technology on agriculture. Farmers can use insights to make decisions, significantly reducing risk and increasing their chances of successful yield. And the industry has seen great success from doing so. In 2014, during a dry spell in Montería (Córdoba), the CIAT recommended farmers delay planting their rice crop. This advice was followed by 170 farmers. By leveraging external insights, farmers were able to mitigate risks. It’s estimated the farmers who followed advice avoided crop losses valued at over USD 3.6 million and produced a better crop yield in comparison to the neighbouring communities who went ahead with the rice farming as per usual.

By now you hopefully have a better understanding of the dynamic use cases of alternative data and the value it brings. Want to discuss leveraging this for your organisation? Fill out the form below and we’ll be in touch!

Using Alternative Data & External Signals for Decision Making

B2B healthcare companies are increasingly using Twitter for a very public social media footprint that on its surface doesn't mesh with the industry's previously secretive communications strategy. But not only is there now an expectation that all companies use social media, but those that do it well are also netting surprisingly positive results. Here are some examples of innovative content.

The B2B healthcare industry is going through a transformation in the way healthcare providers, insurers, and life science companies carry on their online communications. 

Social media has brought a direct way for companies to communicate with their clients, potential partners, and their community, using social channels to strengthen relationships. Here are three ways healthcare companies use Twitter, the best practices they follow, and new ways they are finding to engage with their community.

Healthcare companies work with a fundamental aspect of human’s lives: their longevity, their quality of life, and most importantly, their hope. The ethical implications of selling life-saving drugs make healthcare companies, even b2b healthcare companies, prefer a human-focused communication style. That’s why all these companies sponsor social initiatives related to the diseases for which they develop drugs.

Genentech, a company that uses human genetic information to develop biotherapeutics, announces its collaborative pop-up store with the Living Beyond Breast Cancer Foundation and Third Bra. By partnering with these companies Genentech is reaffirming their dedication to the fight against breast cancer.

On the other hand, Abbvie (a biopharmaceuticals company) broadcasts their concern about Chagas, a tropical disease from South America.

Gilead Sciences, a biopharmaceutical company, tweets about COMPASS, a social initiative to support organizations working to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the Southern United States. 

When people think about high tech, they think Google, Facebook, and Amazon. But healthcare and biotech companies represent a large piece of the industry. To understand their market share, in 2016 the biotech industry in its entirety received over $7 billion in venture capital funding, that’s 10% of the total $69 billion invested in the United States for the same period.

Healthcare companies have to compete in a crowded space where talent is scarce. For that reason, they use Twitter to deliver content that supports their corporate culture, such as team building activities that support their community.

AthenaHealth, a healthcare software company, shares the volunteer work their employees do in Watertown, MA.

Greenway Health, a privately owned vendor of health information technology, did something similar when their employees volunteered at the American Cancer Society. 

In a similar vein, DrChrono, a medical platform for physicians and patients, retweet their VP of Sales and Customer Success, who’s proud of working for over 4 years for their company, something that shows how well the company cares about their employees. 

3. Distributing Content for Lead Generation

All B2B companies need to generate a large number of leads to expand their sales pipeline and hit their quarterly goals. Since B2B healthcare companies have product offerings that are very complex and costly, they need to plan their sales lifecycle so as to continuously generate more business opportunities.

That’s why they rely on content marketing to generate leads. From blog posts to whitepapers to podcasts to webinars, B2B healthcare companies use content to grow.

Kareo, a cloud-based software company for independent medical practices, hosts Twitter chats to connect with their audience in real-time. 

McKesson uses Twitter to broadcast their latest blog post. 

Cerner, a supplier of health information technology solutions, highlights the value of their podcast. 

Finally, Cardinal Health, a pharmaceuticals and medical products distribution company, shares their webinars, which in this case, is focused on attracting laboratorians—their core target audience. 

Twitter continues to be a key channel for B2B healthcare. While these organizations vary in their offers and audience, they all have one thing in common: they use Twitter to connect and generate awareness about diseases, attract talent, and create business opportunities. In essence, the B2B health industry doesn’t use social media very differently than the b2c industry. They do follow the best practice strategy of considering their audience and crafting content that their followers are receptive to and engage with.

If you want to take B2B social media to the next level, consider downloading our ebook on building a social media program on any budget.

3 Innovative Ways Healthcare B2B Companies Use Twitter/X

We’ve all been in either one of these scenarios:

1. You come across a movie trailer that caught your attention… until you saw that it was rated 30% on Rotten Tomatoes along with many negative reviews. Nah, not worth it, you thought.

2. You are searching online for accommodation for your vacation in Bali and come across a listing with great pictures. You scroll down to the review section and read that they have low hygiene standards. Nope, you close that tab and continue your search.

These experiences are not uncommon, and they both demonstrate how detrimental a single user review can be in diminishing the credibility of a brand or product. A single review can change the minds of consumers even if the Marketing team has done a good job with promoting it.

User reviews have always played a crucial role in the consumer decision-making journey, and due to a few recent developments, their influence will only continue to grow. The first is Google’s optimisation of their review feature, which is now closely linked to SEO rankings for both web and map search. Also, Google has made the review process more seamless, adding in prompters to consumers to ensure they give a clear review that will benefit other consumers. With Google making it much easier to share and read reviews, we can expect the volume of Google reviews to grow over time.

The next driving force is the growth of social and e-commerce platforms. E-commerce companies have been around for some time, and a large part of their business model relies heavily on users sharing their experiences through reviews. User reviews assure shoppers that the product or service they are intending to buy can be trusted, reducing risk and uncertainty in the buying process. As e-commerce companies move towards social commerce, the volume and speed of user reviews will see a boost.

Review tracking – now a business must-have

User reviews are a type of word-of-mouth, but unlike speech that disappears once it is spoken, these reviews remain online. A user review can range from generic ones like “I love/hate it”, or in-depth ones that go into detail about what exactly they like or do not.

When brands start tracking reviews and mining this data at scale, they are essentially listening to the organic voice of their consumers. Customer pain points, what they care about and their buying behaviour are insights that can be derived from tracking these conversations. No longer do companies have to pay big money to market research firms to get this kind of insight – that information now exists online and in huge volume. And this is why is it crucial for companies to engage in text mining to extract that data.

The strange thing is that despite many brands acknowledging the need to track user reviews, it is still not a mainstream practice for many organisations. I believe this is attributed to several factors:

1. The perception that it is not practical 

As the saying goes – you don’t know what you don’t know. And many organisations do not know about the existence of companies that provide review tracking services as scale.

2. Many organisations believe they can rely on manual tracking 

The first thing that people think about when I mention review tracking is keeping an eye on reviews on their own brand on a limited number of platforms. This manual process involves randomly visiting review pages and transcribing any new user reviews onto an Excel spreadsheet. It is a time-consuming process that limits the kind of data they can get.

3. No best practice or methodology in place for organisations to scale 

Let’s say your organisation takes the first step and engages in a review tracking service to extract all that data. The next question to think about is what they should be tracking. Not many people can begin to imagine the scale of this task at hand.

Just to give you an idea of the magnitude of what should be tracked – let’s imagine we are a B2C electronics company. Think about the various products we own and the variations of each product. These multiple product listings sit on different e-commerce platforms and discussion forums. Next, to truly understand our consumers, we also want to track reviews of our competitor’s products, and the number of competitor products out there feels almost endless. Manual tracking doesn’t seem so viable now, does it?

User review tracking seems like a huge undertaking, but the good news is that Meltwater can automate the entire process to give you the relevant insights. As I have shared during the FUTR Asia event, Meltwater has the ability to do web crawling at scale. We can extract user reviews from any site with HTML pages such as Google reviews, TripAdvisor and e-commerce platforms such as Lazada.

More importantly, our powerful Natural Language Processing (NLP) technology enables attribution tagging. What this means is that it automates the reading, analysing and categorising of user reviews with near-human accuracy.

When this data is exported to Meltwater’s analytics platform, what you get is a comprehensive report that gives you a deep understanding of your consumers in an instant. It is exciting to imagine the potential strategies and initiatives brands can drive with the new knowledge and insight they get from external data.

If review tracking is something your organisation would like to explore, feel free to reach out via LinkedIn or email me at mimrah.ch@meltwater for an exploratory session.

How To Understand Your Consumers’ Voice With Review Tracking

More companies are evaluating their focus on environmental practices and corporate social responsibility. However, asserting a commitment to the environment and actually adhering to “green” practices are two different things. 

In recent years, many consumers have called out companies for what’s known as “greenwashing.” This refers to making unsubstantiated or misleading claims about the environmental benefits of a particular company practice or decision. In doing so, companies create the illusion they’re more environmentally friendly than they really are. 

Here are some examples of greenwashing and how companies and their communications teams can avoid it while recommitting to green practices.

1. Contributing to nonprofits for a certain disease—and then selling unhealthy products known to cause those diseases

What do you make of a company that contributes to the American Heart Association yet sells fast food to customers? Or a business that makes candy, yet donates to charities dedicated to diabetes awareness?  

To avoid this type of corporate greenwashing, make sure your product lines include healthy products that contain natural ingredients. If a wholesale healthy menu makeover isn’t possible, then focus on ensuring your messaging around product features is both accurate and transparent. Once you’ve aligned your business practices with the marketing message you’d like to share, look at top healthcare brands who got it right for inspiration.

2. Encouraging recycling—but selling products harmful to the environment or providing plastic bags for customers to take recycled items home

Even if a retailer means well and shares messages about the value of recycling, they may not have completely thought through just how green their actual business practices are.

Also, to be meaningful in your approach to environmentalism, help your customers adhere to “green” principles. Consider the following tactics:

Align your environmental values with your product portfolio and purchase processes

Review your product mix and see if you can work with more eco-friendly vendors

Collect items for recycling through a dedicated area in your store or by collecting items upon delivery of other goods

Offer your own branded reusable bags and hand them out to customers

If you’re primarily an online business, reduce packaging and shipping materials

3. Making environmental claims the company is already legally required to provide

Boasting about how you’re helping the environment is considerably less impressive when you are only doing it because it’s the law. Having a green mindset should mean more than simply doing what you’re already obligated to do. 

Stay away from this type of dishonest marketing message. Focus on how you go “above and beyond” for the environment. If you aren’t making an extra effort, then silence is the better option—at least until you develop a truly green operation or process. 

4. Lobbying against environmental measures behind the scenes—while leadership and comms regularly deliver pro-environmental messages

This may be one of the worst types of greenwashing because it can highlight the deceptive lengths certain companies go to in order to project an environmentally sound image. Many companies publicly declare their environmental focus but secretly hire lobbyists to influence legislators to defeat “green” initiatives that may adversely impact the company’s profitability. 

Consider your priorities and values before publicly taking a stand on social media or elsewhere. If you aren’t ready to commit fully to the environment, then don’t make those claims. Deliver marketing messages that are transparent, honest and accurate. Take a look at examples of big brands that decided to mix PR and politics for learning lessons and what to do—and what to avoid.

5. Putting inaccurate environmentally friendly claims on your labels

This is especially egregious when savvy consumers can simply use sites like Ecolabel Index to see the truth. Many greenwashers do it anyway, hoping their customers are too busy to fact-check labels and claims.

Focus on making evidence-backed claims about environmental impacts. To build credibility, some companies are using RFID labels that let customers scan and get access to third-party certification and lab reports. The additional information validates material sourcing, manufacturing processes and the company’s carbon footprint.

The Opposite of Greenwashing: Incremental Change and Transparency

Completely revamping processes and business models to become more environmentally friendly takes significant resources. Eliminating use of fossil fuels or fully embracing renewable energy is an uphill battle. No one can reasonably expect a company to make dramatic transformations overnight. 

Instead, focus on creating transparency and highlighting areas where you can illustrate incremental changes.

Before declaring yourself a green company, define what it means to your team and identify pathways to effectively address this definition. Get everyone in the company to commit to being more green, from board members and executives to customer-facing staff and suppliers. 

Finally, establish green goals and monitor your company’s progress. Share real results, when applicable, with your stakeholders so they see your environmental commitment in action. With this green marketing approach, they join you on the journey to greater sustainability, and may even end up more loyal to your brand in the process.

Tip: Download our free Switching to Sustainable Societies Report

Even if you’ve avoided these challenges, you’ll want to have your crisis strategy in place whenever you take on issues that can be divisive. Read our comprehensive ebook on preparing—and avoiding—for brand crisis.

Psst. You may also be interested in Meltwater's Media Impact Analysis on IPCC's Sixth Assessment Report.

The Sixth Assessment Report (AR6), a series by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), looks at the current state of the climate, including how climate change is progressing and the role of human influence in this process. After a stark 'code red for humanity' warning was issued by IPCC, the Sixth Assessment report was highly covered by the media. We wanted to better understand the media's reaction to this. Take a look a what we found here.

5 Signs of Greenwashing—And How to Avoid Doing It Yourself

Tracking KPIs and reporting on them is the #1 most read topic on the Meltwater blog. Here, we discuss for the first time the importance of standardizing this effort across your organization, especially if you’re overseeing a multi-region operation. For a complete guide on KPIs and reporting for PR and social media, read our comprehensive ebook, Everything You Need to Prove PR ROI.

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