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Generative AI is everywhere now. You see it in content, campaigns, customer experiences, and even internal workflows. It promises speed, scale, and efficiency, but there’s a harder question sitting underneath all that progress; Do your audiences actually trust it?

Trust in the Age of AI: What Consumers Really Think About AI Generated Content

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

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? [Beginner’s Guide 2023]
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

Did you tune in to March Madness? If so, you were one of tens of millions of people who watched the NCAA college basketball tournament this year. In the end, the men’s team from the University of Connecticut took home their second championship trophy in a row. Meanwhile, the South Carolina Gamecocks, led by coach and WNBA alum Dawn Staley, became the women’s team champions. And though it’s clear who won March Madness on the court, marketers need to know who generated the most hype out in the world.

We used our social listening and analytics solution to look at which teams, topics, people, and brands got NCAA basketball fans talking most this year. Read on to learn more about how March Madness played out across social media, news, and other digital sources.

From March Madness’s start on March 19 through the men’s championship game on April 8, there were almost 3.4 million mentions of the tournament. That volume is lower than last year’s 4 million mentions.

Read our social listening analysis of the 2023 tournament.

Texas and California had the first- and second-highest volumes of March Madness mentions in 2024 and 2023.

The 2024 top 10 locations for March Madness conversations are similar to 2023, with New York and North Carolina rising in the ranks. This could be thanks to the NC State Wolfpack men’s and women’s teams making it to the Final Four. 

Texas and California had the first- and second-highest volumes of March Madness mentions. This may be due to both states having many different teams in the tournament. There were five California teams in the women’s March Madness bracket and three in the men’s. Texas sent five teams to the women’s tournament and six teams to the men’s. 

Interestingly, states that had teams in the finals — South Carolina, Iowa, Connecticut, and Indiana — were not in the top 10 locations for March Madness mentions. And Arizona, where the men’s finals took place this year, ranked 24th. 

Of the five top storylines across sources, two were about the men’s tournament and three were about the women’s.

Meltwater’s social listening platform uses LLM-powered clustering technology to detect popular topics and narratives across different content formats and platforms.

Most of the top stories from this year’s tournament were about the hype of the games themselves. However, one of the biggest stories of March Madness 2024 was the Utah women’s team having to switch hotels during the tournament after facing racist incidents at their original hotel in Idaho.

The top entities of this year’s March Madness conversation have one notable standout.

Only UConn came close to matching the NCAA’s prominence in March Madness conversations.

Caitlin Clark is the only individual in a sea of sports organizations. This is a testament to her star power and the value of her brand, even as she ends her college career never having won the NCAA Championship.

Overall, there were about 212,000 more mentions of the men’s teams than the women’s, but the trend of the conversations fluctuated as the tournament reached its final stages.

Mentions of the women’s teams were higher than those of the men’s teams on eight out of the 21 days of the tournament. 

From April 1 through April 5, as well as the day of the women’s finals on April 7, conversations about the women’s teams surpassed those about the men’s. Mentions about the men’s teams had notable spikes on March 21, the start of the first round, April 6, the day of the Final Four, and April 8, the day of the championship game.

The UConn Huskies had 35k more mentions than the Purdue Boilermakers.

Of the men’s teams, the UConn Huskies, the tournament winners, also had the highest volume of mentions. At times, the NC State Wolfpack and Purdue Boilermakers generated more mentions than UConn, but for the majority of March Madness, the Huskies were the most talked about team.

The UConn Huskies had 39k more mentions than the South Carolina Gamecocks.

On the women’s side, the most talked about team fluctuated more often. While the Huskies had the highest volume of mentions overall, the South Carolina Gamecocks champions were the most talked about team by the tournament’s end.

Collectively, though, it’s safe to say the UConn and NC State basketball programs are the true overall winners here.

Our visual analysis of team sponsor logos detected in images related to March Madness shows that Nike was the powerhouse of the tournament.

We used Meltwater's visual analytics features to detect sponsor logos in non-verbal/non-textual content posted across news and X.

The iconic sports brand sponsored three of the Final Four teams in the men’s tournament, including the UConn champions, and two of the Final Four teams in the women’s tournament. And though Under Armour sponsored the women’s champions, the South Carolina Gamecocks, Nike sponsored the second-place Iowa Hawkeyes. This meant that every time the camera was focused on star Caitlin Clark, viewers got an eyeful of the iconic swoosh.

In broad strokes, the “winners” of the March Madness conversation were:

Texas - a top state for communities of basketball fans

Caitlin Clark - the star player of the tournament

UConn - the most prominent of the March Madness schools

Looking forward to next year, there are some potential openings. Who will rise to become the new star of women’s college basketball? Which brand could give Nike a run for their money? And how could the next host city impact the top locations ranking?

The deeper marketers dive into the data, the more insights emerge. Interested in digging further into the conversation about March Madness and other major events that impact your brand? Learn how with a demo of the Meltwater Suite:

March Madness 2024: Top Conversation Topics and Trends

Marketing campaigns inspire stretch goals. Whether the primary focus is increasing awareness, generating leads, engagement, or all of the above, your overall strategy has to achieve goals and tune out static. Long gone are the Mad Men days of one-way marketing that trusted brands to tell people how to think and what to buy. That’s why formulating a social first content strategy is a modern imperative.

With the age of social, capturing the eyes and ears, hearts and minds of an audience is crucial if you’re ever going to hit the bullseye. Few of us are working with Super Bowl Sunday budgets, but we all want the super-hero results. To hit your targets with the resources you’ve got means maximizing reach by creating content that elicits the desired response with an accompanying action.

In this day and age, it’s no longer about building a campaign out from one print ad, billboard, or TV spot. The best way to approach the ideation and brainstorm phase of your plan is to build content with a “social first” strategy. This, at its heart, means taking into account the social elements of your campaign and how social media might react to your content.

Taking the “you-would-already-be-home-if-you-lived-here” approach still works, but social media means you skip going door to door and avoid the high cost of out-of-home and TV. Especially when companies are focusing more on digital campaigns. In February 2016, 40% of marketers said they were shifting TV budgets to digital, up from 37% in September 2015.

The best part about social first media is the breadth of metrics and targeting.

Early social goals were about how many followers your company page had, but technology has evolved to allow additional data that defines the who, what, when, and how of your audience to help meet your goals. Social provides the ultimate trifecta: mobile media, hyper-targeting, and precise metrics. Armed with this info, you don’t have to guess if a campaign will resonate with stay-at-home moms or millennials on OOH or TV.

Mobile marketing means the water cooler has gone digital and grown legs. Technology has evolved allowing brand message delivery into the palm of targeted hands.

Most audiences are sharing wherever they go. Content discovered by way of devices drives conversations from home, to work, and back again. These cross-demographic habits allow brands the opportunity to travel with their audience to create nimble content for social media platforms.

Regardless of the platform, all roads lead to revenue. The ROI dream team is based on lower production cost, wide distribution, and transactional ease. Content doesn’t guarantee immediate cash flow, but, guiding an audience down a path to conversion by way of engaging on social media has grown from the hope to the expectation. In fact, the best brands are known for their social content, above and beyond any other channel.

Tip: Take a look at the best Instagram marketing examples

Savvy brands are evolving away from the belief that they manage customers, as they realize that customers, in fact, are managing relationships by way of social engagement. Social first content is an effective strategy to control the narrative, as well as build the support of brand loyalists.

In an age of social media capturing every breath we take, don’t you want a following to count on?

Choose social channels that your audience engages on. If you’re targeting a younger audience, go to Musically or Youtube since their audience skews younger. If you’re looking for a middle-aged demographic, consider going to Facebook.

Create content that makes sense on that channel. For example, use beautifully styled lifestyle photos and video for Instagram. Think format and audience.

Build a responsive website/landing page that supports and matches digital sources of traffic and content. If someone clicks on the CTA from your Facebook sponsored content, the page they land on should reinforce the messaging seen on your Facebook page, optimized for the device they are on, with a seamless user experience.

Curate original audience content from your audience. Social audiences love when brands respond and most importantly share their user-generated content. But don’t forget to get their permission and give credit.

Before sending out a press release, producing a TV spot, holding a press conference, or training customer service reps, consider how social media will perceive your campaign, your actions, and your communications. When you’re in the middle of a PR crisis, be prepared for the reaction on social media.

Be part of the conversation with social media management software and social listening tools like the Meltwater suite. Current news and trends will trump any marketing convo you want people to jump into. So be where your consumers are and talk about what they want to talk about.

Social First Content Strategy: Start with Social, End with Success

With every move she makes, Beyoncé gets the world buzzing, and the release of her latest album, Cowboy Carter, is no exception. The highly anticipated country album — a follow-up to her 2022 disco/house/pop album Renaissance — has been driving discussion and excitement across the world since even before it dropped on March 29. And while the discussion centers on Queen Bey and her place in country music, her collaborators, inspirations, and related businesses are also seeing welcome boosts of attention. 

We used our social listening and analytics solution to explore just how big of a social media and PR impact the release of Cowboy Carter has had on the people and brands in Beyoncé’s orbit. Read on to see which entities really hit it big in social media and news coverage, thanks to a boost from one of the world’s biggest stars.

Willie Jones, Tanner Adell, Brittney Spencer, Tiera Kennedy, Reyna Roberts, and Shaboozey

Whether she is releasing an album, headlining a tour, or simply posting on social media, Beyoncé is always a hot topic of conversation online. Still, mentions of her name (and her many nicknames) spiked dramatically on Friday, March 29, when she released Cowboy Carter, reaching a peak of more than 1.4 million mentions across social media and news. 

From March 27, the day she released the Cowboy Carter tracklist, through April 3, the weekend of the album release, the volume of conversations about her was 180% higher than in the week prior. Meanwhile, mentions of the album title peaked at nearly 324,000 mentions on release day. That gap of more than a million mentions shows just how much Beyoncé is the star of the show.

The release of Cowboy Carter arrived just over a month after the launch of Beyoncé’s haircare line Cécred. And while many artists would have used the album release to further promote their latest product, Cécred hasn’t had a major role in the rollout. 

Though the brand had a small rise in mentions on March 29, conversation about Cécred has yet to reach the level of buzz from its launch on February 20. 

Beyoncé’s athleisure line, Ivy Park, had an even more modest rise in conversation. 

Though the brand dates back to 2016, its last official collection drop was in 2021, explaining its decreased visibility in the swirl of excitement around Cowboy Carter.

One standout track from Cowboy Carter is “Levii’s Jeans”, featuring rapper/pop star Post Malone. Though the song title has a slightly different spelling from the denim apparel brand, she mentions it by name in the lyrics, singing, “Boy, I'll let you be my Levi's jeans…” And while the Levi’s x Beyoncé partnership is not official (yet?), the brand can thank the music superstar for some stellar promotion. 

Mentions of the brand spiked on March 27 when Beyoncé revealed the Cowboy Carter tracklist, which included “Levii’s Jeans.” They spiked again on March 31, when Levi’s embraced the reference by (temporarily) changing its name on social media. The bio of its Instagram account says it is “FKA Levi’s 🐝”, with the bee emoji referencing Beyoncé’s nickname. 

From the tracklist reveal on March 27, through the following week, mentions of Levi’s were 120% higher than those in the previous seven days. Overall, Cowboy Carter was a boon to the classic Western brand, thanks in part to the Levi’s social team’s quick and clever capitalization on the hype of the moment. 

Beyoncé also put her daughter, Rumi Carter, in the spotlight by featuring her on the song “Protector.” 

From the album drop on March 29 through April 4 the following week, mentions of the 6-year-old were up 131% from the previous week, peaking at more than 4,300 mentions.

As the featured artist on “Levii’s Jeans,” Post Malone also benefited from the Cowboy Carter boost. 

From the album release through April 4, mentions of him were 58% higher than the previous week, spiking above 47,000 on March 29. 

The most reposted X post about the rapper noted that “his manager deserves a raise so bad” in reference to his involvement in both Beyoncé and Taylor Swift’s latest albums. It garnered more than 50,000 likes and 2,200 reposts.

Country and pop legend Dolly Parton is featured prominently on Cowboy Carter, both directly via a spoken interlude titled “Dolly P,” as well as indirectly via Beyoncé’s cover of her hit song “Jolene.” 

Mentions of Dolly Parton rocketed to more than 84,600 mentions on the album’s release day. Plus, from the tracklist announcement on March 27 through the following week, mentions of her were 710% higher than in the previous week. Some of the most mentioned keywords included “new album,” as well as the phrases “flaming locks” and “auburn hair” from “Jolene.”

Beyoncé didn’t forget about Dolly’s fellow country legend Willie Nelson, whom she featured on the tracks "Smoke Hour / Willie Nelson" and "Smoke Hour II." 

From the tracklist drop on March 27 through the following week, mentions of him were 976% higher than in the previous week, spiking above 30,000 upon the album’s release. Though Willie Nelson is popular in his own right, this jump suggests that Cowboy Carter may have introduced him to a wider (and likely younger) pop audience. 

Miley Cyrus is country royalty thanks to her dad, Billy Ray Cyrus, and godmother, Dolly Parton, but it was her own country appeal and vocal abilities that landed her a feature on the Cowboy Carter song "II Most Wanted." 

From March 27 through the following week, mentions of Miley Cyrus were 253% higher than the previous week with a significant bump, surpassing 120,000 mentions, on March 29. 

The sentiment of the conversations in that time were largely positive, with fan accounts using the moment to highlight her body of work, generating tens of thousands of likes, bookmarks, and reposts.

One of the biggest narratives surrounding the release of Cowboy Carter concerned Beyoncé’s ability to highlight other Black artists in country music. Two of her songs, “The Linda Martell Show” and "Spaghettii" feature and pay tribute to Linda Martell, a pioneering Black country artist. 

Linda Martell experienced the Beyoncé boost even before her involvement with Cowboy Carter became public. The release of the album’s first singles, “16 Carriages” and “Texas Hold ‘Em,” on February 11 led to renewed public interest in the first Black woman to perform at the Grand Ole Opry. Mentions of her spike again on February 22 after reports that the now 82-year-old artist received a huge boost in streams of her solo music. 

Mentions then skyrocketed with the release of the Cowboy Carter tracklist on March 27. From that day through April 2, mentions of Linda Martell were a whopping 65,011% higher than in the previous week, with overwhelmingly positive sentiment. That incredible jump in mentions illustrates the magnitude of attention Beyoncé can give other artists, as well as the public’s enthusiasm for learning about the Black roots and history of country music overall. 

Finally, Beyoncé also used Cowboy Carter as an opportunity to highlight contemporary Black country artists. She featured country singer-songwriters Brittney Spencer, Reyna Roberts, Tanner Adell, and Tiera Kennedy on the track “Blackbiird,” a cover of the famed Beatles song by the same name. Meanwhile, country singer and The X Factor alum Willie Jones appears on the song “Just for Fun” and Americana hip hop artist/producer Shaboozey features on "Sweet / Honey / Buckiin'" and joins Linda Martell on “Spaghettii.” 

Collective mentions of these artists from March 27 through April 2 were 2,820% higher than in the previous week, peaking at almost 47,000 mentions on March 29. The most shared link of the conversation was Tanner Adell’s X post from February 11 where she publicly hoped Beyoncé would reach out to her for a collaboration. After the release of Cowboy Carter, fans quoted and shared the post to highlight how Adell’s hope came true. 

Overall, the data illustrates just how valuable Beyoncé’s outputs and platform are to major brands and artists as well as to rising stars and overlooked trailblazers.  

Looking to dig deeper into how internet users and consumers engage with cultural events? See how to get consumer insights like these tailored to your needs with a Meltwater demo by filling out the form below:

The Cowboy Carter Impact: How Beyonce’s new album boosted her collaborators

Research in the digital age takes many shapes and forms. There are traditional methods that collect first-hand data via testing, focus groups, interviews, and proprietary data. And then there are ways to tap into the time and effort others have put into research, playing “armchair detective” by conducting desk research.

Desk research gives you a shortcut to insights by pulling data from other resources, which is crucial for understanding the customer journey. It takes less time and is more cost-effective compared to conducting primary market research. Most importantly, it can give you the consumer insights you need to make important business decisions.

Let’s explore the official desk research definition along with types of desk research, methodologies, examples, and how to do desk research effectively.

Desk Research Meaning: What is Desk Research?

Advantages and Limitations of Desk Research

How To Conduct Desk Research with Meltwater

Desk Research definition: Desk research, also known as secondary research or complementary research, involves gathering information and data from existing sources, such as books, journals, articles, websites, reports, and other published materials. Users analyze and synthesize information from already available information.

Companies use desk research at the onset of a project to gain a better understanding of a topic, identify knowledge gaps, and inform the next stages of research. It can also supplement original findings and provide context and background information.

<table class="table-primary alternate-color">
<thead>
<tr>
<th>Advantages of Desk Research</th>
<th>Limitations of Desk Research</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>Faster insights with done-for-you research</td>
<td>Potential bias</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Cost-effective</td>
<td>Lack of control over types and methods of data collection</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>Diverse types of secondary research/plenty of data to pull from</td>
<td>Data quality could be questionable</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>

Desk research gives marketers attractive advantages over traditional primary research, but it’s not without its shortcomings. Let’s explore these in more detail.

Quick insights. Conducting interviews, focus groups, panels, and tests can take weeks or even months, along with additional time to analyze your findings. With desk research, you can pull from existing information to gain similar results in less time.

Cost-effectiveness. Desk market research is usually less expensive than primary research because it requires less time and fewer resources. You don’t have to recruit participants or administer surveys, for example.

Accessibility. There’s a world of data out there ready for you to leverage, including online databases, research studies, libraries, and archives.

Diverse sources. Desk market research doesn’t limit you to one information source. You can use a combination of sources to gain a comprehensive overview of a topic.

Want to see how Meltwater can supercharge your market research efforts? Simply fill out the form at the bottom of this post and we'll be in touch.

Data quality. Marketers don’t know how reliable or valid the data is, which is why it’s important to choose your sources carefully. Only use data from credible sources, ideally ones that do not have a financial interest in the data’s findings.

Less control. Users are at the mercy of the data that’s available and cannot tailor it to their needs. There’s no opportunity to ask follow-up questions or address specific research needs.

Potential bias. Some sources may include biased findings and/or outdated information, which can lead to inaccurate conclusions. Users can mitigate the risk of bias by relying only on credible sources or corroborating evidence with multiple sources.

Desk research typically involves multiple sources and processes to gain a comprehensive understanding of an idea. There are two main desk methodologies: qualitative research and quantitative research.

Qualitative research refers to analyzing existing data (e.g., interviews, surveys, observations) to gain insights into people's behaviors, motivations, and opinions. This method delves deeper into the context and meaning behind the data.

Quantitative research refers to analyzing and interpreting numerical data to draw conclusions and make predictions. This involves quantifying patterns and trends to find relationships between variables.

Both desk research methodologies use a variety of methods to find and analyze data and make decisions.

Examples of desk research methods include but are not limited to:

Literature review. Analyze findings from various types of literature, including medical journals, studies, academic papers, books, articles, online publications, and government agencies.

Competitor analysis. Learn more about the products, services, and strategies of your competitors, including identifying their strengths and weaknesses, market gaps, and overall sentiment.

Social listening. Discover trending topics and sentiments on social media channels to learn more about your target audience and brand health.

Consumer intelligence. Understand your audience based on digital behaviors, triggers, web usage patterns, and interests.

Market research. Analyze market reports, industry trends, demographics, and consumer buying patterns to identify market opportunities and strengthen your positioning.

Now let’s look at how to use these methods to their full potential.

While desk research techniques can vary, they all follow a similar formula. Here’s how you can conduct desk research effectively, even if it’s your first time.

Desk research starts with a specific question you want to answer. 

In marketing, your objective might be to:

Learn about Gen Z buying behaviors for home goods

Gauge the effectiveness of influencer marketing for food brands

Understand the pain points of your competitor’s customers

These questions can help you find credible sources that can provide answers.

Based on your objectives, start collecting secondary data sources that have done the heavy lifting for you. Examples include:

Market reports (often available as gated assets from research companies)

Online databases and resources, such as Google Scholar 

Secondary research companies or market research tools like Meltwater and Linkfluence

Online blogs, articles, case studies, and white papers from credible sources

In many cases, you’ll use a combination of these source types to gain a thorough answer to your question.

Go through your source materials to start answering your question. This is usually the most time-intensive part of desk research; you’ll need to extract insights and do some fact-checking to trust those insights.

One of your top priorities in this step is to use reliable sources. Here are some ways you can evaluate sources to use in your desk research:

Consider the authority and reputation of the source (e.g., do they have expertise in your subject)

Check whether the content is sponsored, which could indicate bias

Evaluate the publisher’s peer review processes, if applicable

Review the content’s citations and references

Use sources with built-in credibility, such as .gov or .edu sites or well-known medical and academic journals

If your source materials have supporting elements, such as infographics, charts, or graphs, include those with your desk research.

4. Cross-reference your findings with other sources

For desk research to be effective, you need to be able to trust the data you find. One way to build trust is to cross-reference your findings with other sources. 

For instance, you might see who else is citing the same sources you are in their research. If there are reputable companies using those same sources, you might feel they’re more credible compared to a random internet fact that lacks supporting evidence. 

The Meltwater Blog

March Madness 2024: Top Conversation Topics and Trends

Social First Content Strategy: Start with Social, End with Success

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