United States

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

Media Monitoring companies in India, like Meltwater, help organizations understand the conversations taking place around their brands, their competitors and their industry. Today, media monitoring has come a long way since the basic news clipping services of the past. Meltwater’s own proprietary software for example, relies on artificial intelligence and machine learning to mine and make sense of billions of online data sources, so executives and communications teams can make more informed corporate decisions. So, what are some of the use cases for media monitoring in India? you may ask. Let’s take a look.

Showcasing a Return on Investment from Marketing and PR

Marketeers and PR professionals work tirelessly to generate earned media exposure, social media engagement and ultimately, greater business interest from prospective customers. The problem however, is that tying the outcomes of communications campaigns with a company’s bottom line objectives can often be a challenge. Advanced media monitoring tools allow companies in India, and across the world, to not only have a detailed record of the online response to a particular campaign or press release, but the ability to then start connecting the dots between the multitude of branded touchpoints and actual bottom line KPIs.

As a basic example, imagine being able to track the website traffic generated from a particular online press release. With this information, it would be possible for you to explore a potential corresponding rise in website leads over the same period of time. This in turn, would allow you to track actual sales generated from a single PR campaign and thereby report the kind of ROI that directors and C-suite care about. As marketing ROI attribution models become increasingly complex, so the need for accurate PR measurement will continue to grow.

Further to this, your marketing and PR efforts don’t occur in a vacuum. While you may think your quarterly PR strategy was a smash success, the reality is that it’s only when we benchmark our results against competitors do we get an accurate understanding of whose share of voice was dominant (and by extension, who reached the most potential customers).

The world today is not as it was twenty, or even ten years ago. The rapid development of technology alongside the mass proliferation of mobile phone devices has seen a decentralisation of news publishing power. Today, anyone with an internet connection can shape public opinion about your brand, and what’s worse is that the news they share doesn’t even have to be true for it to impact on your share price or client count.

Before we look at the management of a brand, let’s first define what a PR crisis is.

Quite simply, a real PR crisis is a negative story about your brand that has gained momentum and threatens the reputation of your business.

Crises are an inevitable consequence of being in business over the long term, what is optional however, is whether your company chooses to prepare for them or not. Businesses that don’t acknowledge the importance of reputation (and how to preserve it) all too often find themselves scrambling to undo the damage of an unforeseen brand slip-up – and in most cases this is simply a matter of too little too late. Further to this, the commercial ramifications of their lack of preparation tend to linger long past their time spent in the spotlight.

Forward thinking brands are putting in place crisis communications strategies as a proactive step toward safeguarding their most valuable intangible asset. At the cornerstone of these blueprints is almost always a comprehensive offline and online media monitoring tool, and when your reputation is at stake, it’s important you choose wisely.

Statistical analysis of ten corporate crises in South Africa found that the greater the speed and number of positive steps taken in the two weeks after a crisis, the less the company share price fell (Coldwell and Joosub, 2011). With this in mind, be sure to opt for a service or tool that allows for access to data in “real-time”, or as it happens; response time is paramount when mitigating the spread of a crisis.

By investing in online reputation management, an organization improves its ability to protect shareholder value, corporate viability and long term potential, often becoming more adaptive and agile as a result. In short, it improves its business resilience.

In the age of social media, market research is less about surveys, and more about listening to actual conversations happening across your field or industry. Media monitoring companies in India allow local brands to gain insight into the readiness of other geographic markets for their product or service. The benefit here is two-fold: 1) You don’t have to coerce people into filling out lengthy surveys, and 2) natural conversations are less likely to be biased.

In the global economy, many products and services need not be limited to the physical location or country of your premises. With the aid of a high-end media monitoring tool you can identify prospective customers in places you’d never thought to look.

Customer experience (CX) has been said to be “the next competitive battleground”. Gone are the days where price point dominated patterns in consumer decision making. Companies are now obliged to deliver a memorable end-to-end customer journey or face being ditched for those who can. A recent Oracle survey predicted a fall of up to 20% in annual revenues for brands that don’t offer a rewarding CX.

From Mumbai, Kolkata to New Delhi, companies in India that harness the power of social media listening tools can glean instant feedback on not only their brand touchpoints, but how those link together to provide an overall experience. Putting in place structures to recycle this feedback can help business become more agile in their response to changes in customer preference, ensuring that systems evolve to maximise overall user satisfaction over time.

In an increasingly connected society, media monitoring services offer companies the chance to make sense of a world drowning in data. If you’re serious about making more informed corporate decisions using external information, then contact the Meltwater India team and learn how Outside Insight can give you a competitive advantage.

Media Monitoring Companies in India: How to Put Public Data to Work

Some brands take a stand, publicly stating their brand values and detailed how this impacted their brand's public perception. In our current social zeitgeist, the political is often personal and consumers want brands to have the same values as they do. Here are five examples of environmental brands that are winning with their social media accounts, let's see what marketing teams can learn from them.

Social media isn’t just a place for animal videos, funny memes, and clever social media campaigns.

Today, social media is the perfect global platform for brands and businesses to raise awareness (and money) for causes that affect millions of people around the world.

One of the most important causes? Our environment.

With a growing interest surrounding brands that take their earthly responsibility seriously, we thought it would be the optimal time to break down the 5 best environmental campaigns on social media in recent history. Even if your company doesn't play in this space, the creativity deployed by the brands highlighted can still spark ideas for your own marketing department.

6 Best Environmental Campaigns on Social Media

1. J.J. Watt: Hurricane Harvey Fundraiser

Hurricane Harvey was one of the costliest environmental disasters to ever hit the United States. In total, damages were estimated at nearly $200 billion dollars.

Volunteers and organizations from around the world rallied behind the victims of this tragic event. One of those volunteers was NFL superstar J.J. Watt and he contributed in a huge way.

JJ Watt on Twitter: "This is what we'll be distributing today… "

Watt launched a fund on YouCaring.com to start raising money across social media on August 26th, 2017 with an initial goal of $200,000. Looking back, I think it’s safe to say that he might have underestimated people’s willingness to help those in need.

In total, Watt raised an astonishing $37,068,102, which is more than 185X his initial goal. Not surprisingly, J.J. Watt was named the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year in early 2018 for his humanitarian efforts.

JJ Watt on Twitter: "10 semi trucks. 
4 locations. 
Countless incredible volunteers. 
Just the beginning.… "

The outdoor clothing brand Patagonia has been at the forefront of environmental activism since the company’s 1973 founding.

In 2016, Patagonia announced that it would donate 100% of its Black Friday sales to organizations that benefit the environment. Social media caught word and it spread like wildfire – this tweet receiving nearly 1,000% greater engagement rate than others on their profile:

Patagonia on Twitter: "This Black Friday we’re donating 100% of sales to grassroots environmental groups. #LoveOurPlanet: https://t.co/6NgxQit5SJ… https://t.co/XRKkJb89R5"

After projecting that it would hit $2 million in sales, the company was shocked to discover that it sold more than $10 million worth of merchandise. Social media was a big force in getting the word out about their Black Friday campaign.

Patagonia explained that the campaign allowed them to help “hundreds of grassroots environmental organizations” which is a win by many different measures.

3. Apple: “Earth – Shot on iPhone” Video

It’s hard for brands to stay completely removed from politics when the environment is involved.

In the wake of the U.S. administration’s decision to back out of the Paris environmental agreement, Apple decided it would write a “love letter” to the Earth.

Earth – Shot on iPhone captures how beautiful our planet is through the lens of everyday users. Written and narrated by Carl Sagan, the YouTube video serves as a powerful reminder of just how much we have to lose.

The fact we only have one planet “underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another,” Sagan says, “and to preserve, and cherish, the only home we’ve ever known.”

Earth Day, the day set aside each year to celebrate our planet and bring attention to the natural world, is the perfect opportunity to launch an environmental campaign on social media.

In 2017, NASA invited people to “adopt” a portion of Earth’s surface with their #AdoptThePlanet campaign.

NASA Earth on Twitter: "Visit https://t.co/1NFnSiStXV to #AdoptThePlanet today! #EarthDay #EarthDay2017 #EarthWeek… "

When all was said and done, not only did NASA go through all 64,000 locations more than once, they also helped to educate millions of people around the world with their integrated website and social media campaign approach.

5. World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF): #EndangeredEmoji

WWF is on a mission to build a future in which people live in harmony with the earth and with nature. As one of the world’s leading independent conservation body, WWF runs several global campaigns focused on making a big impact.

One of my favorite WWF social media campaigns was called #EndangeredEmoji. Their genius use of emoji on social media helped to raise awareness for endangered animals around the world.

You probably use animal emoji every day in your texts with friends and posts on social media. WWF made it so that you could use emojis to support a good cause.

Every time a user tweeted an animal emoji seen above, WWF tracked its usage and added a small monetary amount for an optional donation at the end of each month.

During the two-month campaign period, WWF received 59,618 signups while gaining global press coverage and influencer attention. A massive win for their brand.

Reading Tip: Learn How Meltwater Helped Track Earth Hour, the World’s Largest Grassroots Movement

The school strike for climate, also known variously as Fridays for Future (FFF), Youth for Climate, Climate Strike or Youth Strike for Climate, is an international movement. The movement, which is leveraged by a number of brands including Lush and Patagonia, encourages school students to participate in demonstrations each Friday to demand action from political leaders around climate change. 

Publicity and widespread organising began after Swedish schoolgirl, Greta Thunberg, staged a protest in August 2018 outside the Swedish parliament, holding a sign that read "Skolstrejk för klimatet" / "School strike for climate. A global strike on 15 March 2019 gathered more than one million strikers and a further 2200 strikes were organised in 125 countries.

While this wasn't necessarily a brand campaign, brands are still benefiting from aligning their values with a topical event. Lush temporarily closed its 250 stores in the United States and Canada in solidarity. “As a business with deep roots in environmental activism, giving our thousands of staff the time to get out there and demand bold action is a no brainer,” said North America CEO and president Mark Wolverton in a brand statement. “We all share this planet, so we need to band together to sound the alarm and show our politicians that ‘business as usual’ is no longer an option. Climate crisis won’t wait, and neither will we.”

Media Not Found

This September, millions will walk out of their workplaces and homes to join the Global Climate Strike. All are welcome and all are needed.✊⁠Join us to demand bold action from global leaders:⁠
⁠
🌍USA - September 20, 2019⁠
⁠
🌍Canada - September 27, 2019⁠
⁠
Find your local action at globalclimatestrike.net or via the link in bio. ⁠
⁠
/📷: @christineirvine⁠
*⁠
*⁠
*⁠
*⁠
#climatechange #environment #sustainability #globalwarming #climateaction

It’s not enough to simply post content on social media anymore.

Customers and social media users have much more control over your brand’s success than ever before.

In order to thrive in a global market, your brand story must personally impact customers. It must resonate emotionally while constantly striving to physically make the world a better place.

That’s why studying these environmental social media campaigns can teach us so many great lessons about turning ideas into movements.

Get Inspired by These Winning Environmental Social Media Campaigns

“To get something from nothing, you need the validity that only third-party endorsements can bring.” – Al and Laura Ries, Ries & Ries

It got me thinking about the importance of third-party validation in the PR world.

We’ve probably all worked with clients who, while they understood the importance of having a third-party reference, were unable to produce one.

There are even clients that will ask, “Why does this matter? Can’t we just move ahead without a customer to speak on our behalf?”

While you can try to reach out to media without a customer reference, it certainly makes it more challenging.

So, why is a third-party endorsement important?

A journalist needs to hear from someone other than the company itself. When clients talk about themselves, of course, they’ll say favorable things. Reporters need third parties to back that up.

Read how to nurture media relationships for better outreach.

“Most of the time, there is no point in a press release about a new product without a customer reference,” says author and long-time analyst Josh Bernoff.

If you can’t produce any third-party references, the reporter may look for some on his or her own. Or he or she may just flat out refuse to interview the client. This makes it well worth the time to put together a short list to provide to them.

And, don’t wait until you’ve pitched reporters and they’ve requested references. Have your references lined up and ready to go BEFORE you pitch.

A customer, an industry analyst or a partner can make an ideal third-party reference.

If you’re looking at customers, your sales team may be a source of potential candidates. They’ll know who’s happy, and maybe more importantly, who’s not.

On that note, be sure to vet your references. If the last time you spoke to them was six months ago, it’s a good idea to check in to make sure all is well. Maybe they WERE happy – but they’ve experienced a problem. Until that’s resolved, it’s probably best to go to the next name on your list. The last thing you want is to provide a journalist with a reference who’s unhappy with your product or service.

Be sure to mention that talking with media benefits them, too, as chances are their name will also appear in the article. Beyond that, they may forge a relationship with the reporter, resulting in future opportunities.

If a customer agrees to be a press reference, it might also be a good time to:

Ask if they’ll allow you to interview them for a success story or case study. This could be produced as a digital and print piece, as well as a video. You can also use quotes from those interviews on your site or in other materials.

Ask if they’d like to be interviewed for a guest blog or a Q&A for your site. This meets needs on both the PR and content marketing sides.

The beginning of a new customer relationship can be the best time to ask. Some brands include it in contract negotiations.

Once you’ve secured the third-party references, you may want to prep them by providing some questions reporters could ask so they can be ready with answers. You can even offer some idea of how you’d like them to answer, i.e., what strengths or benefits to highlight.

It’s also a good idea to impress upon them how important it is to be responsive, should the media get in touch. For example, you don’t want to provide a customer who’s traveling out of the country for the next month as a reference. Journalists work on tight deadlines and may move on if they can’t reach your reference quickly.

Use care not to send too many requests their way. Of course, some references see it as a win-win and love to be interviewed by media, as it gets their name out there, too.

Lastly, be sure to thank your references. Let them know you appreciate their time and effort. Share published pieces with them and mention them when you post the pieces on social media.

Remember, your story may fall flat if you’re the only one telling it.

No one can sing your praises as convincingly as a satisfied customer, an enthusiastic partner or a well-educated analyst. If you harness the power of that praise for your benefit with the media, journalists may view you as a more attractive brand to work with.

In PR, There’s Power in Third-Party Validation

If there’s one constant in the world of public relations, it’s change. The profession is evolving at a dizzying rate.

One change on the radar of some PR futurists is a blurring of the lines between earned and paid media.

It once was that the two were completely separate. Public relations pros secure what is known as earned media, meaning no money changes hands. It’s purely editorial content. Then, there was paid media, also known as advertising. With ads, nothing appears unless it’s paid for the brand.

What we see now is a blending of the two, which some call native advertising or sponsored content. It differs from traditional advertising in that it isn’t relegated to the margins of the digital or printed page. Sometimes, the audience can’t tell the difference between the two. Recent examples include Porsche in The Atlantic, Airbnb in the New York Times, and Under Armour in Complex.

As they merge, we have the makings of a sea change in the industry.

How Does This Put the Role of PR Pros in Question?

Many in public relations have a degree in Journalism, so their roots are in earning editorial coverage. Now, with the advent of these paid options, it casts the role of PR in a different light.

Some view it as good news because it gives them another alternative to earn media for their client – which is undoubtedly tougher to garner these days. More public relations people plus fewer journalists equal more competition. Native advertising gives PR pros another way to get those stories out there. Another pro is that a paid placement provides more control over timing, leaving less to chance.

Others in the profession are slow to come around. They see it as going against the very grain of their journalistic training–never shall earned and paid mix. It muddies the water, without a doubt.

What Does This Mean for the Future of PR?

While there’s debate about who should own what, some ask if it should it be a conundrum. If PR people are equipped with the journalistic skills needed to communicate the client’s message, should it matter if there was a payment made for the placement?

Because PR pros excel at storytelling and writing, this should be a smooth transition. Some make a case for PR and marketing to work closely together on native advertising initiatives because marketers have complementary experience analyzing data which can help brands determine the best channels to get that story out.

“This blurring of media lines will underscore the need for more alignment between PR and marketing efforts in the coming years,” says Amy Osmond Cook of Osmond Marketing. “Paid and owned media, when not executed properly, can often come off as too promotional. PR, when not analyzed, can be an expensive endeavor with few results.”

Do the Lines Between Paid and Earned Media Need to Be Redefined?

Franco D’Onofrio, director at Twiga Communications, makes a case for redefining the line between paid advertising and PR. He believes content creation can still fall to public relations practitioners.

“If we consider the simple definition of PR – the practice of managing communication between an organization and its publics – the nature and intention of native advertising places it firmly in the domain of PR.”

Does this mean more ad agencies will partner with PR firms? Or bring PR in-house? Perhaps.

In the past, anything “paid” sat squarely in the advertising category, while anything earned was firmly in the PR camp. Now, however, we have public relations pros paying to promote social media content to further amplify earned media.

So, shouldn’t the content sit wherever it sits best? Native advertising isn’t an ad, in the traditional sense.

“Since native advertising is designed specifically to be part of the media narrative, rather than a banner on the right, then there can be no arguments about who should oversee this,” says D’Onofrio.

Of course, the world of advertising is undergoing massive changes, as well. Traditional ads don’t work anymore. 84% of millennials don’t trust traditional advertising. It may make sense from both perspectives to have these two collaborate on more content.

Will PR Pros Get on Board with These Changes?

Some already are. Others are reluctant. But, as the song goes, the times they are a-changin’. Where will PR land when the dust settles?

This post was initially published on this site on November 2, 2017. We republish timely posts for our readers who may have missed them the first time around.

How Earned and Paid Media Are Merging—and How It Impacts PR Pros

If you want to make your social media marketing as profitable as possible, you need to keep close track of essential metrics. Social analytics is often the difference between a successful campaign and wasting your time and money on ineffective marketing. There are a variety of tools and services that can help you with analytics. However, what matters most is having a strategy and knowing which numbers to watch. Here are 5 social analytics tips to help you get more out of your campaigns.

Before you can identify the optimum metrics to track and the best social analytics tools for your needs, it’s important to identify your goals. Not all businesses or campaigns are alike. For example, if your primary objective is to increase brand awareness, it makes sense to pay close attention to data such as views, likes, shares and follows. If you’re trying to drive more quality traffic to your website, click-throughs are your biggest concern. Your goals may not be the same for each campaign or for each social media site. Goals for your business can also change over time.

Tip: Read 10 Tips to Increase Link Click-Throughs on Social Media

2. Find Out Which Channels Are Best For You

There are more and more choices when it comes to social media. It’s safe to say that every business should use Facebook as this site covers all demographics that are active online. Twitter is second in this regard even though some other sites actually have more users. Beyond these two, however, you should identify the platforms that your audience uses most. Pinterest can be powerful for promoting physical products. Snapchat is a good choice if you’re focusing on Millennials and Gen Z. LinkedIn is a must if you do any type of B2B marketing.

To really understand which social media channels are most valuable to you, conduct your own testing. You can use social analytics tools to help you find out which sites are sending you the most traffic and which are best for leads and sales. Google Analytics reports are useful for measuring which platforms, as well as individual posts, are responsible for the most leads and

Click-throughs are one of the most important metrics of all for any type of social media campaign. After all, your objective isn’t to get views or even likes but to get people to actually visit your website or wherever you’re sending them. Your CTR is a good measure of how effective your social media content is. It’s just as important to track CTR for your social media posts as it is for paid ads and website content.

Identify key factors in your social media posts and use A/B or split testing. There are a few ways to do this. You can measure your results on one site vs. another. If you find, for example, that you get a higher CTR on Facebook than other sites, you may decide to devote more of your resources to that platform. You can also split test variables on a single platform. Certain topics might perform better than others. you can also test different types of content, such as text posts, images, infographics and videos. There may be other variables as well, depending on which social site you’re using. On Twitter, for example, you can test hashtags.

While everyone says that you need to post to social media sites consistently, there’s far less consensus about just how often to post. Furthermore, there are endless debates about the best time of day and day of the week to post. As with most arguments about social analytics, the best solution is to do your own testing. The same answer is not going to be the same for every business.

Free tools such as Facebook Insights can help you test your results for posting at different times. It’s helpful to know when your followers are most likely to be online and engaged. If your audience lives in multiple time zones you also have to factor this into your calculations. This information helps with other types of marketing as well, such as sending emails and posting to your blog. Knowing how often to post is a little trickier to test for. Many studies on this topic suggest that it’s fine to post often as long as you have fresh and relevant content. It also varies from one platform to the next. It makes sense to post the same content two or three times per day on Twitter because the timeline moves so fast. Doing this on Facebook, however, will more likely annoy your followers.

While you should appreciate all of your social media followers, it’s a simple fact that not all of them provide you with equal value. Someone with over 100,000 followers who shares your post is a lot more significant than someone with 50 followers. Of course, there’s more to influence than the number of followers. It also matters how engaged their followers are and if they represent demographics that match your own audience. You can study such information using either free or paid social analytics tools.

It’s also worthwhile to track followers who may not be considered influencers but who, nevertheless, are very enthusiastic about engaging with your content. Such followers are always worth cultivating. Your time and resources on social media are limited. It only makes sense to devote a disproportionate amount of your energy towards people who can help you the most. When people are valuable or even potentially valuable to you, make an effort to provide equal or even greater value to them. Share their content, leave comments and mention them in your own posts.

These are some of the most effective ways to get more out of your social analytics. Having accurate data is always helpful. At the same time, information is ultimately a tool; it’s up to you to put it to the best possible use. Once you’re clear about what you want to achieve with social media you can search for the tools and techniques that provide you with the data you ne

5 Social Analytics Tips to Improve Your Campaigns

Strong writing skills are more crucial than ever in public relations.

As paid and earned media move closer together and we see branded content continuing to rise in popularity, PR pros who can write well are more in demand. We’ve even seen journalists make the move to PR, where they can continue to write stories, but with more job security and higher salaries.

One case in point is Elinor Mills, who, after 22 years as a reporter, went to work at a PR agency in a new role it created focused on content. This came about, Mills says because the agency recognized that PR is becoming more and more about content.

“PR is increasingly content and good writing,” says Mills, who is now senior vice president of the content studio at Bateman Group.

According to a recent report published by the USC Annenberg Center for Public Relations, writing is the top skill PR firms look for in new hires.

While strong writing may be the skill most in demand, it may be the hardest to find.

“Please make sure they have good writing skills! That is so important and yet missing in most college grads,” said one of the survey respondents.

Further backing up this point of view, Dorothy Crenshaw of Crenshaw Communications says that as the PR profession evolves, writing skills are more important than ever for public relations practitioners. But not everyone agrees.

In an op-ed for PR Week, University of South Carolina’s Shannon Bowen, Ph.D. argues that as PR has evolved into a management discipline, college communications curricula must shift to make room for the teaching of skills like critical thinking and ethics. She believes there should be less emphasis on teaching writing skills, which she says can be taught in the workplace.

The Meltwater Blog

Media Monitoring Companies in India: How to Put Public Data to Work

Get Inspired by These Winning Environmental Social Media Campaigns

In PR, There’s Power in Third-Party Validation

How Earned and Paid Media Are Merging—and How It Impacts PR Pros

5 Social Analytics Tips to Improve Your Campaigns

Why Strong Writing Skills Matter More Than Ever for Today’s PR Pro

How Key Influencers Can Help You During Crisis Communications

Co-creation toolkit: Creating content with audiences

5 Best Nonprofit Social Media Campaigns

How to Engage with Journalists on Social Media

Crisis Management: How 3 Brands Recovered Right Away

Staying on Trend: The Importance of Monitoring Trending Topics Online