Digital communications are a crucial component to your reputation and generate some of the best data for organisations to tap into to assess how they are being portrayed. It can be difficult to separate the insights from the noise but understanding these conversations on social media about your company are necessary as they can form the basis of effectively communicating with your audience.

Issues that require response often first crop on online, as users tend to complain on social media about problems, before they are covered by the mainstream press. Therefore, digital is often the first frontier to protect your reputation and firefight any areas of concern that may become problematic later.

But what do we mean by social conversations and what do they entail?

Social conversations are the measurement of mentions of a defined number of terms on social media, which you can set, such as your organisation or related themes and individuals (such as the Senior Leadership Team). From the raw data, a broad overview can be developed of the key themes that are being discussed, who is talking about you and where you are being spoken about. Through this you can develop an understanding of the digital discourse and the platforms where these discussions are happening – there is no point in formulating a detailed response on LinkedIn, if all the negative conversations are happening on Facebook.

This is where we can come in. We can give you this data through our proprietary social monitoring tool, providing a comprehensive snapshot of what your audiences are thinking, what issues are causing the most discussion, who is doing the talking and on what platform. We can work with you to set out key search terms to capture the conversations, which will include X, Reddit and blogs, supported by manual monitoring on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram (which do not allow social media monitoring on their platforms). From this work, we can identify your key priorities and map out a strategy to ensure that you are talking to the right audience and conveying the right messages to them.

If you are planning or considering responses to do any of the following, you need to consider social conversations:

- A transaction

- A major announcement, such as leadership change

- A reputational crisis

- A cyberattack

- Exploring the launch of a new product or offering

What value can social conversation analysis bring to these events?

In a ‘live’ situation, whether that be a sudden reputational challenge or a cyberattack, social conversation analysis gives you the opportunity for regular updates. This can include what is driving conversation about your organisation, updates on the volume of conversation and who is talking. This can form the basis of your responses as it will provide you context for what key issues users are bringing up, how they are talking about it and where they are doing so. The regular updates will also give organisations to identify other pain points which could be problems further down the road, allowing you to proactively respond them before they turn into even more crises.

In a planned situation, such as a product launch, an acquisition or a major announcement, due diligence is a crucial step before any announcement can be made. A snapshot of the current sentiment and the core topics should inform your strategy for launch. It will identify any hurdles that you may well face, such as users questioning your credentials as a custodian of a target, and any key influencers that you should stay aware of for reaction. From this research, you can formulate a comms strategy that addresses concerns, whether that is through media coverage or other methods such as publicising case studies of other successful acquisitions that your company have implemented.

Social conversations are just one step towards a successful communications strategy, whether that be a planned one, or a rehearsed response to a crisis. However, it should be considered early in the development phase, reflecting how people are perceiving your organisation or the industry more broadly. With these insights, we can work with you to implement your ideal messaging, ensuring that it is delivered to the right audiences and with the right impact.

Want to hear more about our social conversations offer? Reach out at digital@cardewgroup.com