{"id":26012,"date":"2018-12-20T14:04:06","date_gmt":"2018-12-20T13:04:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mention.com\/blog\/?p=20845"},"modified":"2024-07-29T15:35:23","modified_gmt":"2024-07-29T15:35:23","slug":"retail-brands-media-monitoring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mention.com\/en\/blog\/retail-brands-media-monitoring\/","title":{"rendered":"6 Ways Retail Brands Can Leverage Media Monitoring"},"content":{"rendered":"

The internet and social media has revolutionized the way brands – specifically – retailers, interact with their audience.<\/strong>
\nWhat was once a monologue finally turned into a conversation between brands and their target audience, which is a massive shift for brands. <\/strong>
\nRetailers are now able to engage with their customers openly by asking them questions and getting their feedback on different topics.
\nHowever, whether it\u2019s due to cost, resources or time, many retail brands are using social media mainly to blast promotional content instead of interacting with their audience in a meaningful way.
\nThese businesses are missing the mark as they aren\u2019t taking advantage of the best part of the internet: being able to listen in on online conversations.<\/strong>
\nIn fact, media monitoring has numerous benefits for retailers: whether you’re a brick and mortar or an e-commerce store. In this blog post, I\u2019ll share 6 actionable ways retail brands can leverage media monitoring<\/a> to boost their performance online.
\n\"New<\/a><\/span>Check out our latest data report on the retail industry!<\/span><\/p>\n

1<\/strong>. Engage with your customer base<\/strong><\/h2>\n

86%<\/a><\/strong> of businesses are using monitoring tools to attend to the questions and concerns their customers have.<\/strong>
\nThis is good news,<\/strong> as it aligns with exactly what consumers now expect from retails brands. Indeed, they expect the brands to listen to their needs and engage with them in a relevant way. Here are some ways that you can go about this.<\/p>\n

Listen and insert yourself into relevant conversations<\/h5>\n

There are two scenarios.
\nScenario 1: People @mentioning your brand<\/strong>
\nWhen someone @mentions your twitter handle on social media and expects you to answer, don\u2019t wait.
\nIn fact, a recent study says that 42% of consumers complaining on social media expect brands to answer <\/em>within 60 minutes<\/a><\/em>.<\/em>
\nSo if you\u2019re a retail brand, you won\u2019t be able to avoid this – respond to people mentioning you directly, as quickly as possible.
\nScenario 2: People not mentioning you directly, but talking about your brand<\/strong>
\nThis is what happens in 31% of social messages.
\nJust because someone doesn\u2019t directly mention you – it doesn\u2019t mean that the conversation isn\u2019t relevant to you.
\nWhat\u2019s more is that if you jump in those conversations proactively, you\u2019ll surprise your customer in a good way – it\u2019s always nice to know when brands are paying attention.
\nThis is something Best Buy\u2019s community managers do really well:
\n\"retail-media-monitoring-bestbuy.jpg\"
\nBesides, when customers are happy, they also like to share it with their friends!<\/em>
\n\"retail-media-monitoring-bestbuy2.jpg\"
\nBottom line: if you care for your customers, they won\u2019t let you down.<\/p>\n

2<\/strong>. Control the conversations about your brand<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Social media is can be a bit of a PR jungle. In this day and age, there\u2019s no brand in the world that has total control of conversations about them online.
\nIt\u2019s impossible<\/strong>.
\nWhat you can<\/em> do, however, is to be aware and react quickly by staying informed in real-time<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Monitor the conversations about specific stores or topics<\/h3>\n

If you\u2019re a large retailer, chances are you have hundreds of locations. As much as you\u2019d like to listen to conversations about each of them, it wouldn\u2019t be easy.
\nInstead, what you could do is pay attention to specific locations (using keywords) where there are special events happening.
\nAs an example, Target is opening a new store in Brooklyn. Using a monitoring tool, they could listen to all that\u2019s said about the grand opening and jump into the conversations if and when relevant.
\n\"retail-media-monitoring-bestbuy3.jpg\"
\nThis would allow you to track the success of the opening event, and see how it\u2019s being received online.<\/p>\n

Monitor what your employees have to say<\/h3>\n

A healthy business relies both on its customers and its employees. <\/strong>So it\u2019s essential that your brand\u2019s employees feel valued by their own organization.
\nThis is another area media monitoring can help you with.
\nHere\u2019s how best Best Buy engages with their employees. One of them shared a very positive message about how proud he is to work for the brand. Without @mentioning them directly, Best Buy still got the message and responded.
\n\"retail-media-monitoring-bestemployeejpg\"
\nIt\u2019s a very simple gesture and yet, it means so <\/em>much.<\/p>\n

Monitor the campaigns you run<\/h3>\n

Media monitoring<\/a> can bring something to your attention before it\u2019s gets in front of everyone else.
\nThis is very important when a case of the \u2018fake news\u2019 hits your brand, or in this case, fake campaigns.
\nHere\u2019s how one iconic UK retailer handled it. Each year, John Lewis<\/a> releases a beautiful and emotional Christmas ad that is watched millions of times on YouTube.\"retail
\nAt the beginning of November, a fake teaser<\/a> \u201cleaked\u201d across social media platforms and was picked up by many news channels.
\nIt generated a lot of noise and raised many questions among the fans. As soon as the prankster – Chris Moyles – revealed the joke, John Lewis jumped in to confirm it was not<\/em> coming from them.
\n\"retail
\nFortunately, the fake campaign didn\u2019t impact John Lewis negatively and they were able track the source quickly, avoiding any massive PR scandal.
\nSometimes, there\u2019s no way you can prevent PR fires from happening. But you can always try to reduce the potential damages to your brand.<\/p>\n

3. Defuse<\/strong> PR crises before they escalate<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Most retailers deal with thousands, or even millions of customers on a daily basis.
\nAll the more opportunities for a  PR crisis to strike <\/strong>.
\nBut then again, you also know that most PR crises can be avoided early on – if the source is identified and dealt with properly.<\/p>\n

Anticipate PR crises<\/p>\n

Media monitoring<\/a> will help you see and avoid most <\/strong>of the obstacles<\/strong> coming your way<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Listen to your customers\u2019 complaints carefully<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Have you heard of the epic Amazon pillowcase fail? It happened at the end of 2017. Many Amazon clients started to complain about a pillowcase they bought from the platform.
\nThey purchased this item:
\n\"retail
\nAnd received \u2026 this item:
\n\"retail
\nOne can\u2019t help but laugh (it sure gave me a good one) – and it\u2019s not even a joke<\/a>.
\nIn fact, it\u2019s slightly less funny when you picture how much this blunder can cost in terms of returning all the goods\u2026 <\/em>
\nThis unfortunate – yet funny <\/em>– event proves one thing. Amazon works with so many retailers that they cannot control everything that\u2019s sold on their website<\/strong>.
\nOut of curiosity, I used Mention to monitor to potential bad buzz  around the Amazon brand. And in less than a minute, I found a tweet making waves<\/strong>:
\n\"4
\nAt the time of writing this blog post, it had almost reached 350 retweets and accumulated over 500 likes.
\nIf not dealt with quickly, it could escalate into something very big and costly for Amazon.
\nWhat\u2019s interesting is that the person tweeting here is not an influencer, but a average social media user with something relevant to say<\/strong>.
\n\"retail
\nYet another example proving PR crises can come from anywhere, anyone, and at anytime.<\/em>
\nIt took a couple of days, but Amazon did pick it up <\/strong>(phew).
\n\"retail
\nWell done, Amazon.
\nOther than helping you manage potential PR crises, another major use case of media monitoring is to monitor your competition<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

4. Monitor your competition <\/strong>(and learn from it)<\/h2>\n

77%<\/a><\/strong> of businesses rely on media monitoring it to keep an eye on their competitors, <\/strong>in real-time<\/em>.<\/strong>
\nThis means that your competition is likely watching each and every single step you take.
\n\"retail
\nAnd you should be doing the same<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Compare your performance to your competitors\u2019<\/h3>\n

There\u2019s so much you can learn from competition.<\/p>\n