Brand Tracking 101: The Art of Digital Eavesdropping

Imagine having a crystal ball that reveals exactly how the public sees your brand. Would you use it? 

That’s the power of brand tracking.

What is Brand Tracking?

Brand tracking is the measurement of how a brand is perceived by the general public. This can be done by tracking brand mentions and public opinion across various platforms, such as social media, surveys, and forums. 

With these insights, marketers can respond swiftly to shifts in public opinion and manage their online reputation.

Whether you’re striving to stand out in a crowded market or aiming to maintain your industry leadership, mastering brand tracking will give you he edge to stay on top of things. 

Why Should You Be Tracking Your Brand?

Through effective brand tracking, you can:

• Understand consumer perceptions 
• Anticipate market changes and react to shifts in consumer preferences
• Determine which marketing strategies work and which need adjustment 
• Strengthen brand presence, trust, and loyalty among your customer base

Consider this statistic: 81% of consumers say they need to trust a brand before purchasing. This staggering number underscores the importance of a good brand.

Brand tracking goes beyond simple measurement; it’s a strategy to gauge and understand the perception of your brand in the marketplace. Whether your brand perception can become (and remain) positive might be the difference between connecting with that 81% of consumers.

Unlike one-time market research or campaign-specific assessments, brand tracking offers a continuous stream of data and insights. 

With this flow of information, you can swiftly adjust to market dynamics and consumer behaviors.

Think of brand tracking as your dashboard for successful campaigning – a constantly updating display of your brand’s health and performance in the market.

Brand Tracking Metrics: Your Dashboard for Success

Brand tracking provides a complete view of your brand’s performance using several key indicators. These metrics serve as your brand tracking dashboard, helping you assess various aspects of your brand’s health and market position.

Here are some of the essential metrics to monitor on your brand tracking dashboard:

1. Brand Awareness
   Assess how well-known your brand is among your target audience. Are you the first name that comes to mind in your industry, or are you struggling to gain recognition?
2. Brand Perception
   Understand public sentiment about your brand. Use customer reviews, social media sentiment analysis, and net promoter scores (NPS) to get a clear picture.
3. Brand Loyalty
   Measure how often customers return or the stickiness of your customer base. High repeat purchase rates, subscription renewals, and loyalty program engagement indicate strong brand loyalty.
4. Brand Equity
   Evaluate the value your brand adds to your products or services. This can be reflected in your ability to charge premium prices, market share, and overall brand valuation.
5. Brand Conversions
   Measure actual sales conversions tied to brand activities to clearly understand purchasing behaviors. For example, track sales increases linked to a specific social media hashtag campaign or analyze conversions from branded search terms.
6. Brand Satisfaction
   Customer satisfaction surveys, post-purchase feedback, and service quality assessments provide insights into this area. Are you making customers happy?
7. Brand Associations
   What qualities do consumers associate with your brand? Is your brand cool and edgy, or family-friendly? Conduct brand association studies to see what attributes, emotions, or values are linked to your brand.
8. Brand Advocacy
   Gauge who is promoting your brand actively. Track mentions by influencers, the spread of brand-related user-generated content, and the activity of brand ambassadors.

What’s at Risk When You Don’t Track Your Brand?

Neglecting brand tracking can lead to some challenges. 

Without it, you might miss signs that your brand is losing favor with customers, whether it’s due to a competitor’s new product or negative feedback on social platforms like Twitter or Reddit. If unnoticed, these issues can escalate, damaging your brand’s reputation.

Effective tracking allows you to quickly spot and address negative sentiments. This proactive social listening helps you adjust your strategy and directly respond to customer complaints, preserving loyalty and preventing a PR crisis.

Additionally, without regular monitoring, you risk investing in ineffective marketing strategies and missing opportunities to strengthen your brand.

Instead of scrambling to recover from a PR crisis, tracking strategies will keep you informed and ready to make smart, timely decisions that enhance your brand’s health and maintain its strength.

Brand Tracking in Action: A Hollywood Case Study 

Remember the Johnny Depp vs. Amber Heard trial in 2022? This high-profile legal battle captivated audiences and provided a perfect case study for brand tracking in action. 

While not a traditional “brand” scenario, this trial demonstrates how tracking techniques can be applied to analyze public perception and media coverage of any significant event or entity.

Prowly illustrated how brand monitoring can provide insights into public sentiment, media reach, and associated brand impacts.

Here’s what they uncovered:

The Power of Hashtags

In brand tracking, measuring mentions is vital. Consider the stark contrast between Depp’s and Heard’s hashtag mentions:

• #JusticeForJohnnyDepp: 1,928
• #IStandWithAmberHeard: 476

This reflects not just public sentiment but also the effectiveness of different narrative campaigns. 

For brands, this kind of data can indicate which marketing messages are resonating with audiences.

The Ripple Effect

Often, there is a ripple effect in brand tracking. Even brands not directly involved saw significant mentions. 

For example, Warner Bros. and Disney found themselves in a near dead-heat of mentions.

Even beauty brands like Milani Cosmetics, L’Oreal, and Dior got unexpected cameos in this legal drama.

For companies, this demonstrates the importance of monitoring not just your brand but also industry trends and indirect mentions that could impact your reputation.

The Social Media Impact

Depp’s hashtag reached over 2 million people on their best days, while Heard’s peaked at about 780,000. The peak daily reach numbers showcase the viral nature of social media and its impact on brand perception. 

This real-time monitoring lends itself to rapid response strategies for businesses to capitalize on positive momentum or mitigate potential crises.

The Broader Implications

Brand tracking isn’t just for corporations pushing products. It’s a powerful tool that can dissect even complex public narratives, offering a bird’s-eye view of how stories unfold in the media. 

Brand Tracking Strategies: How to Get Started

Ready to put brand tracking to work for your brand?

Here’s how to get started:

1.Define your goals and KPIs.

Begin by clarifying what you want to achieve with brand tracking. Are you looking to increase brand awareness, strengthen brand loyalty, boost brand purchases, or enhance customer satisfaction? Your goals will guide your entire tracking strategy.

For example, a new apparel company may aim to increase its brand awareness by 20% over the next six months. 

Or, a company in a PR crisis may want to focus on improving the sentiment of its brand mentions from negative to positive. 

2. Choose your metrics.

Based on your goals, select the most relevant metrics to track. These might include brand awareness, sentiment, or purchase intent. 

3. Determine your tracking frequency.

Decide how often you’ll collect and analyze data (e.g., daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly). This will depend on your needs, your market, and how often you run campaigns.

4.Select your target channels.

Identify whose opinions matter most to your brand and where they’re most likely to express them. This could include social media, review sites, forums, or the entirety of the internet.

5. Determine your brand tracking tools.
Choose the right brand tracking tools for your needs. This could range from manual tracking methods to sophisticated software solutions.

Consider Brand Monitoring in the Semrush App Center for real time brand tracking. This tool offers features to streamline your brand tracking efforts, regardless of your team size or technical expertise. 

Brand Monitoring: Your Key to Social Listening

For a tool that does the heavy lifting of brand tracking for you, try Brand Monitoring.

This app keeps tabs on your brand and your competitors across the internet, including social media – so you don’t have to spend hours scrolling and searching.

But it’s not just about collecting mentions; Brand Monitoring comes with some analytics to help you make sense of all that data. 

You’ll get the scoop on:

• How often your brand is mentioned
• Whether people are making positive, negative, or neutral comments
• How many eyeballs those mentions are potentially reaching
• How you’re stacking up against the competition

You can also set up custom alerts to ping you whenever something interesting happens with your brand online, like when someone’s talking about you and linking back to your site.

Ready to start tracking your brand?

Getting Started with Brand Monitoring

Brand Monitoring makes it easy to start tracking your brand.
To get started, sign in to the app and click “Get Started.” 

Follow the prompts to set up the parameters of what (or who) you’re tracking.

When you’re ready, click “Create Query” to launch your tracking system.

The app will then display all your brand mentions in a list.

Use the “Filters” section to refine the list by language, sentiment, author, and more.

For example, you can add required keywords to ensure relevancy and exclude keywords to filter out unrelated mentions.

You can also choose where to look for mentions (news sites, blogs, social media platforms) in the “Source” column. 

Under “Mention details,” you can choose where in the content to look for mentions, like titles, hashtags, or backlinks. 

Head over to the “Analytics” tab to look at the results of your online mentions. 

Here, you can see the total number of mentions, mentions with backlinks, estimated reach, sentiment, share of voice, and other metrics. 

Use the left menu filters to drill down into specific data points and time frames.

To stay on top of your brand mentions in real-time, set up alerts in the “Email notification” section.

You can use these insights to catch a crisis before it occurs and engage with your audience more effectively.

More Tools for Brand Monitoring & Social Listening

Brand Monitoring isn’t the only Semrush tool at your disposal. Check these out to supplement your toolkit:

• Social Tracker: Set up a campaign to track all of your social media accounts on the major channels. This will help you stay informed of your social media accounts (as well as your competitors’) performance on a daily basis. 
• Media Monitoring: Another way to track daily mentions is with this app created by social listening company Brand24. 

Brand Tracking Best Practices

Ready to level up your brand tracking game? Here are some tips to keep in mind:

Stay Consistent and Informed
Make brand tracking a daily habit, like your morning coffee. Regular monitoring helps you spot trends and react quickly.
But beware of data overload – focus on what really matters rather than drowning in metrics. 

Mix Quantitative and Qualitative
Assess the hard numbers with customer comments for a full picture. While quantitative data provides measurable insights, those qualitative comments often reveal the ‘why’ behind the numbers.

Embrace Feedback, Avoid Hasty Conclusions
Don’t shy away from negative feedback – it’s your secret ****** for improvement. However, resist the urge to jump to conclusions. Take time to understand the context before making big moves. 

Stay Flexible and Action-Oriented 

Your brand evolves, and so should your tracking strategy. Regularly review and adjust to keep it fresh and relevant. But remember, insights are only valuable if you act on them. Ensure your tracking leads to real changes.

Use Tracking Tools
Invest in tools that align with your tracking needs and can provide deep insights into the metrics you care about. Features like real-time alerts, social listening, in-depth analytics, and integration capabilities are essential for comprehensive tracking.

Turn Insights Into Impact with Brand Tracking

Brand tracking is more than just collecting data. It’s about turning those insights into action, making smarter decisions, and building a brand that resonates with your audience.

Whether you’re a small startup or a global corporation, brand tracking can help you navigate the choppy waters of public opinion and steer your brand toward success.

Further Reading