“Digital insights.” This is a continually trending term used across all industries and especially relevant within the life science space.

According to Forrester Research’s article “Digital Insights Are the New Currency of Business,” “demanding customers and competitive pressures require firms to treat insights—not just data—as a business asset.” One way of obtaining these business assets is through social listening. Social listening utilizes teams and tools to listen to both consumers and customers in order to better understand their needs and behaviors for a product. The goal is to gather this data and analysis and enable the end users with proper decision-making tools based on digital insights specific to each market.

There are four main objectives for social listening that enable the end user to have strategic guidance following this data analysis. These objectives are kept in mind while the team “listens” to several social networks. This is inclusive of Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, patient blogs, and other websites that have a public audience and discuss the brand or disease specifically. These networks also vary depending on the market that is being researched.

Four Main Objectives of Social Listening

1. Map the customer journey and identify competitive positioning 

• Gather details on competitor campaigns, including benchmarks, competitor scoring, and their consumer behavior 

2. Understand the tone and language used for marketing messaging of the brand 

• Recognize customers’ sentiments and their preferred digital interaction
• Understand how these sentiments affect the brand 

3. Identify key opinion leaders

• Understand where there are any gaps in unmet needs from the product
• Learn what individuals, organizations, and entities that direct themselves to a public audience can potentially become an ally for communication across platforms  
• Find out what digital channel is being used most frequently to promote or discuss the brand

4. Monitor topics

• Understand how specific and relevant topics are discussed locally in different markets to guide the brand’s strategy, tone of voice, and opportunities
• Analyze consumer opinion and perception, making it easier for the brand to comprehend their local competitive landscape
   

Social listening is a type of market research that can be based on brand perception, competitor analysis, customer journey, and discussion topics. It is an extensive data analysis focusing on a specific topic. Based on the brand’s goals, the team then provides these strategic recommendations to help guide the client in their launch in a new market, improve their existing presence, or detect any form of a new opportunity.

TransPerfect has a dedicated digital hub that specializes in digital marketing services and can help you to best analyze and digest all data through social listening. We continue to recommend you stay on top of your competitors by gaining as much digital insights, or business assets, as possible. To find out more on how we could help you with social listening, contact us at sociallistening@transperfect.com.