How can social media listening increase customer advocacy? (with examples)

Key stats you should know about social media listening:

Around 61% of businesses use social listening.
46% of PR professionals use social listening to collect data.
The social media listening market is expected to grow to US$9.61bn in 2025 and US$18.43bn by 2030.

First things first: social listening is the process of monitoring social media platforms to track mentions of your brand, competitors, trends, and customer sentiment.

It also allows you to engage with satisfied customers and turn them into ambassadors.

Overall, it’s not just about collecting data, but also about analyzing conversations and getting the insights you need to improve your marketing, customer service, and product development.

Considering 96% of unhappy customers won’t complain directly to you but will tell their friends, it’s important you listen.

“Listening is one of the most important things a brand can do online. If your brand is just broadcasting its own agenda, it isn’t truly engaging in a conversation.” – Jeremy Goldman, Author of Going Social

Social media listening is a proactive approach that helps you understand your audience better and take action based on real-time insights.

Here’s how it works, step-by-step:

1. Monitor conversations

With social listening, you can track mentions of specific keywords, hashtags, brand names, or industry terms across social platforms, blogs, review sites, etc.

For example, a coffee shop tracks mentions of “best iced coffee in NYC” to understand consumer preferences and trends.

2. Collect and aggregate data

Using tools like Sprout Social, Brandwatch, and Hootsuite, you can gather relevant posts, comments, and discussions in a single dashboard, allowing you to better analyze the information.

These types of tools usually compile more than just brand mentions; for instance, you can also get customer feedback and competitor insights.

For instance, if you find that “fast delivery” is a common topic in your competitors' reviews, you can gain an edge over them by addressing this gap.

3. Sentiment analysis

When you use AI-driven sentiment analysis, the mentions are classified as positive, negative, or neutral, allowing you to see how people perceive you.

With this information, you can curb problems before they have a chance to worsen – and identify customers who could become advocates for your brand.

4. Spot trends

You can also highlight trends, recurring pain points, and frequently asked questions. This helps you to create content, tweak your product development, or refine your customer experience.

For example, if you’re a fashion company, you might find a lot of discussions about “sustainable clothing” and decide, based on your insights, to launch an eco-friendly line.

5. Engage and take action

Once all this is done, make sure you also engage with customers directly – respond to praise, complaints, and inquiries on time. In addition, these insights allow you to adjust your marketing campaigns.

What is customer advocacy?

When customers are satisfied with your product or service, they might actively promote and support your brand. These customers go beyond purchasing – they recommend the brand to their friends and family (or followers), defend it in conversations, and generate word-of-mouth.

Social listening can greatly boost customer advocacy by allowing you to engage with consumers in meaningful ways.

You can better identify brand advocates

Who’s consistently engaging with your content or mentioning you in positive ways? By identifying these people, you can create a community for your best supporters, offer exclusive perks, and engage with customers through comments and DMs – all of this reinforces advocacy.

CoverGirl

To revamp the brand, CoverGirl changed its focus from traditional advertising to partnering with thousands of social media influencers. By monitoring online beauty conversations, the brand identified influencers like Sarahi Gonzalez and Lexie Learmann, who resonate with CoverGirl’s target audience.

This strategy led to increased brand visibility and engagement among younger consumers.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Karen Sarahi Gonzalez (@iluvsarahii)

Engage in real-time convos

Responding promptly to people shows them that you’re listening and that their voice matters.

For example, as a coffee shop, you might see mentions of people wanting a seasonal coffee flavour; you reply to them and might even tease an upcoming release. This makes your customers feel valued and heard.

Crumbl Cookies

This brand actively engages with their followers on social media, mainly replying to comments, joining conversations, and answering customer feedback.

They’re active on Instagram and TikTok and their tactic of having different cookie flavors every week lends itself to virality, since people go try them out and share their opinions with their own followers.

By monitoring user-generated content and reviews, they participate in real-time conversations, a strategy they used from the start to rapidly expand to over 1,000 locations.

Leverage positive mentions

Because your customers can be your best marketers, ensure you repost their content to strengthen the connection they have with your brand.

So, why not:

Amplify user-generated content by resharing testimonials, posts, and reviews.
Feature customers in your campaigns.
Encourage word-of-mouth marketing by celebrating people’s loyalty.

McDonald’s

In 2023, McDonald's launched a campaign celebrating their mascot Grimace's 52nd birthday, which introduced a special "Grimace Shake."

The campaign quickly went viral on TikTok (reaching 2.5 billion views), and users began creating funny content around the shake.

McDonald's used this positive buzz by engaging with the trend, sharing user-generated content, and acknowledging the trend on their official channels, which increased the campaign's reach and success.

Clean Origin

Clean Origin, which specializes in lab-grown diamond engagement rings, uses social listening to engage with its audience and boost its brand presence. This allows them to gain valuable insights into what their customers want, as well as industry trends.

And, of course, they also leverage user-generated content, like the post below, where the company retweets a user’s post about them.

"I have a lab-grown engagement ring, and I don't understand why you'd buy any other kind of diamond"

We don't either! Thanks @thisisinsider we love this article!https://t.co/xsfI43L76T
— Clean Origin (@CleanOrigin) June 21, 2023

Address pain points

And do it quickly. Complaints can escalate fast but, with social listening, you can spot negative feedback early before it spreads, address issues in real-time (reducing your customers’ frustrations), and turn a negative experience into a positive one.

HelloFresh

“At HelloFresh, data is at the center of everything we do. It was only natural for us to turn to social listening to improve the performance and efficiency of our marketing and communications teams." – Jordan Schultz, Social Media Manager at HelloFresh

HelloFresh uses social listening to keep track of their competitors and industry trends, get real-time alerts for mentions from influencers, and more. They also use tools like Chattermill to analyze customer feedback from various channels. This enables HelloFresh to pinpoint issues related to packaging, delivery, and ingredient quality.

The result? The company identified 400% more monthly mentions on social media, which they used to improve their service and offerings.

Personalize customer experiences

People engage more with brands who understand what they want.

Social listening helps you to track individual preferences based on engagement history, tailor responses with personalized recommendations, and segment audiences to offer more relevant content.

Ulta Beauty

Kelly Mahoney, the brand’s CMO, said that Ulta Beauty has used AI since 2018 to tailor its marketing based on the way people shop.

"Beauty is so dynamic and beauty is very, very personal. So we were really forced early to think about how to personalize the experience because everybody's beauty experience is just so no one-size-fits-all."

These AI-driven social listening tools can analyze what customers are saying about beauty trends, specific products, and their shopping preferences. And, by understanding these conversations, Ulta can refine its marketing and customer engagement strategies.

Spot trends and opportunities

By monitoring conversations about relevant topics, you can:

Identify emerging needs before competitors do.
Create timely content that resonates with your audience.
Develop new products and services based on consumer needs.

Miu Miu

Italian fashion brand Miu Miu monitors social media to identify and set trends, including their viral micro mini skirt and satin ballet pumps. This led to significant sales growth despite many other luxury brands seeing their sales fall.

Encourage community engagement

You can also use social listening to create campaigns that encourage participation (e.g., interactive marketing), foster discussion around shared values, and reward engagement with recognition or incentives.

For example, if you sold running shoes and noticed many customers discussing marathon training, you launch a hashtag challenge that encourages runners to share progress using your gear – this could help participants to feel connected to your brand and help promote it.

LTK

LTK revolutionized online shopping by connecting influencers with brands, allowing consumers to purchase products directly through social media posts.

By understanding consumer preferences and leveraging influencer credibility, LTK created a community-driven shopping platform with millions of users monthly (and they have 4.4 million followers just on Instagram).

In short

Social media listening goes beyond monitoring, as it’s about crafting relationships, responding to your customers, and proactively building loyalty.

If you listen, engage, and act, your customers become more than just buyers: they become advocates who proudly champion your brand.

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