Social listening creates opportunities.

Social listening is the process of monitoring social media to identify and assess what is being said about a company, individual, brand, product, or service.  Through social listening you can gain market intelligence and intelligence about how your brand is perceived, and you can drive innovation. Moreover, as Daniel Newman points out, social listening has become an integral part of the entire customer lifestyle.

Reaping the benefits of social listening

To reap the benefits of social listening it is essential that you use the information and intelligence gathered. Tracx offers up a great example of how social listening can guide a merchandisers’ supply chain management.  Specifically, how a company can transform social media management by guiding inventory allocation and velocity.

The Aberdeen Group offers additional examples of how social listening has been and can be used: “companies can use the voice of the customer to make critical adjustments and find issues related to inventory allocation, order management, returns management, cost, overall service satisfaction and beyond.”

Tools for social listening

Brad Neathery, founder of Social Media Today, put together a great list of social listening tools that give businesses the right data they need to align their social marketing strategy with business goals.  His list includes:

1.  Social Mention 

2.  SocialRest 

3.  TweetReach 

4.  ViralHeat 

5  Datasift 

6  Simply Measured 

7  Sysomos

8  Zoomph 

The opportunities the supply chain and logistics industries can realize through social listening are great. Not participating in social listening results in missed opportunities including increased revenue.