Shh! I’m Trying to Boost My Voice

Your guide to strategic brand analytics in the digital age

Have you ever thought about breaking away from the crowd? Yes? Great! This post offers an in-depth summary of how you can raise your voice higher than most people online.

What is the key to standing out?

Digital analytics may be one of the best-kept secrets in the marketing, advertising, and public relations industries. The reason for the secrecy, well,  if everyone knew the power of data and how to interpret it, there would be no need to outsource. You’re in luck! This post has broken the complicated subject of digital brand analytics and market share into three easy to digest parts.

Brand, what does that mean to you? Some people may think of Nike, MAC Cosmetics, Target, Chanel, Starbucks, etc. Those are all great corporations and brands with several things in common, one being the ability to effectively analyze content and engagement.

Photo by rawpixel.com from Pexels

Of course, you are an individual and small-business that may not have the available resources like those of Nike or similar companies. To be successful, you don’t need them. Take this quote from Chuck Hemann and Ken Burbary in Making Sense of Consumer Data in a Digital World: Digital Marketing Analytics, “to stay consistently relevant, you must have your finger on the pulse of your digital brand health.”

With that said, here is the first step you should take when growing your brand:

Brand share begins with measuring what category and audience your brand reaches and occupies. The easiest way to think about brand share is to break it down into three equally important parts:

1. What people say – Also known as share of voice (SOV), is easily broken down as: conversations about your brand / total conversations in your brand category. For example, take all the conversations happening about Nike, then divide those conversations specifically about Nike, by all the conversations happening in the apparel category.
2. What people do – More commonly known as share of search (SOS), equals searches about your brand/total searches in your brand category. This may be self-explanatory, and just refers to how many people are searching for your brand compared to your competitors.
3. Who’s your audience – Or share of audience (SOA) is equal to the total audience for your brand / total audience per competitor within a category. This part is a little more complex and should be broken down. Start with focusing on one platform like Facebook, then move onto your other platforms collecting the total sum. After you are done calculating the total of your own audience, do the same for your competitors. By plugging in your total audience with that of one of your competitors, you will then discover your SOA.

If you can remember these three parts, then you’re well on your way to understanding market share, solidifying your brand, and having a competitive advantage over your competition.

I’ll leave you with this quote from Tom Peters in Fast Company, “all of us need to understand the importance of branding. We are CEOs of our own companies: Me Inc. To be in business today, our most important job is to be head marketer for the brand called You.”

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Why aren’t you into makeup? It was made for you.

I am really excited about this week’s topic. I want to discuss what the beauty industry does behind the scenes in preparation for a new product launch. I will begin with the process of analyzing sentiment.

In case you have been living under a rock, makeup is the brand-new buzz word. With four out of five women opting to cover their natural freckles or an unexpected breakout with makeup, how could the industry be considered so controversial?

It is 2018! With megastars like Alicia Keys standing for natural beauty and the #NoMakeup movement, the industry is facing a “trial by Twitter.” Of course, to an industry that is projected to be valued at over $800 billion in the next five years, criticism is just a part of the territory. To me, the beauty industry is like the best lip plumper in the market, thriving.

The “no-makeup makeup” is a huge trend and has overtaken the original stance of #NoMakeup. I agree this is somewhat disheartening; what was a very powerful movement has been buried under CC cream and ultra-lightweight foundation. What most people don’t know, is just about every campaign was carefully crafted to adhere to the response of the last one.  Meaning, nearly everything from foundation to nail-polish was planned around the latest trends.

What happens after all this sentiment data has been collected? If the company wants to be successful, it should continue by doing more research. According to Forbes, the first four out of 17 steps anyone should take before launching a product, are centered around having an intimate understanding of your audience. Social listening should be utilized, and with the help of platforms like Meltwater and Twitter, it is easier than ever.

For example, here is one of my recent tweets to MAC Cosmetics:

Comment from MAC Cosmetics to Janet Diane White

I am sure the company deals with hundreds of mentions every day and probably has a database of automated answers, but the fact that they are listening should be what we care about.  Imagine if 100 of my friends and I stated our opinion on the company’s lack of sonic blue blush. MAC would then have a choice, to either make the desired blue blush or not.

For argument’s sake, let’s say the company is moving forward with launching the blue blush. One of the next steps would include creating a demo or tester. After successfully completing the product safety testing and quality control, it is time to spend the blush out to the company’s list of influencers. In a perfect world, each influencer is loving and raving about the blush, and their audiences are ecstatic about the innovation.

Before MAC officially launches its sonic blue blush, the company should ask itself “why,” one more time. Why does the world need this blue blush? Why do people want a blue blush? Why did we create a blue blush? The fact is, the answers to these questions can be found with research, and MAC should be obligated to answer them without hesitation.

It is go time; the blue blush has hit the market. Unfortunately, we don’t live in a perfect world and there are a few loud disapproval’s. Good thing the company did its research and has already blocked @WeHateBlue because of its habit of publicly posting inappropriate comments.

Congratulations! You now have a foundation on how to do a new product launch. What are you going to launch next? I encourage you to read the entire, “17 Steps to Take Before You Launch a Product,” and then let me know what you think the next biggest trend will be.