Brand Sentiment analysis is one of the most important metrics you have to keep your eye on. 

If you’re focusing solely on the numbers, you might fall into a trap. The high number of mentions does not mean your brand is doing great. That’s because in reality, the vast majority of those mentions could be terrible reviews. Sentiment analysis provides context for your mentions and helps you understand your data.

In this blog, we’ll focus on defining Brand Sentiment analysis, explaining why you should pay attention to it, and show you how to do it with Mediatoolkit.

What is brand sentiment analysis?

Brand sentiment analysis is, to put it simply, a way of determining the general attitude toward your brand, product, or service.

Nowadays, the easiest way to make a sentiment analysis is through media monitoring tools. The reason for using media monitoring is that people often express their opinions on social media channels. Since it’s impossible for you to manually search for every mention out there and evaluate it (especially if you’re a global brand), opting for a media monitoring is a great way to go.

These types of tools analyze online mentions of your brand and give you insights on your brand’s position in the eyes of (potential) customers. The mention’s sentiment is determined as positive, negative, or neutral. 

Keep in mind that the computer can’t detect sarcasm, for example, so the sentiment provided by the tool won’t be correct 100% of the time. But, it will give you a general overview of the sentiment trend. Later in the blog, we’ll show you what you can do to improve the correctness of the sentiment. 

Why is brand sentiment important?

Knowing your brand sentiment allows you to make informed decisions and work towards improving your business in general. Here we’ll show you various aspects in which using sentiment analysis can be extremely beneficial.

Customers’ reviews of your brand

We already touched upon this subject in the previous paragraph. Social media, especially Twitter and Facebook, are filled with different opinions, reviews, and ratings on different topics, products, brands, people, you name it…

It often happens that some mentions a specific brand, but doesn’t necessarily tag it in the post. That’s why it’s important to use media monitoring so you don’t miss out on the posts about your brand if the person writing it didn’t tag you.

https://twitter.com/ginatonicnyc/status/1279801125605171201

Also, by tracking mentions all around the web and social media, you’ll be able to get a clearer and more realistic insight into your brand sentiment and get to know your customers better. 

If you see that the mentions of your brand are turning more and more negative over time, it’s a clear signal something is off and you need to find the root of the problem and fix it. By doing so, you can avoid potential crises, losing customers, and damaging your brand.

Crisis detection and mitigation

No one is immune to crises, and PwC’s research from 2019 proves that. According to them, 69% of participants experienced a crisis in the last five years. 

Sentiment plays two important roles in crisis situations. Firstly, the sentiment is a reliable indicator of a potential crisis in the making.

If you notice your sentiment growing increasingly negative in a short period of time, you should start preparing a crisis communication strategy or implementing the existing one.

The great thing is that media monitoring tools notify you in real-time if the number of (negative) mentions starts growing unexpectedly, so you don’t have to go and check it every minute.

If you’re in the middle of a crisis, sentiment analysis will show you whether your mitigation efforts are working or not. If you see the mention’s sentiment going more towards neutral and positive, it means you’re doing a good job!

Campaign performance

Did your target audience like your campaign or not? 

Sentiment analysis has all the answers. Plus, just as during the crisis, it is wise to monitor the movement of the sentiment during your campaign. That way you’ll be able to do adjustments if necessary and secure your campaign success.

Sentiment analysis can be great for finding influencers, and by collaborating with them you can boost your campaign performance. It is estimated that 49% of consumers depend on influencers’ recommendations on social media, so you better find the right influencers to help you out.

Key people in your company

When monitoring mentions of your brand, it is important to monitor mentions about key people in the company as well. Unfortunately, it often happens that one failed interview with a CEO causes a lot of problems for the company itself. 

That’s why you should keep an eye on the sentiment after big interviews or articles come out, so you can see how people are reacting to them.

Competitive analysis

Tracking competitors’ brand sentiment is as important as tracking your own. 

Use sentiment analysis to explore what your competitors are doing right, and what they’re doing wrong and find opportunities in that. 

For example, if a competitor’s customers are unsatisfied with the product or service, and are posting about it online, it can be a great opportunity for you to suggest to them your product or service instead. You just might get a new customer!

Also, you can examine competitors’ mistakes, and learn from them so you don’t repeat them.

One thing that can help you achieve more positive brand sentiment and better results regardless of the amount of competition around you is establishing a brand voice. Make sure you get to know your target audience well, so you can communicate with them in a way they’ll appreciate. By doing so, you’ll be able to establish successful long-term quality relationships with your customers which will keep your brand sentiment on positive levels.

How to do brand sentiment analysis with Mediatoolkit?

To answer this question, it is first important to distinguish three types of sentiment in the tool and what each of them means. 

Remember when we mentioned that the computer is determining the sentiment of mentions? That is called automated sentiment. 

The second one is manual sentiment. It represents mentions that you manually classified as positive, negative, or neutral in the tool. You can do that in the feed or by setting Automated actions. More on that later on. 

The final type of sentiment is effective sentiment, and it is a mix of automated and manual sentiment.

Now, let’s analyze!

Setting up queries

The first step is to set up a query containing keyword(s) you want to track. To get better results, use Boolean operators, source, location, and language filters.

After you’ve done that, the results will show in your feed. 

Setting up Automated actions

If you’re expecting to gather a lot of mentions with your query, or you simply want to automize the media monitoring process as much as possible, the best thing to do is to set up Automated actions.  

With this feature, you can assign specific sentiment to future (and old) mentions by setting up words, sources, and/or websites that will trigger that action.

After setting all of that up, you can go ahead to the reports.

Sentiment charts in the Reports

Alongside charts like mentions over time, total impressions, locations, languages, etc., Mediatoolkit has five charts with sentiment data in the Advanced reports. 

• Positive-negative sentiment ratio (a quick and simple way of seeing predominant brand sentiment)
• Sentiment ratio (includes positive, negative, and neutral sentiment)
• Sentiment ratio by channel (see the brand sentiment depending on channels your monitoring)
• Sentiment over time (see how your brand sentiment is changing over time)
• Top influencers by sentiment (see which influencers write positive or negative stuff about your brand)

With the reports, you can constantly be up-to-date with your brand sentiment and download them when necessary.

Also, you can create custom reports and charts so you can focus only on data relevant to your business.

Remember when we talked about different types of sentiment? While creating custom charts, you’ll be able to choose what type of sentiment you want to have in the chart. If you want a general overview, choose automated sentiment. The effective sentiment is great for daily reports, while manual sentiment provides you with the most accurate data.

Final thoughts on brand sentiment

Brand sentiment analysis will provide you with valuable insight into customers’ perceptions of your brand. That type of feedback will help you improve your brand and keep you out of trouble. 

Nowadays, the quality of the product is not the only thing that matters. Brand reputation and values play an important role as well. More and more, customers are realizing that they hold power by choosing where they spend their money. And that choice is often influenced by the brand’s position on certain topics. 57% of millennial women say that their purchase decisions are driven by a brand’s values and stance on issues that are important to them. 

Media monitoring can help you understand your customers’ wants and needs better, and put you on the right side of issues.

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