Market research in social media refers to the process of gathering quantitative and/or qualitative data from social media platforms in order to better understand social, consumer, or market trends.

Every social media market research campaign should have a specific goal in mind:

• Do you need market research for your brand, products, online consumer behaviour, consumer insights, customer service, or competitor insights?
• Do you want qualitative, quantitative, or both types of data?
• If so, what measurements will assist you in defining this?
• Which social media platforms do you want to mine data from?

Setting a clear aim will assist you in planning and executing your information collecting strategy. In this blog, we’ll go over some of the numerous strategies, tools, and tips you may use to uncover market insights on social media.

• Understand your customers better

It’s critical to understand what your customers like and dislike about your company. The phrases and metrics you use to measure the performance of your product or service may not always correspond to what customers value most. You may understand what characteristics people use to determine value as well as how they speak about your product, service, or brand by researching social media discussions regarding your product or service. You may communicate directly to consumers and improve the efficacy of your marketing efforts by using these variables and terms in your own marketing. You can help to develop a brand or product image that is unique among competitors and speaks directly to your target market by creating customer-centric definitions of value, quality, and other critical terms.

Quantitative, qualitative, or both data types are available. Quantitative data is represented by concrete statistics that can be used to analyse or measure your research. Likes, Shares, Comments, Mention Volume, Share of Voice, Reach, Followers, and Subscribers are all examples of this. There are a variety of measures you may employ to collect quantitative data depending on the social media platform.

• Establish goals

Every social media market research strategy should have a specific objective in mind. Setting a clear aim will assist you in planning and executing your information collecting strategy. Furthermore, social market research has long been a cornerstone of gathering customer insights on companies and/or products.

To set a target goal, you must first describe clearly what information your company requires:

• Product research
• Product launches
• Behavioural insights on target consumers
• Customer service
• Defining buyer personas

• Use Social Media’s Real-Time Features for Quick Research

Traditional market research approaches like surveys and study groups can take months to design, form, and implement. Research can be completed in a couple of minutes or hours using social media. As a result, market research can be used to track increasingly detailed parts of your marketing operations. From product launches to follow-up marketing, every aspect of your marketing strategy may be scrutinised separately for better outcomes across the board. You may use social media for market research right now, rather than spending months establishing a marketing research plan and possibly simply collecting obsolete knowledge as trends change.

•  Discover Unnoticed Trends and Insights 

The fact that most marketing research methods are driven by questions is one of their main flaws. You must first know what questions to ask in order to collect the necessary information. Simultaneously, merely rephrasing a query can provide significantly different results. This means that the quality of your market research is determined by the questions you ask. Information is gathered through interaction and observation due to the large breadth and interactive nature of social media. You can merely observe or participate as an equal in the debates rather than leading them. This can lead to a range of answers and findings that might otherwise go unnoticed if other research approaches were used.

• Identify new opportunities

Market research can assist you in identifying new market prospects for your organisation. It can assist in identifying potential expansion areas and/or determining whether the market is ready for your new products or services.

If you’re going to start a new retail store, for example, you’ll need to choose a suitable site. Alternatively, you may be considering changing your distribution channel and need to assess the impact on your consumer base.

We could use existing data to address these questions. These resources contain information on topics such as:

• Market size
• Demographics
• Market share statistics
• Industry dynamics
• Major industry suppliers
• Key competitors
• Data on the number of businesses and their geographic distribution in the industry as a whole.

Obtaining this kind of market data is an important first step in effectively “sizing up a new market” and determining the best business strategy and operations. The Social Lions, a Mumbai-based digital marketing business, can assist you with all of your digital marketing requirements.