So — you want to reach as many potential consumers as possible. Perhaps you have what you think is a great idea for a marketing campaign. Maybe you have already prepared a series of memes. You have everything planned, you jump-start it and… it’s a flop. Your audience reach is poor. Some meme pages even mentioned your effort as one of the most misguided media campaigns of 2022.

Until recently, to diagnose such a failure, you would need costly focus groups or questionnaire studies. Fortunately, we live in a time of social media. This means we have social listening tools to avoid exactly such situations. With the help of SentiOne, in a few hours, you will verify ideas for acquiring leads, take a look at competitors’ campaigns and address the most sensitive points of your messaging.

Generating leads – the basics

A short reminder for experts and an introduction for newbies. Leads are different from potential consumers: while the latter is something of an unknown quantity, leads have explicitly expressed interest in our products or services.

This means we know what messages will most likely reach them. We know how our competitors generate them. We know why they would like to buy our company’s services and how we can encourage them to do so.

Let’s discuss a few principles useful in generating leads.

Connect with influencers

Influencers are worth their weight in gold — literally! In 2021, the influencer market was valued at 15 billion USD, and continues to grow!

This is because influencers are resistant to various defence strategies employed by millennials and gen z, for whom advertising equals the greatest of evils. These groups want to watch their favourite content creators, they want to read their tweets and interact with them. Sponsored content is how these influencers survive, and the fans are aware of this. This is the one form of advertising that they accept — specifically because they can consent to it.

Good relations with influencers whose opinions count in your industry also means building brand authority. To influence is to remain credible. Fair and honest criticism — and addressing it appropriately — is a great opportunity to generate leads. And if your product works, and we assume it does, you shouldn’t end up chewed up and spat out.

Take advantage of your competitors’ failures

Social media discussions which criticise your competition are criticised are an excellent repository of knowledge. With the help of social listening, you can easily get information about which solutions should not be duplicated. The widely mocked content, intended to reach younger audiences, is a great warning about how not to advertise. How many times have you seen a meme on Facebook that the company used completely against its original meaning? How many times did the message that was supposed to sound juvenile came out like Steve Buscemi in 30 Rock?

Of course, it’s not just about branding. Knowing your competitors’ shortcomings allows you to improve your solutions. It really works — nothing tastes better than posts that promote an area where your opponents fell short.

Stay up to date with trends

Technologies are synonymous with constant development and innovation. People interested in your industry want to know what the latest solutions and counter-solutions are. You, in turn, want to know which ones you can deliver and sell to them.

Social listening will let you find out the hot topics of your sector. You will also learn about sentiments towards technological innovations. If it is within your capabilities, why not invest in extending your offer? This strategy applies especially to generating new leads who may have been previously uninterested in your services.

Interact with your audience!

You obviously can’t keep up with every novelty. However, that doesn’t mean you should ignore them. If you know what your leads are expecting, you also know how you should comment on current topics. This makes your company feel relevant. Of course, the necessary condition here is to steer clear of posting nonsense.

But that’s exactly what social listening is for. It will not, of course, replace thorough research. It will, however, allow you to easily identify what you need to pay attention to when posting. And post you absolutely should.

Generating leads with SentiOne

Let’s move on to practice. Below I will outline the strategy of discovering who posts about your brand.

SentiOne’s mentions in time widget.

To start with, the analysis dashboard’s Mentions in Time widget will show you a graph of mentions about you over time. This lets you pinpoint the peaks during which your brand was talked about the most.

That’s not everything, though — the Mentions in Time widget has different variants, such as Mentions in Time by Sentiment. That lets you pinpoint when your brand was talked about positively, and vice versa.

SentiOne’s mentions in time by sentiment widget.

Once you have identified a peak, switch over to the Mentions view — this is where the magic happens.

Sorting the mentions by most influential first.

You can sort the mentions based on their influence score, which is calculated based on their audience reach and engagement. This will show you which discussions generated the most buzz.

Next, exclude your business partners and media outlets to pinpoint the opinion makers. You can do that by entering a business partner’s name in the “Name of the Author” filter on the right side of the screen, then hitting “bulk operation” on the top of the view. This will let you ignore every mention by that author from your project. (Careful! This can’t be undone!)

Once that’s done, you’ll be left with a list of mentions belonging to your most loyal influencers.  All that’s left is to filter it by sentiment. Find out who’s been singing your praises and who’s been your most vocal critic — and make contact!

SentiOne’s mention view.

SentiOne — more than generating leads

This article is just an overview of the most popular and readily available lead generation strategies. Of course, social listening alone has many more applications. You can use it to analyse trends, your owned media, or even your competitors!

If you’re interested in exploring the full potential of SentiOne, don’t wait! Book your demo period today.