You may have heard about brands talking about the ‘intelligence’ they acquired about their business, but what does this actually mean? And how did they do this? Where was this information gathered — from the media or social media?

It’s time to get some answers!

The team at Focal Points takes a look at the difference between media and social media intelligence:

What is media intelligence?

Media intelligence is an umbrella term that powers a number of technological solutions, including data mining, data science, media monitoring and media analysis.

This technology is all about gathering large volumes of data about your brand that is generated in the media. The information gathered stems from a variety of channels and variants of mediums, including print, online, broadcast and social media.

So, who collects all this data? Well, this process is normally done by a media intelligence service provider. These services are usually employed by a brand or agency, who then receive insights from the agency based on the data that was found about their brand. The agency then gives the brand a better understanding of their perception in the media, as well as their overall reputation.

What is social media intelligence?

This involves the gathering of data from a business’s social media web page to provide the brand with actionable insights that will help them turn a profit. Imagine your brand recently released a post on social media about your new advertising campaign; you may notice a few differences in terms of its performance on one platform compared to another.

For example, you may discover that the same post about your campaign performed better on Facebook than it did on Twitter. But why is that? Social media intelligence can give you this type of answer.

Think about it: There are tons of consumer insights available on these platforms, and it’s important for marketers to understand exactly why, for instance, one post reached a spike in engagement in comparison to a similar post that didn’t.

It’s these types of insights that will help you make informed decisions regarding your brand based on the data gathered on these digital platforms.

So, what’s the difference?

Social media intelligence allows you to gather all the insights and data you need in regards to your brand’s social pages and platforms that it is active on. You can keep tabs on your competitors, monitor mentions, analyse the sentiment of your consumers’ posts, and more!

With all that can be done with social media intelligence, why then would you use a media intelligence service provider? Well, the thing is, this service is quite niche to social media, whereas with media intelligence, you can gather brand insights across a whole range of mediums in relation to the media.

In fact, it’s beneficial to make use of media intelligence service providers, as they allow you to:
  • gather insights into what exactly your competitors are doing
  • analyse the strengths of your advertisements
  • get a glimpse into the behaviour of your audience
  • measure the impact of your communications efforts
  • discover new content ideas, and
  • manage your brand’s reputation during a crisis.
For more information, visit www.focalpoints.co.za. You can also follow Focal Points on Facebook, Twitter or on LinkedIn.