18 Best Social Listening Tools

Have you ever tapped into the power of the best social listening tools to fuel your agency’s or your clients’ growth? If not, it's time to discover how to propel your social media marketing strategy to new heights and provide the edge you need to break through barriers.

The old saying "what you don't know can't hurt you" may hold some truth in certain aspects of life, but in the realm of business and social media, it is often quite the opposite. Ignorance here is not bliss; it's potential peril. The conversations that you are not part of, the trends you're missing, the negative sentiments brewing, or even the positive feedback left unacknowledged can have far-reaching consequences.

In today's digital landscape, reputation management is essential for staying competitive, executing effective social media campaigns for clients, and growing your agency. Whether you’re experiencing rapid growth and are struggling to keep up with your own brand marketing or are trying to attract more clients to overcome your next growth plateau, a social listening strategy can help make these hurdles smaller. 

This article is here to guide you through different social listening tools that will equip you with the consumer insights needed to make the right decisions for your agency (which you can also apply to your client's marketing campaigns).

• Why Are Social Listening Tools Important 

• 6 Reasons Agencies Need Social Media Monitoring

• 18 Best Social Media Listening Tools for Agencies

• Comparing the Best Social Listening Tools

• Future Trends and Predictions

Why Agencies Need A Social Listening Tool 

“Marketing is a very agile industry,” notes Ramsey Sweis, President and Founder of Aqaba. “If you don’t have these triggers in place, then how do you know you’re performing? You assume you’ve done a good job, but the customer is viewing it from a different set of glasses.”

Social media is a breeding ground for conversations, opinions, and trends that shape entire industries. And marketing is inherently one of them. Through social listening, you hear what people are saying about your agency–straight through the grapevine. 

Having early insights into your agency’s brand mentions is key to two things: reacting in a prompt manner to ride the wave of positive vibes and to promptly mitigate situations that could negatively impact your bottom line. Complement that with multi‑channel marketing agency software to act fast.

In fact, 96% of customers actively seek out negative reviews and comments online–and it’s no different when choosing a digital marketing agency to grow their business. 

But agencies are busy enough monitoring metrics for all their clients–let alone scrolling through various social media platforms to answer and like people’s comments on social posts. That’s why agencies need the best marketing analytics tool for their social listening that:

• Automatically monitors online discussions

• Easily allows you to delegate to your agency team responding through one platform

• Notifies you when something requires your immediate attention

Ultimately, getting a deeper understanding of how your agency is perceived, tracking audience sentiment, and uncovering emerging trends is the secret sauce to skyrocketing your agency's brand presence without taking anything away from your marketing productivity. 

6 Reasons Agencies Should Do Social Media Monitoring

Here are six benefits you may not have considered that social media listening brings to marketing agencies. By harnessing the capabilities of the top social listening tools, you'll gain valuable insights that pave the way for transformative growth and breakthroughs–regardless of your agency’s lifecycle stage.

Competitive Advantage

Social listening offers you a real-time snapshot of how your target audience perceives your agency, enabling you to make strategic decisions that align with their expectations. It also provides a valuable competitive analysis tool, allowing you to monitor and understand what people are saying about your competitors or those in your industry. 

By gaining insights into your competitors' strengths and weaknesses, you uncover opportunities to differentiate your agency and establish a unique value proposition to create an unstoppable brand that sets you apart.

An unstoppable brand is a thriving, purposeful entity built on the right foundations. It’s resilient enough to weather any storm or challenge but is importantly built for long-term, sustainable growth.

David Metcalf, Founder & Managing Director at Distl

Damage Control Ops

Social listening tools identify potential issues before they escalate into full-blown crises. By monitoring social media conversations and sentiments about your agency, you quickly detect any negative trends and respond proactively. 

This could involve actively responding to client feedback, addressing concerns promptly, or even issuing public statements when necessary. It's all about being transparent and accountable, which can do wonders for your agency's reputation.

“Even professional responses to negative reviews can convince a prospect that your company is the one they want to work with,” adds Anya Curry, Owner of Ambidextrous Services.

Granular Audience Insights

Social media listening can reveal deep, granular insights into your audience's behaviors, preferences, and pain points. By analyzing the relevant conversations and topics for your audience, agencies better understand their wants and needs for social media efforts.

Just think about how many times businesses have been burned by sup-par agency work, and then shared their experiences on social media.  

As Lane Anderson, Founder of London Road Marketing, shares, “It is very hard for clients to be able to tell who is legitimate until they've experienced that difference. So ‘trust me, we're different’ doesn't really work. They've heard it before.”

Use the information gleaned from active social media listening to fine-tune your services, choose a niche, tweak your messaging, and adjust your overall approach. It helps you discover untapped opportunities for positioning your agency and attracting new clients.

We lean heavily on the words of our customers. Not our words. Because we can say whatever we want about ourselves. 

Lane Anderson, Founder of London Road Marketing

Check out how to implement a review strategy to grow your agency’s credibility in the video below.👇

Squeaky Clean Reputation

Maintaining a positive reputation is crucial for any agency's success. Social listening allows you to nurture positive relationships with your clients and wider audience, fostering long-term loyalty. 

By acknowledging positive feedback and showing appreciation for your clients, you enhance your agency's reputation. Moreover, by addressing any negative sentiments swiftly and professionally, you show your agency’s commitment to customer satisfaction, thereby strengthening your brand image.

New Client Magnet

“The biggest challenge we are facing as an agency is consistently attracting the volume of qualified leads for our own client acquisition that we want,” says Larry Weideman, SEO Manager, Magnyfi.

And staying ahead of industry trends is key to attracting new clients. 

By using social listening data to understand what's gaining traction in your industry, you position your agency at the forefront of these trends. 

For example, if businesses start talking about struggles they are having with the migration to GA-4, that’s an excellent opportunity to reach out and offer your agency’s assistance, such as a free migration guide. 

Creating lead magnets that resonate with the current industry buzz or identifying inbound marketing opportunities that align with trending topics are a great way to prove your industry leadership and relevance, helping you get more clients and grow your agency.

Client Retention 

Client retention is just as important as client acquisition. With social listening, agencies actively manage their reputation and nurture positive relationships with clients, fostering long-term loyalty. Respond to client feedback and concerns in a timely and respectful manner to enhance the customer experience and ensure your clients feel valued. 

Consider this scenario–a marketing agency is trucking along, thinking everything is going fine with their client campaigns. One day, they notice a sudden spike in negative sentiment across major social networks, mainly Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Clients are posting about the challenges they’ve had reaching their new account rep, and even loyal customers are threatening to leave the agency. Left unattended, this growing discontent could lead to a severe hit to the agency’s reputation and a subsequent loss of business.

Moreover, social listening can help you identify opportunities for service improvement, allowing you to continually meet and exceed your clients' expectations. In the case above, setting an SLA (Service Level Agreement) on response time or using integrated messaging to make it easier for clients to ask questions could remediate the issue being talked about. 

The 18 Best Social Listening Tools for Digital Agencies

There’s no shortage of social listening tools for agencies to choose from. But each of their characteristics will help you distinguish the best social listening tool for your social media strategy needs and budget.

1. Brandwatch

This is one of the most comprehensive social media monitoring tools, and includes sentiment analysis, trend tracking, and gives you an influencer score. Its main strength is its powerful data analytics capabilities. However, it may be somewhat expensive for smaller agencies.

• Key Features: Sentiment analysis, trend tracking, influencer scoring.

• Pricing: $1000 per month for 10,000 social media mentions, however, you’ll need to contact Brandwatch for a quote. 

• Strengths: Powerful data analytics capabilities.

• Weaknesses: Expensive for smaller agencies.

• Unique Selling Points: Extensive data analytics you can use for all your clients and use as an opportunity to upsell clients on this additional service.

2. Hootsuite

Known for its social media management features, Hootsuite also offers effective social listening capabilities. Its unified dashboard allows for easy monitoring of multiple social platforms. It's user-friendly, but its digital marketing analytics features might not be as robust as some other tools.

• Key Features: Social media management, unified dashboard for multi-platform monitoring.

• Pricing: Starts from $99 per month.

• Strengths: User-friendly interface, good for multi-platform monitoring.

• Weaknesses: Social media analytics features might not be as robust as some other tools.

• Unique Selling Points: Combines social media management with social listening in a single platform.

3. Sprout Social 

Sprout Social combines social media management tools with social listening. It has the ability to monitor keywords and hashtags, and track sentiment across various platforms. It is a bit pricier than some competitors, but it offers a comprehensive suite of tools for social media managers.

• Key Features: Social media management, tracking relevant keywords, hashtag tracking, sentiment analysis.

• Pricing: Starts from $249 per user per month.

• Strengths: Comprehensive suite of tools.

• Weaknesses: Pricier than some competitors.

• Unique Selling Points: Robust social listening capabilities coupled with social media management.

4. YouScan

YouScan is a social media listening tool powered by AI and machine learning. It provides visual insights, sentiment analysis, topic clustering, and demographic data. Its image recognition technology can analyze user-generated content to detect your logo, products, scenes, objects, and actions, thereby providing comprehensive insights into your audience's perception of your brand.

• Key Features: Visual insights, sentiment analysis, topic clustering, demographic data

• Pricing: Starts at $1000 per month, but you’ll need to contact their sales rep.

• Strengths: Offers AI-powered image recognition technology for visual insights

• Weaknesses: May have more features than smaller agencies require

• Unique Selling Points: Uses machine learning to provide insights on user-generated content

As you can see in the example above, YouScan’s image recognition feature searches for any social mentions of McDonalds' logo.

5. Talkwalker

Talkwalker provides a broad range of listening features, including image recognition. It offers AI-powered analytics to deliver insights on customer sentiment and trends. Its AI capabilities are robust, but it may not be as user-friendly as other tools.

• Key Features: Broad range of listening features, image recognition, AI-powered analytics.

• Pricing: According to G2, prices start at $9600 per year ($800 a month). Pricing details are available upon request. 

• Strengths: Robust AI capabilities for analytics.

• Weaknesses: May not be as user-friendly as other tools.

• Unique Selling Points: Comprehensive social listening with powerful AI-driven analytics.

6. BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo is an effective tool for content research and monitoring. Social listening findings include the most shared content on social media channels and the ability to identify influencers in their industry. It's great for content marketing, but it may not offer as many listening features as other tools.

• Key Features: Content research and monitoring, influencer tracking.

• Pricing: Starts from $119 per month.

• Strengths: Strong capabilities for content marketing.

• Weaknesses: May not offer as many standalone listening features as other tools.

• Unique Selling Points: Helps find the most shared content on social media and identify key influencers.

7. Agorapulse

Agorapulse is a social media management tool with strong social listening features. It allows users to monitor chatter on social channels and get actionable business insights. Its strength is its combined management and listening features, but it may not have as many standalone listening features.

• Key Features: Social media management, social chatter monitoring.

• Pricing: Starts from $49 per month.

• Strengths: Good combination of management and listening features.

• Weaknesses: Might lack some standalone listening features.

• Unique Selling Points: Combines social media management and listening capabilities.

8. Mention

Mention offers real-time social media monitoring and provides detailed analytics reports. It allows users to monitor millions of sources in over 40 languages. It's great for international brands, but smaller agencies may not need such extensive capabilities.

• Key Features: Real-time social media monitoring, detailed mention analytics reports.

• Pricing: Starts from $41 per month.

• Strengths: Extensive monitoring capabilities across multiple sources.

• Weaknesses: Might offer more features than needed for smaller agencies.

• Unique Selling Points: Powerful, real-time monitoring and reporting across millions of sources.

Here’s what it looks like for Twitter, for instance:

As you can see, there’s a dashboard that displays all your historical data in one place. This includes a Twitter feed, influencer marketing suggestions, an insight center, and a report creator.

By adding alerts, you focus on the information you’re seeking while blocking out potential distractions. If someone is talking about your agency on Twitter or anywhere else on the web, Mention will find it. 

9. Sendible

Sendible offers a combination of social media management and listening. It allows users to monitor brand mentions and sentiment across various platforms. It's easy to use but may not offer as many analytics features as some competitors.

• Key Features: Social media management, ability to track brand mentions, sentiment analysis.

• Pricing: Starts from $24 per month.

• Strengths: Easy to use, good for multi-platform monitoring.

• Weaknesses: May not offer as many analytics features as some competitors.

• Unique Selling Points: Offers a user-friendly platform for social media management and listening.

10. Synthesio

Synthesio is a social media monitoring tool that also provides a wide range of analytics. It allows for demographic and sentiment analysis, influence score, and more. It's powerful but may be more suited for large enterprises than small agencies.

• Key Features: Demographic and sentiment analysis, influencer scoring, wide range of analytics

• Pricing: Custom pricing available upon request, however, according to PCMag it starts at $1200 per month.

• Strengths: Offers deep social listening capabilities

• Weaknesses: May be more suited for large enterprises than small agencies

• Unique Selling Points: Provides a wide range of analytics for comprehensive insights

11. ZoomSphere

ZoomSphere is a comprehensive social media management tool that offers capabilities for customer care, social media publishing, analytics, and benchmarking. It's designed to help agencies and brands manage their social media presence effectively and efficiently. With ZoomSphere, you can track your brand's social media performance, analyze your audience, and manage your customer interactions all in one place.

• Key Features: Customer care, social media publishing, analytics, benchmarking

• Pricing: Starts at $149 per month. 

• Strengths: Comprehensive social media management tool with strong analytics

• Weaknesses: May be more than what smaller agencies need for social listening

• Unique Selling Points: Offers a range of modules for different aspects of social media management

12. TweetDeck

TweetDeck is a social media dashboard application for the management of Twitter accounts. Ideal for heavy Twitter-using agencies, it allows for the scheduling of tweets, monitoring multiple Twitter feeds, and tracking social conversations. 

While it doesn't provide robust analytics of other platforms compared to other social media tools, its strength lies in its simplicity and focus on enhancing the Twitter experience.

• Key Features: Allows management of multiple social media accounts, scheduling of tweets, monitoring of Twitter feeds

• Pricing: Free to use.

• Strengths: Ideal for heavy Twitter users and Twitter-based agencies

• Weaknesses: Only suitable for Twitter, lacks robust analytics

• Unique Selling Points: User-friendly interface, great for tracking online conversations on Twitter

For social listening, create a dashboard with columns for:

• Home

• Notifications 

• Trending Topics

• Likes

• Mentions

• Activity

While it’s similar to Twitter’s advanced search feature in many ways, the primary difference is the ability to view all your data–based on your selections–in the same place, as you’ll see in the example below: 

13. Awario

Awario is a powerful tool designed for marketing agencies to monitor their clients' brands across social media and the web. It provides real-time data, which can be invaluable for reputation management, spotting trends, and understanding audience sentiment.

• Key Features: Real-time monitoring, sentiment analysis, competitive analysis.

• Pricing: Starts from $24 per month for the Starter plan.

• Strengths: Real-time data, comprehensive monitoring capabilities.

• Weaknesses: May lack the advanced analytics of some other tools.

• Unique Selling Points: Offers non-stop monitoring and instant notifications, ensuring agencies never miss important discussions about their clients' brands.

14. Oktopost

Oktopost is a social media marketing platform specifically designed for B2B marketing agencies. It allows agencies to manage, monitor, and measure all of their social media activities for their clients.

• Key Features: Social media management, monitoring, and analytics.

• Pricing: Pricing details available upon request, though Trustradius states they start at $49 per month. 

• Strengths: Specifically designed for B2B marketing.

• Weaknesses: May not be as well-suited for B2C agencies.

• Unique Selling Points: Built for B2B marketing, allows for comprehensive management and measurement of social media activities.

15. Iconosquare

Iconosquare is a dedicated tool for managing, monitoring, and analyzing Instagram metrics and Facebook activity. It's a fantastic tool for marketing agencies focused on these two platforms, offering detailed analytics to help improve social media strategy.

• Key Features: Instagram and Facebook analytics, social media management.

• Pricing: Starts from $49 per month for the Pro plan.

• Strengths: In-depth Instagram and Facebook analytics.

• Weaknesses: Only supports Instagram and Facebook.

• Unique Selling Points: Offers a dedicated solution for Instagram and Facebook monitoring and analysis.

16. Tailwind

Tailwind is an all-in-one tool for Pinterest and Instagram. It offers scheduling, analytics, and listening features. This is an excellent choice for marketing agencies whose clients heavily use these visual platforms.

• Key Features: Scheduling, analytics, listening for Pinterest and Instagram.

• Pricing: Starts from $19.99 per month.

• Strengths: Comprehensive tool for Pinterest and Instagram.

• Weaknesses: Limited to Pinterest and Instagram.

• Unique Selling Points: Offers a dedicated solution for these visual platforms, with features like SmartSchedule and Tailwind Tribes.

17. Digimind Social

Digimind Social provides competitive intelligence and social listening tools, making it a great choice for marketing agencies. It enables agencies to monitor brand reputation, understand consumer sentiment, and gain industry insights to stay ahead of the competition.

• Key Features: Competitive intelligence, sentiment analysis, brand monitoring tool.

• Pricing: Pricing details available upon request, though G2 states it starts at around $15000 per month.

• Strengths: Provides competitive intelligence, great for tracking brand reputation.

• Weaknesses: The interface can be a bit complex for beginners.

• Unique Selling Points: Strong focus on competitive intelligence, advanced analytics for deep insights.

18. Twitter Advanced Search

Last but not least, you don’t have to look any further than Twitter to get started with social listening for your digital agency. The search is a built-in feature of Twitter that allows users to refine their search criteria to find specific tweets, users, and conversations.

• Key Features: Filters for words, people, places, dates, sentiments, and other specific elements in tweets.

• Pricing: Free to use.

• Strengths: Powerful search refinement, ability to search for tweets in any language, search for tweets within a specific location or region.

• Weaknesses: Limited to Twitter's platform, lacks comprehensive analytics and tracking.

• Unique Selling Points: The depth and granularity of the search parameters available help users find specific content amidst the vast amount of information on Twitter.

Let’s take a look at an example of a query: 

• Exact phrase: content marketing 

• Language: English

• Social media engagement: Minimum likes of 100

• Dates: February 1, 2022 to February 21, 2022

Now for the results:

The default search provides you with “top” results, but you can also filter by latest, people, photos, and videos. With a popular search term like content marketing, it’s good practice to use these filters to narrow the results.

No matter what type of social listening you’re doing on Twitter–from a specific industry to videos only–the advanced search feature can be your guiding light to know what your audience is Tweeting about and what hashtag trends to get on board with to extend your reach. 

Comparing the Best Social Media Listening Tools: Which Is Right For You?  

Boggled by all the choices listed above? Here's a table summarizing the 18 of the best social listening tools, their relevance to marketing agencies, and their pricing:

Latest Trends and Future Predictions for Social Media Listening

Social listening has grown beyond the ability to track mentions and sentiment to provide insights into broader consumer habits, trends, and perceptions. As this space continues to evolve, here are some of the latest trends and future predictions agencies should keep in mind. 

AI and Machine Learning

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning analytics tools are becoming increasingly critical in social listening. These technologies not only enhance data processing capabilities but also improve the accuracy of sentiment analysis, topic categorization, and predictive analytics. As AI and machine learning algorithms continue to evolve, we can expect even more nuanced and precise insights.

Image and Video Analysis

With the rising popularity of visual content on social media platforms, image, and video analysis is becoming increasingly important. Tools like Brandwatch and YouScan are already leveraging AI to analyze images for logo recognition, scene and object detection, and sentiment analysis. This trend is likely to continue, with advancements in AI making it possible to analyze videos for similar insights.

Integration with Other Data Sources

Social listening tools are increasingly integrating with other data sources like CRM systems, sales data, and customer support interactions to provide a more holistic view of the customer. Social listening is gradually becoming a key part of a unified customer data platform.

Real-time Listening and Response

With the speed at which information spreads on social media, real-time listening and response are becoming crucial. Tools are evolving to provide real-time alerts and facilitate quick responses to customer queries, complaints, or any potential crisis.

Predictive Analytics

The future of social listening lies in predictive analytics. Rather than just tracking past and present social data, tools are becoming capable of predicting future trends and consumer behavior. This will help agencies to be more proactive and strategic in their decision-making and campaign planning.

Privacy Concerns and Data Ethics

With increasing concerns about data privacy and ethics, there will be a stronger emphasis on ethical data collection and analysis in the future. This may impact the amount and type of data available for social listening, and tools will need to adapt to these changing regulations while ensuring they provide valuable insights.

Conclusion

As we look to the future, it's clear that social listening is getting more sophisticated by providing deeper and more nuanced insights. Agencies that leverage these advancements will gain a significant competitive advantage, being able to understand and respond to their existing and potential customers in real-time, predict future trends, and make more informed strategic decisions based on campaign analysis. 

When selecting a social media listening tool, also consider the needs of your clients so that this tool can be incorporated into your agency's overall social media marketing offering. The right social listening tool can only help propel your social media capabilities, leading to stronger results that you can showcase in your social media analytics reports. 

Speaking of social media analytics, AgencyAnalytics makes it simple to automate your client reporting and stay on top of all your marketing metrics in one place. 

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