With the communications landscape changing, the required talent is also changing. Now, communications executives must hire people with skill sets, that three years ago, were not necessary. People who understand – How AI is impacting communications. Business in general, including how to read a balance sheet. How fake news is impacting businesses. Even the role of a CCO is modernizing. It’s no longer enough for the role to be foundational. Instead, they must be an integrator across the business to create cross functional collaboration. And they need to use data-driven insights to make their organization more agile.

This topic was discussed in a recent CommPRO webinar by top communications  executives. Here are five key skills for next generation communicators.

Storytelling with Data

Many communicators chose their profession to avoid having to deal with data and numbers. They tend to have very high EQs (Emotional Quotients) and great storytelling skills. And often feel that they are not as adept at the more data-driven business skills found in branches such as finance or legal. David Chamberlain, former VP of Corporate Communications at PNC, explains that these are actually essential skills for next generation communicators because they need to analyze and use media data insights to make better decisions. Media data allows you to answer questions like: are our CSR campaigns working to garner more positive SOV? Do we need to reallocate resources to messages that are not pulling through? Are our spokespeople staying on message?

Communicators can apply their storytelling skills to explain the insights that their analysis provides. Charts and graphs aren’t very interesting without the narrative to explain what someone is looking at and why they should care. Insights from your analysis should ultimately answer the question “what do we do next?”

Agility

Bill Price, VP of Communications at Zoetis notes that having a playbook mentality with only one way of thinking will not make you a successful business partner. Instead, he explains that, “you have to be adaptable to the strengths of leadership and their priorities and what works for them”. Instead of being a coach that makes players adapt to a system, be a coach that understands the talent and build success with that talent. Being able to recognize priorities and adapt to them is an important skill to create great business partnerships.

Chamberlain also adds that it is important to pivot and find alternate solutions. Being a critical observer will make you a well-rounded teammate and help lead situations to a preferred outcome.

Empathy

Having a level of empathy allows you to interpret signals and better understand others’ motivations. This is especially important when trying to understand signals the CEO is sending you, so that you can properly assess their concerns and come up with a solution. Graeme Harris, CEO of Strategic Profiles Management adds that “having that empathy and being able to decipher is a skill that you learn over time dealing with people. For some people its innate and easy, but others need to learn it”.

Persuasion

Unlike newer skills for next generation communicators, like focusing on data and analytics, the art of persuasion is still a core skill that they must possess.  Data will help your influence and support your strategy, but you need the soft skills to fully persuade audiences. Harris notes that “if you’re not able to impact and influence within your organization on behalf of your function, you are going to come up short as a communicator”.  There are strategic ways to impact and influence your organization, but it takes creativity and strategic thinking.

Networking and Diplomacy

Bill Price mentions that “you must be able to understand the allies you need to make before a meeting, who you need to pre-brief and how to manage egos to get people behind an idea when you are not the final decision maker.”

To accomplish this, get better at networking and have a good sense of your internal network. Who are the people that can get things done? Who is going to teach you gaps in your own knowledge of the business? Build your network to get this insight because it’s not included in your orientation kit when you first join a company. Price suggests that you build relationships over constant communication, meetings, phone calls, etc. Over time, this allows you to understand the team, the culture and how to get things done within your organization.

While it’s important to have a great internal network, next gen communicators should expand even further. It’s easy to become internally focused when working at a large company, but this blocks out such valuable information from the outside. Stay externally focused to research best practices and even look across industries. Don’t get bogged down in your day-to-day to do list.

• Attend webinars, read books and even follow social feeds of other companies or executives.
• If your company uses an outside firm, consult them and ask what their other clients are doing.
• Build your network and consider creating a group of people you trust, who are in similar roles, to occasionally talk and learn from one another.

For more executive insights on How to Be a Next Gen Communicator >>

The role of the Chief Communications Officer and the communications function is changing rapidly. Communications has been elevated to a proactive function that is increasingly providing value across the organization. This topic was discussed in a recent CommPRO webinar by top communications executives. Here are 5 ways the communications function is changing:

You Need to Be a Business Person

You may have turned to communications because you weren’t a math person, but gone are the days where communicators can shy away from understanding broader business numbers. The next generation of CCOs are using business data to earn themselves a seat at the decision-making table.

Bill Price, VP of Communications at Zoetis, explained that having that clear line of strategy across the business is essential to achieving goals. But to play the game, you must speak the language. David Chamberlain, former VP of Corporate Communications at PNC, adds that “we have to be business people who are communications experts, that are socially engaged.” He adds that “what I mean by business people, is that we’ve first got to be able to have a discussion about the business on the businesses’ terms, not just as a communications expert, for us to be able to move with them”.

CCOs Must Align Comms to the Business through Data-Driven Strategies

All-star communication teams are characterized by a close alignment of communication targets and business goals. However, current metrics commonly employed by PR teams fail to live up to modern standards.

David Chamberlain adds: “How we take in all that data and make sense of it and turn it into the insights that are actually actionable, to me, is something that most communications teams that I’ve seen struggle with …But as our social media and our traditional media evolve and new forms of media give us greater ability to measure and see analytics, I think that this type of interpretation and insight is probably going to be one of the critical skills that we all need to develop and strengthen going forward.”

Far too many departments are still struggling to understand data, let alone capture accurate metrics around tone, share of voice, or brand reputation. Next generation CCOs and their departments need to show their impact on business goals and the key is to tame the data wilderness by focusing on harnessing it for actionable insights.

Leads Must Modernize and Keep Up with the Times due to the Competitive Landscape

According to Arthur Page Society, the environment in which enterprises operate is fraught with emergent challenges from new competitors reinventing traditional business models to new modes of work, regulatory and socioeconomic factors. This has transformed how individuals communicate with one another and engage more actively with organizations.

Communicators are responsible for keeping pace with these times and advising their senior leaders on how to keep up. The communicator of the future harnesses media intelligence to understand their market and share findings with other parts of the organization like the C-Suite, IR, marketing and product development.

CEO of Strategic Profiles Management, Graeme Harris echoed this when he explained that during his past tenure as SVP of Communications at Manulife, it was his job to track key technological innovations. He added that this was essential information to help advise the senior executives on how their institution was keeping pace with the industry.

The Communications Function is Breaking Down Silos and Elevating itself

Communications leaders must communicate both internally – bringing together data and, externally – bringing voices from across the entire organization.

In many organizations such as PNC, communications is playing the role of breaking down organizational silos. For instance, David Chamberlain has taken the role of not just reporting on his team, but also sharing the results of the entire organization across the board. He adds that playing this new role as an integrator within his organization “has helped give Corporate Comms a halo, not only as an integrator, but as a strategic player and someone that people want to involve.”

Strategic Planning is a Much More Integrated Process

In addition to serving as a corporate integrator, communications itself has expanded tactically. Bill Price recounts “I can remember years ago when you developed communications plans and social media was an add-on at the end, or it was all about the press release…the way we approach everything now is much more integrated.”

Today, modern communications plans often encompass a mass array of tactical plans from media relations, to digital communications and even customer engagement. With all these different activities, teams need to find a way to pull in different sources of data from traditional and social media and measure them in a consistent matter that tracks your impact on the bottom line: specifically, quantifying brand reputation and impact on corporate goals.

For more executive insights on staying relevant as a communicator and the evolution of the communications function watch our CommPRO Webinar: How to Stay Relevant in 2020

Last week, I spoke at the annual NIRI conference addressing the changing nature of activist investing and how the IR function needs to evolve to keep up with these changes. As the rise of activists continues, so must strategies to monitor and engage across the media landscape and proactively manage brand (and investor) perceptions. A critical piece of being prepared for a brand crisis is building consistent and accurate data about your brand and reputation before a problem arises.

The Landscape Has Shifted – Social Media Has Made Leading the News Cycle Very Important – Albeit More Difficult

The Trump Era has ushered in a period where leading the news cycle with a narrative and message can commandeer the perception of truth. This “direct narrative of the truth” is often driven or amplified by direct communication on social media.

There can be many indications that an activist is targeting a stock – a regulatory filing, a phone call from the fund manager, or a newspaper headline. However, indications can also include questions from a junior analyst at a fund, a private meeting request or now increasingly a rumor on social media. Today, it is imperative that IR teams are aware of the impact of unregulated social activities in addition to all online conversions so that they can get in front of that “truth narrative”.

IR is no longer about surveillance and is now quickly shifting to proactive management. You need to not only understand how things are spreading on both traditional and social media, but more importantly, understand the entire media landscape and its key players to quickly react.

Activists Are Now Using Sophisticated PR Strategies to Engage the Shareholder Base – and So Should You.

The growth of passive shareholders has given companies more stable shareholder bases and made them accountable for delivering results, hence the need for proactive marketing and messaging. The need is further enhanced with the rise of Activist Investor movements and fast-moving market volatility. To carry out this proactive engagement, a richer partnership is required between IR and PR.

Here are some things you need to be thinking about now:

1. Different investors will react to various types of information and weigh various reputational aspects of a brand uniquely. It is important to determine how your brand drivers are resonating with key audiences. How are these key elements being captured in the media and in social conversations? Where is there a need for improvement?
2. Brands need to identify their weaknesses and their comparative advantages versus the competition at all times. Then you need to build the right messages to correct misguided perceptions with investors.
3. It is critical to understand your “influencers” – those that drive the perception of your stock as a place to invest. Not all influencers are created equally; it is not just about the Wall Street Analysts anymore. You need to know who the right influencers are, be it a government regulator, money manager, journalist, or simply an influential blogger, and engage those that matter.

Generic Tracking of the Media Conversation will no Longer Protect you – Go Deep to Get Smart.

Analyzing media is extremely important because media sentiment has been proven to be correlated with stock price. But, you need to go beyond simple keyword tracking to get accurate and actionable data – the “why”.

For media analysis to be successful, you can no longer rely on simply tracking your company name, executives and focusing on financial sites.  Old-school keyword-driven tracking and analytics will likely leave you blindsided. Instead, it’s time to understand the “reputational conversation”. Reputational data can help you break down your public perception and understand what is driving it. You can also know how to pitch content that will positively impact your image it by identifying authors and outlets that are pushing certain messages and receiving a lot of social traction. Benchmarking your reputational data can pinpoint areas for targeted, effective message improvement.

The World has Moved to Data-driven Decisions. Don’t Get Left Behind.

When making decisions, a simple opinion does not cut it. You need to work with numbers now – fight fire with fire – and get savvy fast. Interestingly, the best defense is a good offense. Hedge funds have huge data capabilities, but IR often does not. So you need to ask yourself: are your technologies and data analytics giving you an advantage versus your adversary?

You need to make sure you have the proper resources working reliably to generate quality data to back up your decisions.   And should a crisis hit, use that data to move smartly, quickly and in a proactive manner instead of chasing the issue.

Speed of AI is Increasing, but AI Still Struggles with Accuracy and Can Lead us Astray.

Use of artificial intelligence (AI) in IR is growing at a rapid pace. Enterprise IR solutions (Bloomberg CMi2i, Q4 Activism Alarm, Nasdaq IR, and others) apply machine learning to big financial data sets to predict vulnerable companies, investor trends and behavior, and overall investor sentiment towards specific industry sectors.

This information is useful as a baseline for a company to understand investors and identify when their company is being viewed as vulnerable. But repeated studies continue to prove that unsupervised machine learning is still missing the mark with media analysis.  Changing zeitgeist, linguistic nuances, sarcasm, and a variety of company perspectives and priorities greatly limit the effectiveness and accuracy of machine-only solutions.

In addition, automated story-writing on company earnings has taken off.  In 2014, Associated Press started to publish automated earnings stories. In Q1 of 2014, 300 of these stories were published. Fast forward to Q1 of 2018 and 4,700 stories were published. Clearly, the speed of AI is increasing, but at what cost? Neil Hershberg, SVP at Business Wire states, “While they certainly provide greater visibility to small and mid-sized companies that were previously excluded from editorial coverage, the template format of these reports can often result in material information being left out of stories.”

So if you are responsible for investor relations, your world is changing fast.  Social media, data analytics, artificial intelligence, and a rapidly changing investor landscape seem to have conspired to make your job more difficult.  So how are you going to regain control?

Written by Eric Koefoot, PublicRelay Founder & Strategic Advisor.

In today’s 24/7 news cycle, staying on top of what’s going on is a Sisyphean task for companies, non-profit organizations, and industry groups (not to mention private citizens). Issue tracking is a nonstarter for many busy professionals — especially in fast-paced industries like tech. What about tracking policy issues and concepts that aren’t summarized by a quick three-word Google search, like “online content responsibility?” The bigger the players involved and the more complex an issue, the more time-consuming and tricky it is just to keep up. The minute you’ve got a handle on the conversation, it transforms into something unrecognizable. Back to the drawing board.

Finding influencers who write about these issues can also feel like nailing Jell-O to a tree. Who’s writing about my complicated topics? Which of their articles is getting traction on social media? Who has a bone to pick with my industry? What authors write favorably about my topics and might be interested in my pitch? These questions are tough enough to answer when your topic is niche. What if your industry is “tech” and your topic is “who’s responsible for content posted on social media?” Tracking big policy areas like these (and the people with influence) takes time and resources and we know how scarce both of those are. That’s why analyzing industry/topic-related news to locate influencers is something few companies have the bandwidth to do well — despite the potential rewards.

Wading through the melee is possible, though — with a plan. Recently, PublicRelay and a leading tech industry advisory group picked five hot technology-related topics and set out to get an idea of what was being written about them and who was doing the writing:

• The effects of AI on job creation/destruction
• Who is responsible for content posted online?
• Use of the internet by terrorist/extremist groups
• Hacking/online security breaches
• Antitrust issues in the tech sector

Finding relevant articles to analyze is the first step. These topics are not simple, and cannot be summarized by a word or string of words. Human-assisted AI helps to quickly cull through the slew of media content published about the tech industry and isolate the most important coverage.

Next is the analysis of the coverage. This is where you answer questions like “who is writing negative articles about anti-trust law in the tech industry that are gaining traction on social media” or “are there new authors covering the effects of AI on job creation?”.

These answers not only help the association keep an accurate pulse on policy issues their members turn to them for but also inform their communications strategy. Insights around key media conversations that impact consumer and legislative stakeholder perceptions help them tailor an advocacy and influencer outreach strategy that gets results. These takeaways help bolster the association’s ongoing efforts to develop essential standards and ensure its members are heard on the Hill.

Read Next: “How Third-Party Influencers Can Shape Your Media Strategy“

No matter what terminology you prefer – driverless car, autonomous vehicle, autonomous driving, self-driving car or something else – the future of human and non-human driving is a hot topic. And we kicked off 2018 with two major consumer events that had the media abuzz about it. PublicRelay analyzed traditional and social media around autonomous vehicles at both events and here are some of the interesting nuggets that we uncovered.

Read Next: “6 Steps for Measuring PR at Your Next Event“

CES hands down “wins” for sheer volume of coverage at 7X the number of articles written on the subject. Autonomous drive was among the top five products discussed at CES 2018, along with gaming products, computers, and smart home technology. At the Detroit Auto Show it placed in the top four with vehicle infotainment systems and electric cars.

Social sharing of autonomous driving articles also put CES in the lead by 8X – Detroit Auto Show articles were shared 19,416 times across Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn and CES articles were shared 151,662 times. The topic as a percentage of traditional coverage for each show was much closer – the topic appeared in 13% of total CES event coverage, and in 11% of Detroit Auto Show coverage. The chart below outlines the top topics by percentage for both events.

The most obvious reason is that CES is first on the calendar. But more probable is that CES’ focus on technology is a perfect platform for showing exactly HOW these vehicles are coming to market. The CES audience is extremely interested in technology and innovation that they can use today or in the future. How a car can drive itself certainly fits that bill.

The self-driving topic appeared in more than half [54%] of Nvidia’s traditional coverage at CES. They released a new platform for self-driving vehicles, and announced partnerships with VW and Uber. At a press conference, Nvidia’s CEO stated, “the complexity of future cars is incredible.”

While autonomous driving was covered at the Detroit Auto Show, the show focus is on what is available today for consumers. For instance, articles about self-driving features within traditional cars, rather than fully autonomous vehicles were popular.

A hot self-driving sub-topic in Detroit was government regulations and guidelines, with many articles citing quotes from U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and other legislators. Chao appeared in 16% of the Detroit Auto Show’s autonomous driving coverage.

Learn more about PublicRelay’s coverage of CES: Understanding the Success of CES.

The world of data and measurement in PR is consistently a mixed bag. In a perfect world, organizations would have a useful bounty of accurate data and insights. Unfortunately, many times this aspirational goal is unrealistic. The major downside to data-driven analytics right now is that people simply don’t trust the data.

According to recent (2017) studies by MIT, Cal Berkeley, and Northwestern University, technology alone, including artificial intelligence (AI), is not even close to delivering the needed insights. It’s going to take some hefty shifts to gain the right information along with the industry’s trust. According to a recent survey by PRNews, over 60% of communications professionals are asked by their CEO and executive boards for data-driven analysis and metrics. Gone are the days of measurement simply to prove one’s worth – measurement is now necessary as organizations look to tie efficacy of campaigns and broader business goals.

While it’s great that executives and board members are seeing the value that strategic data and intelligence can bring to their business, more than 75% of communicators found the data to be unreliable. This number is staggering considering that both communicators and executives all desire media analysis to drive both reactive and proactive strategies.

So what do you do when the data just isn’t up to par? When practitioners are wasting time cleaning up data to figure out what insights can be derived? Here are some things that communicators can do now to take steps toward this ultimate data utopia.

Be Your Own Advocate

55% of communicators use media analysis to drive both reactive and proactive strategies…BUT only if they can trust it. It’s essential to prove to board members and business leaders that smart communications data is in fact available and deserves a seat at the table. Mapping results to business goals is the best way to advocate for a strong measurement function.

Historically, the data executives saw wasn’t smart, helpful or insightful. In fact it was rather surface level including things like mentions, reach and impressions. Today we have copious amounts of relevant, helpful and strategic data at our fingertips that should be used to inform business strategy. Communicators don’t need to use data to prove worth and ensure job security anymore; they can instead turn it into something useful and become a strategic partner to the business.

Implement Efficiency

Nearly 40% of communicators find it difficult to understand the media data they receive and are spending way too much time hunting for insights instead of developing strategic campaigns. In fact, 69% of communicators said they’d rather spend time building strategic messaging plans and 65% said they’d prefer to put more effort into pitching or focusing on influencer outreach rather than media analysis. Basic metrics aren’t helpful, and automated tools aren’t enough to add enough valuable context to business leaders. Operating efficiently is paramount.

It’s essential to know that you don’t need to go overboard on measurement, especially when you clearly understand your business goals. In both cases of B2C and B2B – it’s the context and not the counts that are going to move the needle.

Similarly, we often see sarcasm used on social media and even in traditional media which can be easily misinterpreted when looking at tone. This can be as challenging to detect as contextualizing a positive statement about you in an otherwise negatively-toned article. Analysts expertly trained at picking up these nuances are extremely efficient and accurate, giving you back time for more strategic endeavors.

Gain More Insight

Over 60% of communicators would like media intelligence to be more “insightful.” Now that is an aspirational concept that could mean different things for every business, but in reality it goes deeper than surface level measurement.

Say goodbye to content overload. In today’s media landscape, business leaders would much rather have fewer pieces of very insightful data, than a mass amount of media coverage without much context.

Now to obtain this data can provide insight into share of voice and how companies are doing against the competitors, digging into sentiment for brand and reputation drivers, and also looking at how your organization is perceived on social media. Communicators need to illustrate how corporate social responsibility efforts are progressing along with sentiment at conferences and trade shows. At the end of the day, this is the type of aspirational data that is going to put businesses ahead of the competition.

As it stands, there needs to be a fundamental shift in the way communicators generate trustworthy media intelligence. With CEOs and boards demanding data driven analytics to help make decisions, communicators need to take the next step with their analytics solutions. The industry needs to rise to the measurement challenge so the information they are delivering is insightful, reliable and exceeding expectations.

Read Next: “How Third-Party Influencers Can Shape Your Media Strategy”

It’s easy for PR pros to feel left behind in the Big Data era. While marketers have countless tools for targeting, personalizing, tracking, and measuring how their campaigns perform, public relations initiatives can seem harder to quantify. After all, how do you measure influence or public sentiment? And how can you connect those concepts to business outcomes?

Communications teams need a way to measure the impact of influencer engagement strategies, uncover new brand influencers, and be ready with data to prove the value of their influencer strategies.

Here’s the good news: using accurate data to guide your influencer outreach strategy isn’t just possible, it’s also the key to getting an edge on your competition. Using these five tips, you’ll be able to answer:

• How is our influencer engagement strategy performing?
• Do we have the right influencer relationships?
• Are they worth the investment?
• What should we do differently?

With data to prove your influencer engagement is delivering results, you’ll have more leverage when allocating budget and resources towards your PR program — and become a strategic asset to your company.

Take Your Influencer Outreach Pitches to the Next Level

Let’s face it: your brand’s ideal influencer likely keeps a busy schedule and a packed inbox, so if your pitches aren’t laser-targeted and personalized to perfection, you’re wasting time and a potentially lucrative relationship.

To make a great first impression, you need solid data about your influencer. Many author and outlet databases provide high-level details about an author’s beat and background, but that’s not enough information to engage the influencer, let alone ensure that they’re the right fit for your brand.

You need to take these insights to the next level. Analyze how someone has written about a topic, industry, or competitor. With a more complete picture of your target influencers, you can craft a pitch that catches the right influencer’s attention and piques their interest.

Pay Attention to the Interplay of Social and Traditional Media on Influencer Coverage

Say a powerful industry influencer mentions your brand in a large trade publication — that’s terrific, but what traction did this article get on social media? The sheer volume of articles written and the reach of the publication are not necessarily indicators of high social sharing probability.

With accurate media intelligence and social listening, you can measure influencer engagement on platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn and determine whether they have enough reach to drive your brand’s message home. Before you even identify influencers, you can get a sense of who to look for by overlaying social sharing data on your traditional coverage data, revealing which platform each topic gets shared on most often.

A firm understanding of how social and traditional media build on one another in your particular industry points you in the right direction. Look at how frequently an influencer’s messages are shared on the platforms most important to your business, and you can efficiently and effectively create a messaging plan to engage these thought leaders.

Go Beyond Authors and Outlets — Identify Third-Party Influencers

Reporters and social media stars aren’t the only influencers you should reach out to. You should also identify third-party influencers like industry experts, regulatory groups, academic researchers, political organizations, and NGOs. These thought leaders may be less visible than the influencers you typically think of, but they hold tremendous sway over media coverage of their fields.

Using accurate analytics, you can track the impact of third-party influencers by several measures, including:

• How often they are quoted or cited in articles
• How powerful their social and traditional media channels are
• How frequently they publish

Once they’re on your side, you can access industry trends just beginning to bubble up — and be top of mind once those topics make impact.

Find Industry Whitespace, and Leverage Influencers to Make It Yours

The attention economy is a buyer’s market. To engage new audiences and boost your influence, you need to find topics your audience cares about before your competitors get hip to that conversation. A data-driven influencer engagement strategy is a powerful tool for carving out that niche.

One Fortune 500 telecommunications company used this tactic to craft messaging around a topic that was picking up steam: data privacy. They identified industry influencers shaping the narrative, as well as the sentiments underlying their coverage. The company cultivated powerful relationships with many of these influencers, who helped guide the organization’s messaging plan. These alliances gave the telecom firm confidence as it joined the data privacy conversation.

Proactively Measure Your Impact

Measurement is more than a look backwards — it’s a constant, multifaceted evaluation. Start by establishing your baseline across brand values, then prove that your program is working with robust data that you can tie to KPIs.

Constantly combine data about sentiment and tone toward your brand, your executives and spokespeople, your products and services, your industry and competitors. Determine how that tone maps to your reputation drivers, corporate values, and goals. Evaluate whether the frequency of coverage about your brand and the topics it cares about is increasing or decreasing.

Finally, ask yourself the following questions:

• Are influencers helping to grow my brand’s audience, reach, and engagement?
• Is my influencer strategy helping with message penetration among key publics?

Get Results From Brand Influencer Engagement

Become an indispensable strategic partner to your business with the media insights you need to engage new audiences, boost your reputation, and reach powerful brand influencers. PublicRelay provides the expert data analysis you need to identify influencers, cultivate relationships, and prove the value of your efforts with measurable results.

Follow PublicRelay on LinkedIn for more news, advice, and insights on influencer engagement, and contact us today to learn more about how PublicRelay can turbo-charge your PR strategy.

In today’s world, “You are what you tweet” – as well as what others tweet about you. Take the popular “Mean Tweets” segment on ABC’s late night show Jimmy Kimmel Live!: Celebrities sit on a stool and read hateful Twitter posts addressed to them, as the classic R.E.M. song, “Everybody Hurts,” plays in the background. By showcasing the not-so-nice things users write on social media, the segment satirically underscores the power of negative tweets.

Companies too are paying attention to what social media users are saying about them, as opposed to simply measuring metrics. While an impressive volume of shares, re-tweets or likes demonstrates online engagement, after all, they don’t illustrate how the audience perceives the brand’s story. Engagement can be both good and bad, and the latter may convince you to shift gears. But does it provide you with enough insight about which direction to take?

Read: The Role of Social Media in Public Relations

This is where substantial and valuable measurement comes in, in which a partnership between humans and technology proves critical. Why? Because social media analytics delivers insights about stakeholders’ perceptions of brands. But whether positive or negative, there are always many layers to those sentiments. Disappointment and sarcasm, for example, represent key indicators of an ongoing campaign’s health — recognizing these reactions as more than just “negative” can help a company successfully redirect the campaign. Because analytics solutions will encounter some limitations here, human analysis should play a lead role in fully understanding social media posts, and discerning between feelings, i.e. the “why” behind the “what.”

In addition, accuracy remains an elusive quality, especially when organizations solely rely upon tech solutions to interpret the public’s voice. An analytics tool will misinterpret a sarcastic tweet as praise if it cannot detect what “mocking looks like. But people can often spot sarcasm, mockery, irony, etc. the moment they see it.

With people filling in “what” and “why” gaps which tech tools cannot, brands can narrow in on the nature of user sentiment, to design, readjust and execute more targeted strategies in real-time. What’s more, humans and technology can combine to bring a higher level of intelligence to predict social media storms or viral shares. With this, organizations can pinpoint factors that trigger a viral post, and then customize and model their approaches with new-found enlightenment which contextualizes user engagement. This will bring unlimited potential for highly positive conversations about your brand.

To summarize, brands must focus on two essentials in developing a social media measurement strategy, as supported by people and technology:

Directing Campaigns as Sentiments Dictate

Let’s illustrate this “must do” with a common scenario: A news story or brand initiative hits the public radar, and clearly misses the mark. Through effective social media measurement, the company in question deconstructs the intention behind stakeholders’ posts and traces it back to the specific aspect of the news story or brand initiative that drove negativity, to modify this element. Thus, near real-time insight reroutes a campaign that was headed for a cliff, while identifying what worked and what didn’t.

Understanding the “Why” Behind the “What”

To rise above the noise and really hear what online stakeholders are saying, it’s essential to understand the “why” behind a reaction, to come up with a response which is genuine and distinct. Ultimately, this reinforces a brand-stakeholder relationship built upon trust, overcoming hurdles along the way.

At PublicRelay, we ensure that our clients take full advantage of both human and technological resources to maximize the value of the morphing social media landscape. We enable them to transform quality data into actionable insights, to confidently and accurately manage and adjust strategies based upon stakeholder sentiment. We empower them to measure shares, re-tweets or likes in business terms. If this sounds like something you’d like to discuss further, then please contact us.