Social media continues to grow and adapt into a more exciting technology than ever before. While it was once a purely personal platform, the business and marketing applications are ace. Now we have entire degrees dedicated to the practice, and firms popping up all over the world promising to help brands expand on and off the web.
While many offer tools to allow you to measure your own analytics, others handle everything for you. In any case, a business can improve their visibility, leads, conversions, and evangelism with the right social media analytics company.
Social media analytics companies use social media API data for easier reporting, monitoring, trend tracking and competitor analysis. Social media analytics aims at helping you estimate your social media ROI (return on investment) and improve your key performance indicators (KPIs).
Here are some great ones to keep an eye on this year.
Simply Measured
Simply Measured has been continuously praised by users and tech review sites as being one of the best on the market today. This is usually a reference to their various social media analytics tools, which include an impressive list of free ones. They cover multiple social networks, such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google Plus and Vine, and monitor traffic sources.
***Reports, social branding, audience analysis and more are offered as part of their packages. It’s not an easy task to find the pricing info on the site, so you’ll have to request a demo to find out how much it will cost for your specific needs.
Unlike many social platforms, Simply Measured gives you a fair amount of tools and perks without having to spend a dime.
SumAll
SumAll is an all-in-one social monitoring tool that has two options: free, or a $99 paid plan. On the free side you have smart tweets, desktop view, and unlimited profiles for both. For paid it is an actionable analytics tool and weekly report to help you grow your social efforts. It looks like they have canceled their paid plan which is both awesome and surprising.
They have pretty good support, so you never have to worry about your emails or calls going unanswered.
Brandwatch
Social listening is an important skill, but it isn’t one many companies have mastered. Which is why they turn to Brandwatch. This firm will help brands to not only hear the conversation happening around them, but understand and utilize it for their advantage.
They have two products to choose from: Analytics and Vizia. The first is basic social reporting and monitoring like you would expect. The second is a complete social command center with advanced features to get the most out of your data.
They feature three plans on their website with 0 info on actual pricing which is somewhat confusing. You need to request a demo to find out the rates.
TalkWalker
Talkwalker provides centralized social media analytics dashboard offering you graphs and analysis for:
- Hashtag and campaign tracking including shares, reach, engagement, mentions
- Sentiment analysis
- Image recognition to help you protect your trademark & reputation
- Google Analytics integration for social media ROI estimation
- Virality that monitors how your content spreads across the web
- Influencer marketing helping you identify industry influencers and (future) brand ambassadors
Social Bakers
This is another tool/company that offer multiple solutions for brands that need something more than basic analytics. Social Bakers core platform handles monitoring, engagement, competitive and industry benchmarking, competitive analysis and more, customized to meet the specific needs of companies that are based on sales. This is unique to many other platforms that could also be used for non-sales brands, such as blogs.
You can choose from three different plans and a number of standalone free tools. The prices for paid plans are low enough that it would be worth dropping the dough to get more.
amaSocial
amaSocial is a social tool that operates within four categories: Brand Management, Conversation Management, Profile Management, and Topic Monitoring. This gives an intensive approach to data gathering and implementation that attacks the problem of a weak campaign from all angles.
They offer a free trial by request, and pricing on the needs of your brand. It is definitely worth contacting them for more information on what they could do for you and your online success.
Bonus: Cyfe
Cyfe is not a social media amalytics platform, per se, but they can combine a lot of API data for easier monitoring and analysis. It is my personally favorite tool for collecting and archiving all sorts of social media stats and trends. It supports all kinds of sources including Instagram, Youtube, Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus. You can connect it to your Google Analytics to monitor correlations and keep an eye on your social media campaign effectiveness.
It’s a huge time-saver, especially if you manage clients and need to monitor dizens of accounts within one network. Unlike many social platforms, it gives you a fair amount of features and perks without having to spend a dime.
Keep An Eye Out For These Guys!
These social media analytics companies are sure to grow in the future. As they do, you will have plenty to take advantage of as a user, in order to grow your own brand’s visibility and engagement.
Anyone you think should be on the list? Let us know in the comments.