Sprout Social’s research found that a staggering 85% of companies consider social data to be a vital source of business insights. As there are almost 4.6 million individuals using social media networks, they have become an integral part of any successful growth strategy.
In today’s competitive digital landscape, it is crucial to stand out among your competitors and flourish on social media. One of the most effective ways to achieve this is by analyzing competitors in social media.
Why analyzing the competition is SO important?
1. Improved knowledge of your target audience
Analyzing your competitors’ social media presence can help you gain a better understanding of your target audience. This information can be used to develop more effective marketing strategies, including identifying which social media platforms your audience uses, the type of content they consume, and their pain points.
2. Development of a stronger social media strategy
By analyzing your competitors’ social media strategies, you can identify strengths and weaknesses in your own approach. This can help you develop a more effective strategy, as well as identify opportunities for growth and potential threats.
3. Creation of relevant content
By understanding what types of content your audience responds to, you can create more engaging and relevant content. Analyzing your competitors’ content can help you identify gaps in the market and create unique content that resonates with your audience.
4. Improved marketing and positioning
Analyzing your competitors’ social media presence can help you identify opportunities for more effective marketing. By using underutilized social media features and strategies, you can set you brand apart from the competition and establish yourself as an industry authority.
Tools for Competitors Analysis
1. Not Just Analytics
An analytic tool for Instagram and TikTok monitors the growth of competitor profiles, the hashtags they use, and their engagement rates.
2. Social Mention
A search engine that collects user-generated content on social media, blogs, news, and videos. It tracks and displays all conversations about a competitor brand, including who is talking about them, what they are saying, and on which platforms.
3. Socialbakers
A social media management tool for monitoring and comparing content performance across social media platforms in one place. It also offers free competitor analysis tools for Instagram and Facebook.
4. Sprout Social
A suite of social media management tools that includes scheduling, analytics, and competitor analysis for businesses of all sizes. Its competitor analysis feature allows you to monitor their audience growth and publishing schedules.
5. Socialty.io
A full-service tool for social listening, scheduling, and competitor analysis that provides insights into your competitors’ paid ad campaigns, social media performance metrics, and content strategy and history.
6. BigSpy
A free tool for analyzing your competitors’ ads on social media. It offers a database of advertisements on different social networks, helping businesses find campaign inspiration from their competitors to create better marketing campaigns and social media strategies.
How to do a Social Media Competitor Analysis
Conducting social media competitor analysis can be simplified into five easy steps, regardless of which platforms you use.
1. Establish your brand goals and metrics before analyzing your competitors.
You should determine your social media marketing objectives and how they fit into your overall brand objectives. You should also identify your target audience and the key performance indicators you will use to track success.
2. Identify your competitors’ social media.
This includes both direct and indirect competitors who offer similar products or services or solve the same problem as you. Then, create a list of your top five competitors.
3. The third step is to collect and analyze data.
You can choose from the various analysis tools that we mentioned before to help you study and compare your competitors’ performance. Some of the social media metrics to track during competitive analysis include account reach, followers, engagement rates, social media ads insights, share of voice, estimated organic traffic, and quantity of keywords.
4. It’s time to create the Social Media Strategy.
You must interpret the data to gain business intelligence that will inform your strategy. Determine what your competitors are doing well and how you can use these insights to develop a better social media strategy. Also, identify their weaknesses as potential opportunities for your brand growth. Create a SWOT analysis table to summarize your brand’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
5. Keep tabs on your account’s progress and your competitors’.
Regularly analyze your competitors’ performance, update your competitor research spreadsheet, and identify new opportunities or threats. This will help you monitor your brand progress, notice new competition quickly, evaluate the effectiveness of your social media strategy, identify new growth opportunities, and keep your marketing plan up-to-date.
In conclusion, performing a social media competitive analysis is crucial to the growth of your brand. It enables you to establish a strong social media presence, earn customer trust, and enhance your brand’s credibility. By following the steps outlined above, you can easily conduct this analysis for any of your social media accounts.
