What to put in a social listening report

Social listening reports are a great way to reflect on account performance, but most importantly, investigate current trends and look ahead to what opportunities there may be to grow.

We complete social listening reports on request by our clients and enjoy both the reflective and forecasting sides to the report. What has gone well? What could we do more of? Which trends are in the respective industry at the moment that we can take advantage of?

Completing these reports as a social agency that run the accounts associated means we become very entrenched in the brand’s online community and the wider industry itself, which has clear benefits when writing and presenting the report.

Recently, the L’Oréal team, who completes these reports for some clients, rethought our approach and are excited by our new format which looks ahead with a critical eye on what’s coming in social media or the beauty industry to give our clients the upper hand.

Here are our tips on what to include in a social listening report:

Choose an appropriate block of time:

How frequent will your social listening report be? Biannual, quarterly, or even monthly? We have found quarterly to be the most manageable in terms of turning the report around in time and works because it can often be seasonal which makes a lot of the content relevant and holistic.

Summary of reporting period:

It’s important to reflect on the moment of time that you’re reporting on, whether that be quarterly or biannually for example.

However, we have found that monthly reporting on account performance is sufficient and does not necessarily need to be rehashed in another report. Social listening is all about investigating what is happening NOW and predicting what will be important ongoing.

Data collection:

We have learnt that less is more when it comes to including data as it is a collation of monthly report data. Ask yourself what the most important details are. Is it community management information regarding community sentiment? Or perhaps your client wants an overview of engagement. Or both! Asking the client what is of most value to them will ensure that all parties are happy with the presentation of findings.

Competitor tracking:

A super important step: analysing what the brand’s industry competitors have been up to. Deep dive into primary competitor brands and what they posted or activated throughout the same period of time. Make sure to note launches and events, special offers, controversies, and even commentary from followers that is relevant to issues your brand may face.

Whilst some may be stockists of brands and not specifically competitors, having a look over retailers’ activity can also be helpful. Discover ways in which you can partner with them if they’re a stockist of the brand’s products, such as competitions, or other ideas to get your brand featured on their accounts.

Trends & Opportunities:

The most important part! This section requires the most research, as well as relying on knowledge of the industry’s changes. We recommend being proactive with social listening basically all year round, taking screenshots of posts, campaigns and commentary that you see that could be included — these can be positive or negative/constructive.

We’re fortunate to have access to some great marketing insights channels, such as WGSN and WARC, that we access to see what’s happening in the industry.

Then, based off your research, advise on the areas where key opportunities may lie. Is there a social platform that you could be using more of or joining? Try to link account performance to trends that give your brand more leverage in using popular content styles for engagement and growth.

Next steps:

Set out a clear timeline on implementing the ideas and opportunities you’ve outlined so that they’re more likely to be done. This makes you and the client accountable moving forward to trial new things and see how they go. You could even come back to it each time you present the new report to track progress.

This could either be pre-filled on the final slide or done as a collaborative activity at the end of a presentation based off the feedback received from your ideas. Or perhaps a bit of both!

Record your process:

It could be a smart idea to list sources where you sourced the most valuable information so you know where to go back to next time. Keep screenshots of locations filed somewhere to best remember and pass on to anyone working on it in the future.

As we mentioned above, make sure to save things on the go in a folder to include in the reports so you’re not stuck looking back too retrospectively when time comes to write the report. Having a solid knowledge and memory of what has been going on in the industry will make report writing that much easier!

So, that is what we include in a social listening report.

If you’d like any assistance with a social listening report, be sure to get in touch!