With all of the “noise” out there in social media, have you ever stopped to wonder at the many ways to make sense of the information? Every day it seems there’s a new program out with a new way to slice the available information, discover your influence, or help you understand how people are using social media more accurately as a way of helping you shape your marketing message.
There’s so many – which ones are helpful? (Because you really don’t think you need one more thing to track, right? <grin>)
Here’s a roundup of 15 free social media monitoring tools you’ll want to become familiar with (if you aren’t already) to simplify the ways you track your brand and influence online.
1. Klout
Klout’s vision is to allow people to discover and measure social influence. Through a variety of algorithms (over 400 variables), Klout assigns users a score measuring a particular user’s influence in the real world as well as in social networks. This is useful for monitoring your own influence, as well as making sure your influencers are of top quality and trusted sources.
2. Kred
Another form of reputation measurement, Kred debuted about a year ago, and measures two parts of engagement: influence (how you inspire others to share your tweets) and outreach (how much you respond to and retweet others)
Both products have history of providing social media monitoring tools, especially for small business and enterprise customers. Announced just last week, HootSuite has acquired Seesmic, and has pledged in the near term to support both products while working toward a single, unified platform for users.
Search for new people to follow, track who unfollowed you, and find your best time to post when the bulk of your followers are online with this comprehensive set of Twitter tools.
According to its website, Social Mention is a “social media search and analysis platform that aggregates user generated content into a single stream of information.” It monitors over 100 social media sites, allowing you to track what people are saying about you, your product or service, your brand, etc.
6. Cyfe
Cyfe is an all in one business dashboard that helps you monitor and analyze data scattered across all your online services like Google Analytics, Salesforce, AdSense, MailChimp, Facebook, WordPress and more
When there’s a topic you want to monitor, enter it in Google alerts to receive e-mail updates for the latest Google results of the term you’re searching.
With Google Trends, you can compare data on up to 5 terms or websites. Data to compare includes related sites and top searches for each term.
9. Pinerly
Analytics for visual social media, starting with Pinterest! Schedule pins, receive real-time analytics on which pins are being shared and liked the most. Pinerly also delivers data on best practices for those engaged in content creation and brand management.
10. SharedCount
Track your shares, likes, Tweets and more. SharedCount tracks Facebook, Twitter, Digg, LinkedIn, Google +1, Pins, Delicious, and StumbleUpon.
11. Social Oomph
A suite of productivity enhancing tools for social media users, including Tweet scheduling, keyword tracking, and more.
12. Topsy
Want instant analysis of any topic, term or hashtag across years of conversations on millions of web sites? Topsy’s your site. You can compare social media reachover any timeframe, as Topsy counts the times tweets, terms, topics, slogans, hashtags or Twitter @-names appear across all users’ tweet streams.
13. TweetReach
Who’s reading your Tweets? Who’s sharing your Tweets? TweetReach measures the impact of conversations on social media.
14. TwitterGrader
How does your Twitter profile rank? A Hubspot tool, TwitterGrader lets you check the power of your Twitter profile compared to the other profiles (millions) that have been graded. Factors considered include number of followers and the extent to which you engage those followers.
15. WhatHashtag
When you’re looking for a hashtag that people are actually following, here’s the tool for you! WhatHashtag is a service that helps you find the most often used hashtags for keywords you enter. As a result, your Tweets on various topics are more likely to be seen by a greater audience.
Whew! There’s more information and analysis available than ever before, right? Did you discover a new way of understanding your social media influence and reputation that might help boost your business? I’d love to hear – leave me a comment below!
About Author
Kim Garst
Kim Garst is a renowned marketing strategist and speaker who is trailblazing the use of artificial intelligence in digital marketing. With over 30 years of experience as an online entrepreneur, Kim helps entrepreneurs grow their business and authority online by using AI technology. She is leading the way with proven AI frameworks that help entrepreneurs build authority in their space.
She is keynote speaker and an international best-selling author of Will The Real You Please Stand Up, Show Up, Be Authentic and Prosper in Social Media.
Named by Forbes as a Top 10 Social Media Power Influencer, Kim is well-known for her skill to simplify complex technology and make the use of AI understandable for business growth. Her relatable, actionable advice helps guide new entrepreneurs to harness the power of AI to succeed in digital marketing. Kim is leading the way in combining human and technological skills to create a new model for AI-powered marketing.
What Hashtag is new to me. I will definitely check that out, that's right up my alley! ; )
Such great resources Kim; there is more than one that I have to check out. Thanks
I know I learned about several tools I'm not yet using – thanks as always for information I can put into practice now!
Awesome list Kim! There were a few I have never heard of so I will check the out!
Great list Kim, Cyfe is totally new to me. Never heard about it; I certainly will check that one out
I have not heard of many of these sites. Thanks for the great information, and I have pocketed this for further reference!
Glad they were helpful, Suzanne!
Thanks Kim!! More info for me to learn!!
Martin, I will take a look!
It’s all in the tools! 😉
🙂
Thanks for the tip on the link, Lisa! Yes, we do use the hashtag and the mention for sure! They are both critical elements of engagement on Twitter.
Hi Kim, Well I'm currently using SocialMotus for monitoring all my social media activity. It is a great tool and very expensive in my oppinion but I was lucky enough to win a giveaway for a 1 year business plan. Beside that I'm a big fan of Tweetdeck but I don't use it that often anymore. Thanks for sharing these tools Kim, gonna go and check out some of them. Have a great day,cheers.
What do you like about SocialMotus?
Thanks for suggesting some adds.
Awesome! Glad you picked up on something new!
Never heard of it but will definitely check it out.
Start with Hootsuite then 🙂
Kim is always delivering great content and useful tips and tricks to gain an edge in the social media marketing world! Thanks Boom!
This article was extremely informative as suggested reading in my Social Media Marketing: Basics and Beyond class. Very comprehensive, and helpful for somebody new in the industry. I look forward to following you.
Thanks for the heads up! Sometimes tools are no longer in use and then it’s hard to go back and remember every blog post we may have used them in. Thanks again :-)!
Great list! Take a look also at BRAND24! It’s really nice, easy to use, and efficient tool for social listening. Truly recommend!