As social media grows more important in the daily lives of consumers, corporations are relying on increasingly sophisticated forms of social listening to understand how their brands are being discussed in the market. Internal audit is uniquely positioned to influence these strategies, working to strengthen business performance.
Roughly speaking, organizations are using three approaches. The first, and least complex, is social media monitoring, whose main focus is crisis management and customer service. It is considered passive: a company uses an automated scanning tool that triggers notifications for internal audit based on established identifiers and thresholds — for instance, when a brand is mentioned negatively 10,000 times in a given time period. This form of monitoring is usually performed only on social media channels that the brand owns, controls, has a presence with or knows about up front.
Social media listening is a few steps more evolved and is the most prevalent form among brands today. In this approach, data analytics proactively examines what is being said online and in social media conversations in order to gain insights and develop research about the brand, products,…
