Social media audits in today’s day and age are as important as a cohesive brand strategy. Brands need to conduct social media audits in order to understand the market trend, their target audience and their expectations from them. Just like audits of financials is a must on an annual or bi-annual basis, a social media audit is highly important too. It allows the brand to have an idea of how their customers, influencers, partners and employees are participating on the social web.

Social Media Audits allow you as a brand to identify priorities, benchmarks the previous efforts and build a strong future brand strategy. Following are the ways in which social media audits should be conducted by brands in order to be useful:

• The initial planning process for any brand needs to done strategically. Brands in the planning stage should find out their competitors, their target audiences, customer experiences and most importantly the market for their products or services.
• Annual audits are as important as the audits conducted in the initial planning stage. If you are associated with a social media marketing company, you need to work with them to understand how and why social web responded to the activities in the relevant market. You should find out the terms which were most popular and analyze the changes caused and the reasons for those changes. This data is of key importance as far as your budget is concerned. Additionally, you need to utilize this data and set your goals for your future strategies.
• In addition to initial and annual audits, you also need to be on top of affairs throughout the year. You should constantly monitor your target audience and market using alerts and reports. This type of monitoring is helpful when you need address crisis and issue in real time.

It is important to note that you should not conduct your audits in a vacuum. You should try identifying your stakeholders and measure your keywords and phrases accordingly. Once you have solid findings, make sure you share them with the shareholders so that strategy for the next steps can be determined.

Do not hesitate to explore platforms suitable to your brand’s needs other than the mainstream ones available. Be mindful of hiring and allocate funds where they are needed to avoid wasteful spending. Your finances are one of your most important assets and hence they need to be managed accordingly. All the above mentioned tips are going to be help you conduct a thorough social media audit and will be helpful in formulating a solid strategy that is cohesive and works well for your brand.