David Hargreaves, CEO of Beyond, presented at Wednesday’s Social Media Camp in NYC.  His presentation on the Art of Listening included recent trends, as well as tactics and tools brands can leverage to analyze social media and web analytics data to increase customer engagement and increase traffic to websites, blogs, and other company social media channels.  He presented two client case studies (Zevia and Sybase) that illustrated how listening and data analysis can really influence your social media campaigns.

David’s presentation was very effective because he was able to distill down the complex concept of “listening” and illustrate how companies can use the data they mine from their research.

Essentially the steps include listening to the conversation that’s taking place away from your branded properties in forums, deal and review sites, etc., identifying the key influencers and communities and the content that they care about, researching search engine key words, looking at your web analytics to understand which sites your visitors are coming from, and investing to create the content that the community is searching for.

The most compelling realization for me was how keyword research should inform and shape your content creation strategy.  David recommends getting an understanding of what people are searching for, and then identifying and focusing on relevant keywords that aren’t  highly competitive.  Using these keywords in your content will drive traffic to your site, and could ultimately result in an increase in online sales.

These are great techniques that we’ll be incorporating for our clients in the future.

Connect with David on Twitter  @DavidHargreaves.