The visibility of Iga Świątek’s personal brand exploded in August (7–21 August)! The number of mentions increased by 78%, while the number of positive mentions jumped by an impressive 144%. Where did this growth come from? This is a clear sign for PR professionals to analyse brand sentiment and begin an investigation!
This was clearly due to the Cincinnati Open tournament and the start of the US Open Grand Slam tournament. From a PR perspective, such a sharp rise in positive sentiment is an opportunity not to be missed.
That’s precisely why staying up to date and using social media monitoring to analyze brand sentiment is important. How does it work? What tools do you need?
What is PR sentiment analysis?
In public relations, sentiment analysis involves monitoring public moods and customer feedback in various media channels. Using social listening tools, the sentiment of mentions can be verified as positive, negative or neutral. Recipients’ emotions towards the brand are also analised.
In simple words: PR sentiment analysis = How do people feel? + Why do they feel this way? + How should we respond?
Sentiment analysis determines how to build positive brand perception through communication activities. You can’t do PR without tracking sentiment!
It’s all about monitoring customers’ emotions through human language or emojis to understand their moods around your product.
That’s why sentiment analysis is often considered an advanced form of social media monitoring. It gives PR teams actionable insights into brand perception.
How does sentiment analysis actually work?
You can analyse mentions in the media and on social media platforms, as well as comments and opinions. The best AI sentiment analysis tools today use the latest technology to interpret sentiment data as accurately and quickly as possible.
Speed of response is crucial in social listening!
Analyze sentiment score of your brand 24/7
Why is sentiment analysis work important?
- Verify the mood surrounding the brand and customer feedback.
- Protect your brand from image crises.
- Verify whether changes (e.g. to products) are popular with consumers.
- Monitor and influence the brand’s credibility and trustworthiness.
- Improve customer experience by addressing recurring pain points highlighted in negative sentiment.
Measure the emotional impact of campaigns and PR activities across different channels.
What’s more, sentiment analysis helps PR teams plan communications better. Tracking customer sentiment data over time helps to identify long-term changes in perception, as opposed to short-lived spikes.
This helps brands see how well your campaigns are working, if your messages are having the effect they want, and decide where to spend their money.
For PR professionals, this means changing from reacting to situations to planning ahead, by always keeping an eye on how the audience is feeling.
How to do PR sentiment analysis?
Can you imagine having to check thousands of mentions and comments by hand to see how your audience feels about your brand?
I certainly can’t, which is why sentiment analysis tools are so useful. They provide real-time information about consumers. Just one click!
Example of sentiment analysis software
Let’s look at the results for Iga Świątek’s personal brand over the past two weeks. She has been mentioned almost 12,000 times, including over 4,000 pieces of user-generated content and a similar number of mentions on social media posts and comments.
How long would it take to find all this content manually by searching the internet?
Fortunately, a sentiment analysis model and internet monitoring tool can collect this information for you.
Results for the brand Iga Świątek from August 7–21
AI is getting better at recognizing human emotions.
In a study published on SSRN in November 2024, the authors described a text-based emotion detection natural language processing (NLP) model with an accuracy of 97.92%, surpassing that of humans (approximately 96.22%).
Many sentiment analysis tools currently adopt similar approaches.
Technology can understand the context of a conversation or mood, but it still finds it hard to recognise sarcasm or wordplay. Our statements have many different meanings, so managing a brand’s reputation still requires human input.
Stay up to date with customers’ moods
PR sentiment analysis example
Public relations involves activities across many channels. You need to see everything, everywhere. This is why sentiment analysis needs tools that can access data from different sources, like social media, to understand people’s feelings and recognise the emotional context.
For me personally, the biggest advantage of this type of solution is its quick crisis management capabilities. Public relations professionals often find it difficult to handle negative comments before they go viral.
With this tool, it’s possible to do so in a matter of minutes.
I will guide you through the entire advanced sentiment analysis process using the AI-powered tool Brand24 as an example.
Step 1: Set up the monitoring project and collect data
First, you need to set up a project. Pick the phrases that best describe your brand, company or product. Remember to include all possible spellings, including those with minor typos.
You can also monitor your competitors (if so, create a separate project) or the entire industry. For example, for Iga Świątek these would be phrases such as ‘tennis’, ‘the best tennis player’, ‘grand slam’, ‘WTA’, and so on.
At this point, it’s important to remember that social conversations are full of unstructured data, which means they need the right tools to make sense of them.
The aim is to measure overall sentiment and capture valuable qualitative data hidden in comments, reviews and emojis.
This combination gives you a better idea of how people see your brand in different contexts. Then, wait for the sentiment analysis software to collect the data and perform the initial analysis.
Once this is complete, you can filter the information by source, overall sentiment score (positive sentiment, neutral sentiment or negative sentiment), location, language and many other criteria.
Step 2: Check the sentiment breakdown
Now let’s look at the details. The next step is to see what people think of the brand.
You can either get general information about trends in how people are feeling, or you can see individual mentions that are sorted into positive, negative or neutral categories.
You can also use the AI Brand Assistant to obtain in-depth analyses and insights, as well as ready-made recommendations for action. This is a really helpful solution if you don’t have time to analyse content.
As you can see, this enables you to conduct a thorough analysis of changes in sentiment towards the brand, as well as the causes or factors that influenced these changes.
This makes my work much easier. I can respond quickly to situations that affect the brand’s image, such as a comment from an influencer.
Step 3: Discover the exact emotions
This is not the end of the analysis. The difference between positive and negative can sometimes not be enough for effective communication, particularly on social media where people’s moods and tone can change very quickly.
It’s worth taking the time to understand the feelings of your audience. This will help you to understand what makes them want to buy and what stops them.
When you use sentiment analysis tools at this level, you can go beyond numbers and detect which emotions dominate specific brand mentions.
If you notice negative words used by your customers, you can find weak points in the customer experience and fix them before they get worse.
This helps you to communicate better and build stronger relationships with your community.
Brand24 can recognise not only general sentiment score, but also specific emotions.
- admiration
- disgust
- joy
- sadness
- anger
- fear
Understand your audience better
Step 4: Check the emojis
Not only do words show how your audience is feeling, emojis do too. You can’t ignore them when you’re using sentiment analysis tools. Sometimes they say more than the text itself!
You can see which icons your audience uses most often and use this information in your communication strategy. You could even make it a trademark of your brand. This is an effective way to get people involved.
You can find them in the Analysis tab.
Step 5: Dive into topics
It’s time to understand the context. What problems are your audience talking about? Which subjects make you feel strong emotions?
Looking closely at topics can help you understand where trends in opinion come from.
You can explore individual mentions of a chosen topic to find out exactly what your audience is discussing. The tag cloud, on the other hand, gives you a quick overview of the topics that are being talked about the most.
At the US Open, for example, he got a lot of attention for playing in the mixed doubles tournament with Casper Ruud.
At the US Open Mixed Doubles, Iga Świątek is a star player who evokes admiration and joy, probably because of her excellent performance in reaching the final, as well as sadness relating to her loss in the last match.
When we look at what people are talking about, we see that the US Open Mixed Doubles is being discussed along with other tournaments that the tennis player has played in. News of her victories and social media posts also play a big part.
Step 6: Detect influencers
One comment from an important creator can make your brand look good or bad. That’s why it’s important to keep an eye on what creators are posting!
Brand24 lets you discover who is talking about your products or brand, and what they think of them. This lets you get involved in the discussion and choose your own collaborations.
You can choose influencers who are interested in your brand and who will recommend it to their followers.
Modern tools like Brand24 can classify sentiment in influencer content and detect the emotional tone that resonates most with their audience.
By applying machine learning and AI, sentiment analysis becomes more precise, helping to spot not only reach but also the potential impact on customer satisfaction.
This ensures that partnerships are based on genuine alignment, not just on follower counts.
Step 7: Track the sentiment over time
Sentiment towards a brand can change very quickly, influenced by a single comment or mention. PR professionals will know what I mean.
Some sentiment analysis tools can integrate with other applications, such as Slack or Teams, and provide real-time notifications.
Monitoring the situation regularly, e.g. via Storm Alerts notifications, can help you react in time when something important is happening online.
Why is it important to constantly monitor sentiment with sentiment analysis tools?
- Knowing what topics your audience cares about most is key.
- Understanding their emotions and where they come from is key.
- Planning your communication more effectively, you can respond to your audience’s moods.
- Collaborating with credible influencers who are genuine fans of your brand.
In Brand24, you can also compare different periods to see how sentiment has changed over time.
Monitor your brand sentiment 24/7
How do sentiment analysis impact on PR?
Sentiment analysis is an important indicator affecting almost every aspect of PR, not just marketing strategies. How exactly does it impact a brand’s development?
Crisis management
Sentiment analysis tools work as an early-warning system, giving PR teams the chance to act before a problem turns into a full-blown crisis.
- Detects positive, negative or neutral mentions at an early stage.
- Tracks sudden spikes in negative sentiment and their sources.
- Amplifies positive mentions as authentic social proof that strengthens credibility.
Building positive brand image
Monitoring with sentiment analysis software helps highlight what resonates with your audience and makes campaigns more trustworthy.
- Identifies reviews and comments worth amplifying in communication.
- Turns positive feedback into proof of reliability and trust.
- Provides evidence that strengthens reputation across every social media platform.
Customer loyalty through trust
Understanding emotions behind customer feedback is a foundation for long-term relationships.
- Translates customer feelings into actionable insights using sentiment analysis tools.
- A well-trained sentiment analysis model can process thousands of mentions quickly and accurately.
- Builds loyalty by showing that customer voices on social media shape communication.
Competitive advantage
Comparing sentiment across brands reveals opportunities to differentiate and adjust strategies.
- Tracks how audiences perceive both your brand and competitors.
- Highlights which campaigns inspire admiration or disappointment.
- Helps position your brand by learning from competitor missteps and successes.
Conclusion
PR Sentiment analysis can protect your brand from many crises. However, there is more to it than just reputation management and crisis protection, both of which are extremely important for PR professionals.
Sentiment analysis is primarily a key element of public relations, enabling you to make informed decisions. The right approach to communication strategy and responding to the evolving needs of your audience.
PR sentiment analysis can do much more than just spot problems — it’s the foundation of effective communications. For PR teams, it means knowing not just what people say about your brand, but how they feel about it.
The context will shape your strategy and changing your message if it’s not working.
But obviously, noone has the time to read every comment. That’s where tools that use AI to analyse feelings come in. They don’t just flag positive or negative mentions, but also decode the underlying emotions and shifts in perception.
Final thoughts about how to analyze sentiment:
- Sentiment analysis is no longer just a bonus — it’s a core part of PR and social listening, driving informed, data-backed decisions.
- Combining the accuracy of AI sentiment analysis tools with human intuition enables you to understand not just sentiment, but also the real emotions and contexts behind it.
- By continuously tracking brand sentiment, you can protect your reputation, identify opportunities and develop communication strategies that truly resonate with your audience.
This is more than just another metric. Sentiment analysis is a treasure trove of information about your audience.
