Gone are the days when monitoring social mentions was just a nice-to-have. In 2025, knowing who talks about your brand and how they do it shapes your reputation, fuels competitive advantage, and has become a matter of survival for SEO and AI discovery.
- What are social mentions?
Social mentions are tagged and untagged references to your brand published on social media platforms. - Why should you care about social mentions?
They provide valuable insights into UX, product updates, target audience behavior, market trends, competitive landscape, and overall brand perception. The quality and quantity of social mentions strongly impact your SEO and AI discoverability too. - Is manual tracking enough?
While manual tracking is generally free, it quickly becomes unscalable. That’s why implementing a social media monitoring tool is a smarter path.
What are social mentions?
Social mention occurs when your brand or product is referenced in a comment, post, or other type of content on various social media platforms. It can be direct (e.g., “@brand_name”) or indirect (using a keyword, like a brand name).
Tagging is accomplished by using the “@” symbol followed by the user’s username. It usually triggers the notification, so you’re directly informed that someone is discussing your brand online.
The fact is that social media users often discuss brands or products without tagging them. Such a situation is called an untagged social mention.
Example of an untagged social mention
In that case, to detect such mentions, you need to use a social media monitoring tool for tracking social mentions.
Track all your social mentions with Brand24!
Why are social mentions important?
Social mentions are pieces of information that, on a scale, carry a lot of valuable insights about your brand.
Precisely speaking, when users mention your brand online, they’re giving you feedback on:
- How to improve user experience
- Ideas about the changes to be made for the next version of your product
- Research on your target audience
- A deeper look into the factors that influence purchase decisions
But here’s what most businesses don’t realize: these mentions contain patterns that can predict the future.
By future, I mean emerging trends, competitive weaknesses, and people passionate about your brand before they become customers.
With careful tracking and analysis of your social mentions, you can spot a product issue before it goes viral or discover an unexpected use case that could become your next marketing campaign.
The businesses that track social mentions gain an almost unfair advantage. Why?
Let me show you how to be one step ahead of your competitors!
Benefits of monitoring social mentions
To make things easier for you, I curated this list of 5 main advantages you gain when starting to monitor online conversations:
- Take care of your digital reputation
Every tag and reference to your brand creates a digital footprint that shapes how others perceive your brand.
By monitoring these conversations, you can amplify positive buzz and address concerns before they escalate and shape your brand online.
It’s an important factor for a social media marketing strategy. What narrative are you letting others write about you?
- Boost your AI Visibility
Social mentions are key to improving your brand’s visibility in traditional search engines and continuously growing AI search (like ChatGPT).
They act as signals of trust and credibility, informing algorithms that your brand is relevant and authoritative.
The rule is simple: the more and in a more positive way your brand is mentioned, the more likely it is to surface in AI-powered answers and recommendations.
Further read: The Ultimate Guide to Brand Mentions for SEO & AI Visibility
- Establish relationships
When someone mentions your brand, they’re opening a door to connection. Brands that respond transform casual commenters into loyal advocates.
These “minor” interactions are what truly matter in building authentic relationships.
- Be one step ahead
Your mentions are much more than empty words. They can be the early signals of what’s next in your market.
Your competitors’ weaknesses, emerging trends, and unexpected product use – are all revealed in these conversations.
- Find new opportunities
A single mention can give growth or become a reputation crisis. The difference often comes down to how quickly you spot it and how you respond.
By tracking mentions, you control the narrative rather than scrambling to recover from it.
Track & analyze your social mentions in real time!
How to track mentions on social media?
There are basically two main ways to track social media mentions:
- Manual tracking
- Using social mention tools
01 Manual tracking
Most social media platforms allow you to track mentions manually by checking notifications on your social media apps.
Here’s a quick snapshot of how social media platforms’ native analytics can help you track your social mentions manually:
PlatformNative ToolCapabilitiesLimitationsFacebookNotifications, Activity Log, Meta Business SuiteAlerts for tags; list of mentions.No analytics.InstagramNotifications tab, Activity Feed, Meta Business SuiteAlerts for tags in posts, comments, and Stories.No analytics, no untagged mentionsX (Twitter)Notifications tab, X Analytics (limited)Real-time feed, 28-day stats.Analytics paywalled, no untagged mentions.YouTubeYouTube StudioLists channel mentions.Selective alerts, no analytics.LinkedInNotifications, ActivityAlerts for post and comment tags.No analytics, history limited.
⭐️ Pros of manual tracking:
- Cost-effectiveness: Usually, it’s a free option.
❌ Cons of manual tracking:
- Time-consuming: Manual tracking can be very time-consuming, especially as your brand grows.
- Not comprehensive: You might miss mentions, especially if users don’t tag your official profile or if they occur on platforms you are not actively monitoring.
- Lack of social media analytics: Unlike social listening tools, manual tracking doesn’t provide analytics or sentiment analysis.
02 Using social media monitoring tools
While manual tracking is generally possible for small brands, larger businesses (or those serious about reputation management and engagement) benefit much more from social media monitoring tools.
These tools automate the tracking process, provide comprehensive social media analysis, and ensure you don’t miss out on important conversations across social channels.
Here’s a guide on how to set this up:
- Select a social media monitoring tool that suits your business size, industry, budget, and specific needs.
- Ensure the tool covers all the social media platforms relevant to your brand. For example, Brand24 monitors Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, TikTok, Reddit, LinkedIn, Medium, Bluesky, Twitch, and Telegram.
- List all relevant keywords, hashtags, brands, and product names you want to track. Then, set up a monitoring project.
- Discover the Mention Tab – the place where all mentions appear. You can filter them to find the most relevant.
- Pay attention to the sentiment of the mentions, whether they are positive, negative, or neutral.
- Configure the tool to send you notifications or reports for mentions.
The Brand24’s dashboard for tracking social mentions
Remember that effective social and brand mention tracking requires a strategic approach, the right tools, and genuine engagement.
⭐️ Pros of using social media monitoring tools:
- Real-time tracking: You never miss any social mention – both tagged and untagged.
- AI analysis: You get instant and AI-powered customer insights to use in your marketing campaigns right away.
- Time efficiency: You can focus on the most important mentions or check just the general reports for a quick overview.
- Reporting capabilities: You don’t need to create reports from scratch, but it’s easy to make them personalized.
❌ Cons of using social mention tools:
- Costs: For more comprehensive tools – you need to pay.
Try Brand24 – the best social media monitoring tool for tracking mentions!
How to respond to social media mentions?
Whether you’re a small, mid-sized business or a large company that gets tens of thousands of online mentions per day, what matters most is:
What can you do with a social mention?
How do you respond to the people who are behind each mention: your customers, your clients, your users, and your fans?
There are 3 types of social mentions:
- Positive – gives you an opportunity to show appreciation to the person behind it.
- Negative – gives you an opportunity to potentially solve a problem. Or, it lets you display some sensitive smarts and show sympathy for customers who didn’t have good experiences.
- Neutral – is an opportunity for you to collect feedback about your service or product that wouldn’t otherwise have been shared.
Whether it’s a positive, a negative, or a neutral mention, each of them is an opportunity for you to engage with your audience.
But, the way you should approach will be dictated by the type of the mention.
So, let me briefly explain how to respond to each type.
What to do with a positive mention?
If only every online mention could be an ego-boosting flattery!
Unfortunately, that’s not the case. But that only makes us appreciate positive mentions even more.
DJ and record producer Alan Walker spends his entire day making music, but he still finds time to let his listeners know how much their support and opinions matter to him with posts like this on his social media channels:
“Reading all your comments. Thanks for all the kind words, I’m glad you like it!”
Nothing beats personalization and individual attention.
However, if you receive more than 400 comments & 16k likes from a single post, just take a cue from DJ Alan Walker and simply acknowledge that your listener, user, customer, or client has taken personal time to praise you in a mention.
Thank them for it!!!
What to do with a negative mention?
The example below is our favorite kind of negative social mention.
Why? A specific problem has been addressed, which gives us an opportunity to offer a solution.
Example of a negative social mention
The Babbel customer is experiencing trouble with a recent update and is unable to use the app because of this problem. They clearly anticipate a quick response from them.
If you receive a negative mention like this, which poses a problem that you can solve – fantastic!
Any viable problem has a viable solution. Just remember to respond with patience and kindness in your answer.
Now, what if the social mention is more of a scathing insult, and there isn’t a particular problem for you to solve? What should you do then?
A scathingly negative mention is ruled by emotions.
Whether the problem occurred with your company, a partner, retailer, supplier, or shipping services provider is irrelevant. In the eyes of the customer, you’re guilty by association.
The best way to handle a situation like this is to be direct and apologize.
- Acknowledge any mistakes or oversights that may have occurred.
- Be sympathetic and truly listen to your customers.
Document the exchange with these negative mentions so that you can learn from it, use it to train future employees, and improve the way that you handle situations like these in the future.
Here’s a guided infographic with more details on each step of the process for handling negative social mentions.
Don’t get upset if the customer doesn’t immediately change their tune afterward.
Your goal isn’t to change their mind. When you’re handling any negative social mention, remember that:
- If there is a specific problem mentioned, try to solve it.
- If there isn’t a particular problem for you to solve, at least acknowledge that your customers did not have a positive experience and apologize for their inconvenience.
- If applicable, offer compensation or a small token as a gesture of your appreciation that personal time has been wasted.
What to do with a neutral mention?
A neutral social mention is an opportunity for you to collect feedback about your product.
Take the example below:
This mention neither raves nor complains about the Lays’ vs. Doritos versions of wasabi chips.
It provides relevant marketing information to both Lays and Doritos (both are actually part of the Frito-Lay family, but that’s another topic).
This neutral social mention shows Lays which other chips their consumers compare them to (Doritos), and the flavors that their customers enjoy (wasabi).
Collecting other social mentions like this (and unlike this) will give you access to all kinds of information that will be helpful to your market research.
Neutral social mentions can help you fill in the gaps and answer questions like:
- Who is my target audience?
- Who is my main competitor?
- What do my customers like about my product?
- What do my customers dislike about my product?
- How can I improve my product?
- Why do they choose my product?
- Why do they choose my competitor’s product?
My 5 simple tips on replying to social media mentions
To make it easier for you – I created this list of more general tips to answer mentions (doesn’t matter the sentiment).
So, here’s what you should do:
- Respond ASAP – people expect brands to answer their queries timely.
- Make it private – Sometimes it’s easier to provide personalized and genuine experience in the DM’s. Plus, it’s a better option for your digital reputation.
- Be a human – People are over with AI-generated replies. They look for empathy and understanding.
- Set boundaries – Do your best to resolve customer issues and turn the conversation around… But keep in mind that some problems take time and not every customer will be fully satisfied despite your efforts.
- Attract engagement – Instead of simply reacting to a comment about your brand – answer with a question. It will encourage the person for further engagement and boost your visibility.
Track and analyze your social mentions with Brand24!
Conclusion
Social mentions have become critical for shaping reputation and driving visibility in 2025.
They provide first-hand insights into customer experience, product feedback, and audience behavior.
Tracking social mentions helps brands detect pain points before they escalate to something bigger and discover opportunities before competitors.
While manual tracking can work for very small brands, it quickly becomes inefficient at scale.
Social media monitoring tools like Brand24 enable to monitor tagged and untagged mentions in real time. These tools not only save time but also boost analysis with sentiment insights and reporting.
Each mention – positive, negative, or neutral – offers a chance to connect with your audience. The key is not just monitoring but responding quickly, strategically, and with empathy.
Final thoughts:
- Every mention is a window through which you can see how people truly perceive your brand.
- Responding to mentions is both about listening and speaking.
- Mentions analytics can reveal patterns and trends.
- Untagged mentions are low-hanging fruits. Don’t ignore them!
Start a Brand24 free 14-day trial and track your social mentions in the most efficient way!
