Social Share of Voice
Quick answer
Social share of voice is share of voice calculated specifically from mentions across social platforms and online communities, rather than from all sources, such as news and AI answers, combined. It answers a narrower question: of all the social conversation about a competitor set, how much belongs to one brand.
Why it matters
Social conversation moves faster and reacts more directly to a single post, launch or complaint than news coverage does, so social share of voice can shift sharply over a short window in a way that a brand's overall, all-sources share of voice would smooth out. Tracking it separately shows social-specific momentum, such as a product launch gaining traction in one community, that a combined number would hide. It also tends to be the first place a competitor's campaign shows up, often well before any news coverage follows.
How to measure it
Count mentions of the brand and a fixed competitor set across social platforms and communities specifically, excluding news and AI-answer mentions, over a recurring window, then divide the brand's count by the combined total. Comparing this alongside the brand's overall share of voice shows whether social conversation is moving in the same direction as everything else or diverging from it. Breaking the count down further by individual platform or community can also show exactly where a shift is coming from.
Example
A habit-tracking app sees its overall share of voice holding steady for a month, but its social share of voice specifically rises after a short video about the app circulates on a community platform. The team recognizes the change is confined to social conversation rather than spreading into news or blog coverage, and watches whether it fades or turns into a sustained shift before reading too much into the single event. A few weeks later the increase has mostly faded, confirming it was a short-lived spike rather than a lasting change.
Frequently asked questions
How is social share of voice different from overall share of voice?
Overall share of voice combines every source a brand tracks; social share of voice isolates just the social and community portion, which can move very differently from the combined total over a short period.
Which is more useful to track?
Both, for different reasons: overall share of voice shows the big picture, while the social-specific version shows whether a particular platform or community is driving a change worth understanding on its own.
Should the competitor set be the same for social share of voice as for overall share of voice?
Usually yes, so the two numbers stay directly comparable; changing the competitor set between them makes it harder to tell whether a difference reflects the channel or just a changed definition between the two figures.
Can social share of voice be negative or misleading at low volumes?
At very low mention counts, the ratio can swing sharply from a single post, so it is worth checking the raw mention counts alongside the percentage before reacting to a small sample.
Related terms
Related
MarketHQ tracks brand mentions across communities, news, blogs, social and AI answers, and turns them into gap analysis and action plans.