Usable Clicks

Blog & buzz tracking gives brand managers real time feedback on how the public is responding to news and campaigns through a variety of social media platforms that millions of people contribute to each day.  Following references of brand terms and competitor brand terms on blogs, video & photo sharing services, and more.  Below is a list of tools that will help to monitor the real time response:

Blog Search Engines
Search the live web for the most recent blog posts on a subject.  Utilize multiple search engines for the most comprehensive results.

• Technorati
  special features: Filter by level of authority of blog
• IceRocket
  Special features: MySpace profile search; set searches by specific date range
• Google Blog Search
  Special features: Rank content by Google relevance; detailed customized search options
• Ask Blog Search
  Special features: Rank popularity based on Bloglines data

Search Behavior Trends
Drill down into search trends:  see keyword search history, compare terms, view geographic results, and related content.

• Google Insights for Search
  Compare search volume patterns across specific regions, categories, and time frames
• Google Trends
  Compare search volume and news reference volume trends, see key impact events

Social Media Trending
Utilize tools to view the change in volume in discussion of particular words or phrases, and compare trends of multiple terms, across social media platforms over time.

• Facebook Lexicon
  Trend and compare word/phrase volume on Facebook profile, group, and event walls
• Technorati Blog Charts
  View volume of blog mentions of  a term, filtered by level of authority or language
• IceRocket Blog Charts
  Trend and compare volume of blog mentions of up to 3 terms
• Nielsen BlogPulse Blog Charts
  Trend and compare volume of blog mentions of up to 3 terms

Social Media Search
Utilize site-specific search engines to view user-generated content in social media environments.

• Twitter Search
  Search the popular real-time micro-blogging platform
• YouTube Search
  Search the popular UGC video content site
• Flickr Search
  Search the popular UGC photo sharing site
• DeviantArt
  Search the popular UGC art sharing site
• Delicious
  Search the popular social bookmarking site
• Digg
  Search the popular social news site
• WhosTalkin
  Social media metacrawler that searches references across a number of blog, news, video, photo, forum sites, and more