Many brands realize the importance of monitoring social media conversations to watch for customer issues, track sentiment and gather insights. In the financial services field, MasterCard seems to be leading the way with its global and around-the-clock “conversation suite,” as recently profiled by both Digiday and The Financial Brand.
At MasterCard, a team of 60 people in four locations track social media conversations around the world 24/7. While the sheer scale of this monitoring effort is impressive, even more impressive is what MasterCard does with the information and how it shares it within the organization:
- Employees from across the company are encouraged to visit the suite and even bring in outside partners.
- Teams from PR, marketing and customer service rotate through the command center daily.
- Insights gained through monitoring are used to inform product development, and they influenced MasterCard’s rollout of MasterPass earlier this year.
- The payment network tracks key metrics like regional share of voice and follows influencers.
- Weekly and quarterly analytics are prepared and shared throughout the company.
It’s one thing to track social media conversations; it’s another thing to apply context and analysis. But it seems that MasterCard is going even further and using what it hears in the social space to inform actions across their global organization. This is really putting social into action.
Many financial institutions use social media as part of their customer service strategies, but MasterCard has expanded the idea of what can be gained from listening. It’s not just about the individual tweet or post; it’s about broader trends… and applying them to essential business decisions.