Recently I have been going through the HubSpot Certification course and picking up new tips and tricks along the way. One new trick I learned can help supercharge your b2b social media monitoring.

There are a million social media monitoring tools out there that can get the job done. HubSpot’s Social Inbox is unique because it’s integrated with a host of other tools in HubSpot’s software (like contacts, lists, campaigns, and more).

Just to be clear, HubSpot’s Social Inbox incorporates social media publishing, engagement, and monitoring tools. This post will only look at maximizing Hubspot’s social monitoring capabilities by taking advantage of it’s integration with the lists tool. Throughout this post I will use the terms Social Inbox and social monitoring tool synonymously.

So what are lists? Lists are a way of segmenting your contacts in HubSpot for more personalized marketing automation.

You can make two different kinds of lists:

Static Lists – a list that only adds contacts once. A static snapshot in time. Ex: all your blog subscribers as of today.
Smart Lists – a list that adds contacts whenever they meet specified criteria. Ex: a list of your blog subscribers that adds contacts automatically whenever they subscribe to your blog.

It would be more useful to have a smart list of blog subscribers because it will update automatically and not go out of date.

A static list is better for things like: a list of everyone who attended an event, or everyone who signed up for a webinar.

So what do lists have to do with social? Lists can give you key insights on your contacts’ behavior on social.

Here are 4 lists that you need to make in the lists tool and then monitor in Social Inbox:

1) Customers

In order to have closed loop reporting, it is integral to enter your customers in HubSpot. Making a list of your customers makes it easier to focus your message to the correct stage of the Inbound Marketing Methodology. You want to make sure that you are focused on delighting customers, not wasting your time and theirs with attraction stage content. That goes for email marketing as well as social media monitoring.

Make sure you are monitoring your customers for any questions or concerns they may express on social that you can delight them with an answer.

Here’s how you create the list:

A) Navigate to the Lists tool under the Contacts tab.

B) Once your there create a new list.

C) Name your list “Customers” or something to that effect, and select a smart list.

D) Make sure the requirements are the same as the screen shot below and click save.

Presto. Now whenever a contact becomes a customer then they will be added to this list.

2) Employees

Again, you don’t want to be sending the wrong info to the wrong people. A list of employees can keep you from marketing to your own people. Monitoring your employees on social media can help you show them that you care. According to a study by Weber Shandwick, 50% of employees post messages about their employer.

Do the same thing you did to create the customers list except make it a static list, name it something to the effect of employees and save it. You will then need to go back and add each of your employees to this list manually. I’m sorry. If you know of a better way, by all means do it.

3) Social Media Evangelists

This is a great idea for you to be aware of and reward your most loyal fans across all your social networks. You can create a list that automatically adds contacts when they have clicked X number of times on social messages. Thank your loyal fans; reward them; do something to let them know you know and care they exist. Did someone in the list stop engaging? Find out why.

This list will be a smart list. Make sure the requirements are as follows:

Make sure that you end up with three rules (an “or” list), not three requirements to the same rule (an “and” list). An “and” list only includes contacts that meet ALL of the requirements while an “or” list includes contacts that meet ANY of the requirements. To do this click the “Add another set of requirements” not “Add another requirement.” I have faith in you.

4) Unsubscribers

Create a list of contacts who unsubscribed from your emails. Making a list of these people can help you to see if there are any trends that are causing people to unsubscribe from your emails. These unsubscribers are a great opportunity to right your wrongs on social. After all, social is the only personalized channel of communication you have left.

This will be a smart list, and like the Social Media Evangelists list it will be an “or” list. Make sure the requirements are set to look like the screen shot below with one exception: you are going to make a rule for every email your company sends. This can take awhile, but its worth it I promise. When you are finished name the list, save it, and voila: you have six new lists.

But wait, you’re not finished.

You now need to monitor these bad boys in Social Inbox.

1) Go to your social monitoring dashboard and click on the button to add a new stream.

2) Click on the Dropdown menu titled “Show me tweets from:” and click on the option “Hubspot Contact List.”

3) Click on the drop down menu “Select a Hubspot contact list:” and select one of the lists you just made.

If nothing shows up then it is because you don’t have a twitter handle for any of the contacts in that list. You can fix that by going to each individual contact and searching for them in Google. If they are active at all on Twitter, you will most likely be able to find their Twitter handle.

Man, way to go, you made it all the way through. Making sure you’re segmenting your contacts thoroughly with lists and utilizing those lists appropriately will help make your b2b marketing way more relevant and personal.

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