Businesses must always be prepared to evolve. Like a living entity, there will never be a point in which your business is perfect and requires no more evolution. There is no finish line in this race.

One of the greatest forces pushing this constant development is the emergence of new technologies and one of the most game-changing technologies arriving on the scene today is sentiment analysis. If you aren’t using sentiment analysis already, it’s about time to get on board because soon it’ll be a necessity in order to remain competitive rather than a luxury. And it’s all thanks to these 7 major benefits that just can’t be ignored.

1. Revising marketing strategy

The built-in analytics of services like Facebook and Google are valuable tools to measure the success of your marketing efforts but they offer no nuance or in-depth understanding of one simple question: why? This leaves you with no option but to engage in a slow process of elimination, trying different approaches one at a time based on nothing more than theory before you finally hit one that works. And even when you find one that works, can you really be sure there isn’t another one that works better?

Sentiment analysis goes a long way in filling this gap by telling you how customers feel about your brand or product in their own words. This kind of insight gives you a huge leg up in shaping a marketing strategy that addresses prominent concerns and highlights the exact points that are likely to draw those customers to your products or services.

2. Measuring ROI of marketing campaigns

Sentiment analysis measures the efficacy of your marketing campaigns far more accurately than the number of likes, followers or shares you get. This technology lets you see how much of the online conversation surrounding your brand is positive or negative and you can track the effect of your marketing campaign on this sentiment. If the percentage of positive comments online goes up as a result of your campaign, you must be doing something right.

3. Improve the quality of your products

But it’s not just your marketing efforts that should be adjusted to reach your audience more effectively, your products and services should also evolve to meet your customer’s preferences. You could put customers on the spot with a survey, but you’ll probably only get negative responses from frustrated customers. Like a fly on the wall, sentiment analysis lets you see how consumers are candidly discussing you and your products online, often highlighting very precise points that can be improved. And why shouldn’t they be? The customer is always right, right?

4. Give better customer service

Sentiment analysis can alert you when someone has written something negative about you. While not every complaint necessarily requires a response, showing that you’re aware and that you care with quick replies can go a long way to keeping your current customers happy and willing to recommend you to others. In a world with millions of people posting online, it can be difficult to engage with all of them. Sentiment analysis helps you identify those you should engage with the most and reach out to them directly.

5. Better crisis management

Seeing what people are saying about you can help you identify potential crises and PR disasters and address them before they blow up. The faster you are able to respond in such situations, the less likely one person’s complaint will develop into anything more. After all, why complain about something that’s already be fixed?

6. Generate leads

All of the above points lead to the increased generation of leads. With solid marketing campaigns, better customer service and constantly improving product quality, who isn’t going to want what you have to offer. Happy customers beget more happy customers and the information you gain from performing accurate sentiment analysis helps you come up with the best ways to reach out and attract new customers to your brand.

7. Boost sales revenue

And of course, the be all and end all for any business, the benefits of sentiment analysis translate directly into increased sales revenue. Could there be any greater incentive to pursue sentiment analysis?

And the technology is becoming more and more accessible over time. While high costs and technical requirements have made sentiment analysis somewhat of an exclusive club of the biggest and wealthiest entities, Senno has drastically reduced the entry barriers to get quality sentiment analysis. This has been achieved by building a sentiment analysis engine on the decentralized blockchain with an open SDK so developers can create whatever kind of sentiment analysis app they need.

Whether you’re a large business, a small brand just getting started or even an individual who wants to consult the opinion on the masses, there’s never been a better time to prioritize the use of sentiment analysis.