The things your customers are saying about your brand mean something — and sentiment analysis tools can translate for you. These tools work to understand the context of feedback, comments, and messages so you can know how your audience really feels.
Tracking customer sentiment is easier with social listening technology. Let’s explore 20 of the top brand sentiment analysis tools and how they help you monitor and understand the sentiments around your brand.
Contents:
What Is Sentiment Analysis?
Top 20 Sentiment Analysis Tools
How to Choose the Right Sentiment Analysis Tool
Why You Should Embrace Sentiment Analysis
What Is Sentiment Analysis?
Sentiment analysis via social listening allows brands to surface the true meaning of what people are saying about your brand, products, or services. It uses artificial intelligence (AI) to learn the context behind content.
When people post comments on social media or provide feedback in a survey, for example, they’re doing so because they feel some type of way. There’s emotion embedded into their commentary, and sentiment analysis software uncovers hidden meanings.
A sentiment analysis tool via reviews feedback at scale and classifies it as positive, negative, or neutral. It’s common for brands to have a mix of all three types of feedback, but you can get an idea of the broader sentiment and know how you're meeting your customers’ expectations.
TIP: Sentiment analysis is just one of the many benefits of using a social listening solution. Check out our Definitive Guide to Social Listening to learn more!
Top 20 Sentiment Analysis Tools
In today's social media landscape, there's no more room for manually reviewing every comment, survey, online review, or social media post about your company. Here are 20 of the best sentiment analysis tools that can analyze sentiment accurately and at scale.
1. Meltwater
Meltwater's social listening solution provides AI-powered sentiment analysis that tracks brands across publications, social media, websites, podcasts, and other channels. Brands get real-time insights regarding public opinions, enabling them to be proactive about their strategies.
The platform identifies sentiment trends, customer emotions, and shifts in perceptions. It can track these trends over time to help companies see how their efforts are contributing to their brand image.
2. Brandwatch
Brandwatch uses AI and natural language processing (NLP) to analyze customer sentiment across millions of online conversations. The platform specializes in social media monitoring and will track brand mentions and keyword-based discussions on your behalf.
Brandwatch will categorize posts for you, such as opinions and negative comments. This makes it easier for marketers to review feedback and prioritize their next best steps.
3. Sprinklr
Sprinklr’s customer experience management platform includes sentiment analysis as a feature. It uses AI to detect nuanced emotions to help spot trends in feedback. It’s made for enterprises who have diverse and large-scale needs, as well as multiple employees working toward common goals.
Users can see at a glance whether social media posts have been viewed in a positive or negative light. The platform integrates with popular CRM systems and other tools, giving you a more comprehensive option for brand monitoring.
4. Hootsuite Insights
Hootsuite is widely known for its social media scheduling, but it also includes AI software for sentiment analysis. Users can collect insights from 150 million websites and 30 social media channels. Hootsuite will rate mentions as positive or negative and track how sentiment changes over time.
Hootsuite’s visual data and real-time monitoring allow brands to see their audience’s perceptions. It also shows you where conversations are taking place so you can enter the chat prepared.
5. Talkwalker
Talkwalker’s Customer Feedback Analytics feature analyzes sentiments from 300 unique sources. It monitors online reviews, surveys, and customer service interactions in real time to surface opportunities to improve your brand image.
Brands can set up alerts when there’s a shift in sentiment, allowing them to take action. You can get a bird’s eye view of sentiment across all channels or dig deeper into a specific area to see how you might improve the customer experience.
6. Lexalytics
Lexalytics is part of InMoment’s customer experience platform. It collects and analyzes text feedback from various sources, then synthesizes it into easy-to-digest summaries.
After analyzing things like online reviews, Lexalytics will prepare suggested responses so you can address negativity at the source. It detects nuances in conversations, especially complex comments that might contain both positive and negative elements.
7. Medallia
Formerly MonkeyLearn, Medallia uses text analytics to surface customer sentiments. It detects keywords, tone of voice, and complex nuances of conversations to give marketers insights into what customers are talking about.
Decode customer emotions, effort, and satisfaction all in one place. The platform can send alerts to specific users based on role, allowing them to react and respond accordingly.
8. Buffer
Buffer is a common name among social media scheduling tools, but it can also support other parts of your strategy with sentiment analysis.
Buffer organizes sentiment based on the type of post (e.g., negative comment, question) to make it easier for marketers to review feedback. This adds an extra layer to the social media management puzzle to give brands a more complete picture of their performance.
9. Quid
Quid (formerly NetBase Quid) is a comprehensive consumer intelligence platform that includes social media sentiment analysis. It works with structured and unstructured data across a global feed to learn what customers are saying.
The platform can track millions of conversations in real time, with AI serving as a huge component in its analytics. It delivers actionable intelligence from all of your social media channels so you can respond to shifting needs, preferences, and behaviors.
TIP: Meltwater's AI-powered consumer intelligence platform can help you develop a comprehensive understanding of your audience and customers.
10. Salesforce Einstein Analytics
Salesforce Einstein Analytics includes an API that analyzes customer sentiment. It classifies customer responses into Positive, Negative, or Neutral ratings, which can be useful for lead targeting or account based marketing.
The API can analyze a wide range of content, including emails, social media posts, and text from chatbots. Companies can use the API to learn how customers feel about products, customer service, or overall experiences, and even find their most loyal supporters based on feedback.
11. Google Cloud Natural Language API
Google Cloud Natural Language API offers flexible software for sentiment analysis. Since it’s an API, you can integrate it to the tools you’re already using and familiar with.
The API can detect sentiment in documents, reviews, and other text-based content. Unlike turnkey platforms, there is some coding involved in setting up this API for your workflows and use cases.
12. Cision Communication Cloud
Cision’s PR platform comes equipped with sentiment analytics tools. This platform monitors global media to find mentions and help brands maintain their public images. With sentiment analysis, users can dig deeper into each type of media coverage to see how it’s contributing to brand goals.
The platform can differentiate sentiment between stories and campaigns and even compare your brand sentiment to competitors. Taking it a step further, the platform connects the dots between sentiment and other metrics like engagement, website traffic, and conversions so you can see how much your audience’s opinions matter.
13. Amazon Comprehend
Amazon Comprehend is a machine learning-based tool that uses text analysis to decode customer sentiment. It reviews multiple types of text-based sources, including documents, social media posts, web pages, emails, and customer support tickets.
Unlike most social media sentiment analysis tools, Amazon Comprehend isn’t part of a brand management or media monitoring platform. It’s highly customizable and integrates with your existing tech stack.
14. Qualtrics
Qualtrics’ customer experience platform includes Text iQ, which is its sentiment analysis tool. It uses NLP to make sense of unstructured data from sources like social media posts and surveys.
Text iQ categorizes its findings into themes, making it easier for marketers to spot trends in feedback. It works across multiple platforms and languages to create a more comprehensive approach to sentiment analysis.
15. Microsoft Azure
Microsoft Azure AI Language is another customizable option for social media sentiment analysis. Models are optimized for specific tasks, like sentiment analysis, and can deploy anywhere in your workflows.
This one requires some knowledge of model training and implementation. It’s best for larger companies and enterprises with dedicated AI and computing resources.
16. Mention
Mention uses sentiment analysis to help brands gain a competitive edge. Brands can monitor their own customers’ feedback as well as the reputation of competing brands and companies from a single tool.
Mention automatically analyzes your content for sentiment hints and will compile it into side-by-side reports with competitors for easy comparison. It can also analyze the sentiment of one-off comments or mentions on social media or the web.
17. Awario
Awario is a social listening software that includes social sentiment tools. It tracks brand mentions across multiple channels, then analyzes the sentiment of each comment or mention.
You can sort mentions by positive, negative, or neutral ratings, helping you to prioritize negative feedback and prevent potential crises. See what percentage of mentions fall into each category and track your results over time.
18. Zoho Analytics
Zoho Analytics connects more than 500 data sources to understand and report on sentiment. Brands can apply Zoho’s sentiment analysis tools to social media, documents, reviews, and even internal communications to get immediate feedback on how their audience feels.
Zoho’s tools also look at engagement metrics to help understand a post’s popularity and sentiment around it.
19. HubSpot Service Hub
HubSpot’s customer service tools infuse sentiment analysis to gauge how your customers think and feel. It reviews NPS survey results to learn whether a customer’s feedback is good or bad, then organizes the results for visual appeal and understanding.
The Service Hub also connects to HubSpot CRM. It can quickly identify customers who are potentially unhappy so agents can be proactive about following up with them.
20. Dialpad
While most social media sentiment analysis tools focus on written media (e.g., reviews, social comments), Dialpad was made for monitoring the sentiment on phone calls. Its sentiment analysis tools are built into their contact center management platform and transcribes voice calls in real time.
During call transcription, AI technology detects positive, negative, and neutral sentiments. This allows managers to see if and when calls are turning heated or problems aren’t getting resolved.
How to Choose the Right Sentiment Analysis Tool
Choosing sentiment analysis software involves various factors, including your business needs, goals, budget, and the level of analysis you expect. When exploring your options, consider the following criteria:
- Level of accuracy
- Natural language processing (NLP) to detect nuances like humor, sarcasm, and complex emotions
- Real-time analysis
- Integrations with your CRM, survey tools, social media channels, and other software
- Scalability as your business needs change
- Reporting features, especially visual data options
- User-friendliness
- Training and adoption timelines
- Compliance and data security
- Multilingual capabilities
- Technical support
These criteria give you a good starting point as you learn what you need and want in sentiment analysis software.
Why You Should Embrace Sentiment Analysis
That mountain of customer feedback and commentary you’re sitting on isn’t helpful until you understand the why behind it. AI has enhanced the way brands analyze sentiment, ensuring you get the full context behind customer feedback.
Sentiment analytics tools can parse through this data quickly and give you a clear read on how your customers feel. The more you know about how your customers view your brand, the better you can align your products and messaging to meet their needs.
The AI sentiment analysis tool within Meltwater social listening digs deep into your data along with conversations popping up across the digital ecosystem. You can take an always-on approach to listening to your customers and know exactly where you stand.
Request a demo to find out how Meltwater’s social listening solution can help you better understand the sentiment around your brand.