Share of Voice (SoV)

Share of Voice (SoV) is a metric that measures the percentage of total mentions or conversations a brand captures compared to competitors over a defined period, within a defined market or topic. It reflects how visible and dominant the brand is in a given digital ecosystem.

Originally, SoV referred to the share of paid advertising impressions a brand held in a market. Today, it extends to mentions across social media, search, news, blogs, and other channels. By understanding SoV, organizations can evaluate their competitive position in terms of attention and share of conversation.

SoV provides insights that raw volume metrics cannot:

• It reveals relative performance: even if total mentions are growing, SoV shows whether a brand is gaining or losing ground versus competitors.
• It helps allocate marketing resources strategically: knowing that a brand’s SoV is low might justify additional investment in PR, content, or influencer partnerships.
• It guides campaign benchmarking: tracking SoV before, during, and after a campaign helps determine whether the campaign genuinely increased share of conversation.
• It aids market segmentation: by breaking SoV down by geography, customer segment, or channel, brands can detect strengths and weaknesses in particular markets or audiences.
• It enhances reputation and brand positioning: a high SoV is often associated with authority, trust, and brand leadership.

Suppose a company launches a new product or campaign and wants to see how much of the public conversation it captures compared to other players in its industry. By aggregating mentions across social media, blogs, forums, and news, the company can compute SoV and determine if its voice is “louder” than competitors’, even before metrics like sales or leads are evaluated.

SoV can be broken down by various dimensions to provide more nuanced insights:

• Channel-level SoV: SoV in social media, so the share of mentions on Twitter, Instagram, or TikTok.
• Geographic SoV: share within a specific country, region, or market.
• Topic or campaign SoV: share of mentions related to a campaign slogan, hashtag, or product line.
• Time-period comparison: tracking how SoV changes over time (daily, weekly, monthly).
• Segmented SoV: share of mentions among a demographic group or customer segment.

• Buzz / mention volume — SoV builds on raw mention counts by contextualizing them relative to the market.
• Share of Engagement (SoE) — how much interaction your share of conversation generates in comparison to others.
• Impact / Source Impact — mentions from high-authority sources count more, so combining SoV with impact gives a more accurate picture.
• Earned Media Value (EMV) — SoV can feed into EMV models that translate share into estimated media value.

• Create content and campaigns that spark conversation.
• Use brands’ voice amplification: influencer partnerships to drive mentions.
• Monitor competitor activities and respond dynamically.
• Participate in trending topics and conversations relevant to the brand.
• Focus efforts in underperforming geographies or channels to raise local SoV.
• Encourage user-generated content and brand advocacy to grow share organically.

• SoV = brand’s share of public conversation within a category.
• It complements raw buzz by giving relative context.
• Best used in combination with Buzz, Sentiment, Engagement, Impact, and EMV to deliver holistic insights.
• With Palowise, teams can monitor SoV in real time, benchmark against competitors, segment by geography or campaign, and tie it to other KPIs for deeper understanding.