Social Share of Voice
Social MediaAlso: Share of Voice · SOV · Social SOV
Quick definition
Social share of voice is the percentage of total conversation in your category that mentions your brand instead of a competitor. It's calculated by dividing your brand mentions by the combined mentions of you and your competitors across social platforms, then expressed as a percentage.
A rising share of voice alongside flat or falling sentiment usually signals a problem, not a win. Check sentiment before reporting the number upward.
How it varies across Australia
Share of voice in Australia tends to concentrate around one or two category leaders, with the rest of the field splitting a smaller remainder. Categories with a dominant incumbent show the widest gaps. Categories with fragmented players show a flatter distribution.
See brand and positioning benchmarks across Australian industries →What it actually means
Imagine a room full of people talking about your category. Share of voice measures what fraction of the room is talking about you specifically, versus your competitors. It's a volume metric, not a quality metric.
That distinction matters because volume and sentiment don't move together. A brand can hold a strong share of voice during a product recall or a public complaint pile-on. The mentions are real, the share is real, and the brand is still losing.
Social share of voice sits closest to brand awareness among the metrics marketers track. It's a proxy for salience, how likely someone in your category is to think of you first. It's less useful as a standalone KPI and more useful as one input alongside engagement rate, sentiment analysis and actual conversion data.
Most tools calculate it by scraping mentions across platforms using brand name, handle and defined competitor set, then dividing. The competitor set you choose changes the number substantially. Include too many minor players and everyone's share looks small. Include too few and your share looks inflated relative to the real category.
Share of voice tells you how loud you are. It says nothing about whether people like what they're hearing.
How to calculate it
Share of Voice = Your brand mentions ÷ Total category mentions x 100
Worked example. Your brand received 800 social mentions last month. Your three tracked competitors received 600, 400 and 200 mentions respectively. Total category mentions = 800 + 600 + 400 + 200 = 2,000. Your share of voice = 800 ÷ 2,000 x 100 = 40%.
The Australian context
Australia's social conversation is smaller and more concentrated than the US or UK equivalent, which means share of voice numbers move more dramatically off single events. A viral complaint thread or a well-timed campaign can swing a brand's share by double digits in a week, in a way that would barely register in a larger market.
This also means smaller Australian brands can win meaningful share of voice with a fraction of the spend a global competitor would need, because the total conversation pool is thinner. It's a genuine advantage for challenger brands willing to be louder than their budget suggests.
Where people get this wrong
Social Share of Voice vs Brand Awareness
| Social Share of Voice | Brand Awareness | |
|---|---|---|
| What it measures | Relative conversation volume against named competitors | Whether people recognise or recall your brand at all |
| Data source | Social listening tools scraping mentions | Surveys, recall studies, search volume |
| Requires a competitor set? | Yes, always relative | No, can stand alone |
| Reacts to a single event | Quickly and sharply | Slowly, needs repeated exposure |
Related terms
Common questions
What's a good social share of voice?
There's no universal target. What matters is whether your share is growing relative to your own history and whether it's paired with neutral or positive sentiment. A market leader might reasonably hold a much higher share than a challenger brand and that's expected, not a benchmark to chase blindly.
How do you measure social share of voice?
Use a social listening tool to track mentions of your brand and a defined set of competitors across platforms over the same period. Divide your mentions by the combined total, then multiply by 100. Keep the competitor set and time window consistent so trends are comparable.
Does share of voice include negative mentions?
Yes, by default most tools count all mentions regardless of sentiment. That's exactly why share of voice should never be reported without a sentiment breakdown alongside it. A high share built on complaints is not a marketing win.
Is share of voice the same across all social platforms?
No. Share of voice on X can differ substantially from share of voice on Instagram or TikTok because audience composition and conversation style differ by platform. Report share of voice per platform rather than blending them into one number if the platforms serve different audiences.
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About New Rebellion
New Rebellion is a marketing intelligence consultancy. We build tools, score Australian businesses on how their marketing actually performs, and publish Debrief every day. This dictionary is part of how we work in the open.
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