Social Listening Blog
Social listening insights, workflows, customer stories, and news from Octolens team
What Is Media Monitoring? A Practical 2026 Guide
What it covers, what it actually costs, and how teams set it up in 2026 — with real numbers and real practitioner quotes.
The 15 Best AI Sentiment Analysis Tools in 2026 (By Use Case)
Sentiment analysis is a different product depending on where your text lives. Here are the best tools for each case — with verified prices, real user quotes, and the honest failure modes.
Sprout Social Pricing in 2026: What It Actually Costs Per Seat
The seat prices are public, the invoice isn't: both billing bases side by side, the Listening add-on nobody prices, and what 358 real contracts say teams actually pay.
Brand24 Review (2026): Hands-On Test, Pricing, and Verdict
We ran Brand24's free trial for our own B2B SaaS. This is what the coverage actually looked like, where the noise came from, what it really costs, and who should buy it.
Brand Reputation Monitoring in 2026: The Complete Guide
How to track what people — and AI models — actually say about your brand, measure it, and catch problems while you can still fix them.
Meltwater Pricing in 2026: What It Actually Costs (Real Contract Data)
Meltwater won't publish prices, so we did the digging: real contract data, a public government rate card, user-reported costs, and the contract terms that catch teams off guard.
23 Best Competitor Monitoring Tools in 2026 (By Category)
Competitor monitoring is seven different jobs, not one — from AI competitor analysis to competitor intelligence platforms. Here's the best tool for each, with G2 ratings, real prices, and real user quotes.
How to Get Your Brand Mentioned in ChatGPT (and Every Other AI Assistant)
AI assistants recommend the brands the internet talks about. Here's the full system: money prompts, citable pages, and earned mentions - with the exact workflows.
12 Best Social Media Monitoring Tools in 2026 (Free & Paid)
We compared 12 social media monitoring tools on alert speed, platform coverage, noise filtering, and real pricing — plus the free options that actually work.
21 Best Social Listening Tools in 2026 (Compared)
We compared 21 social listening tools side by side — G2 ratings, real pricing, platform coverage, and what actual users say about each one.