Content topics from social listening: how to choose

Short answer

To choose content topics from customer discussions, collect four kinds of topic from public discussion: repeated questions, misconceptions, difficult moments before and after purchase, and topics people argue about. Score each topic on four factors: demand (how many different people write about it), fit (how relevant it is to your brand), gap (does a good answer already exist) and ability (can you genuinely give a valuable answer). The highest-scoring topics go into next month's content calendar. That way content rests on the audience's real questions, not the team's guesses.

Why start from discussion

Content teams often choose topics from the inside: a new product feature, company news, a competitor's post. These may interest the audience, but often they do not. Public discussion shows the topics people are already thinking about: they ask about them, argue about them, share wrong information about them. Content written on such topics gets searched for, shared, and draws "finally someone explained it" comments. Starting from discussion means testing a piece's value before it is made.

Four topic sources

• Repeated questions — the same question asked again and again by different people: "how to choose", "how long does it last", "which is better".
• Misconceptions — wrong information spreads in discussions and nobody corrects it: "filtered water removes all useful minerals", "online courses never work".
• Difficult moments — hesitation before buying or a problem after: "how to prepare for installation", "what to watch in the first week".
• Debates — topics where people split into two camps: "rent or buy", "online or in person".

A four-factor score

1. 1Demand (1–5)How many different authors wrote about it in the last three months? Few — 1, many — 5.
2. 2Fit (1–5)How relevant is the topic to your product and audience?
3. 3Gap (1–5)Does a good, clear answer already exist? If not — 5.
4. 4Ability (1–5)Does your team have a genuinely valuable, checked answer on this topic? Is a specialist needed?

Multiply or add the four scores — what matters is using the same rule every month. A topic with a low ability score is dangerous even if demand is high: a weak answer does not earn trust, it loses it.

The content card

• Topic and core question — in people's own words.
• Evidence — two or three linked quotes, the number of different authors.
• Scores on the four factors.
• Format — post, short video, detailed guide, newsletter, Q&A.
• Who writes and who checks — especially on medical, legal and financial topics.
• Success measure — fewer new questions in comments, saves, shares.

Format by question type

• A short factual question ("how long does it last?") — a short post or FAQ.
• A choice question ("which should I pick?") — a comparison table or guide.
• A procedural question ("how do I install it?") — a step-by-step video or illustrated instructions.
• A misconception — a "myth and fact" format, with a source.
• A debate — a piece that shows both sides honestly, ending with "which suits whom".

The monthly loop

1. 1CollectIn the last week of the month, new topics from discussion are written onto cards.
2. 2ScoreThe four factors are scored and the top 4–6 topics chosen.
3. 3PlanChosen topics go into the calendar with a format and an owner.
4. 4MeasureComments under the published content, and how often the same question still appears in discussion, are tracked.

Illustrative example

This is an illustrative example. A nursery chain's content team usually posted photos of holiday events. On parenting forums, though, three topics dominated: crying during settling in, the food menu, and "what happens when my child is ill". Settling in scored highest on the four factors — high demand, no good local answer, and the chain has a psychologist. A short video was made with the psychologist; parents wrote their own questions in the comments, and those questions became the next month's topics.

What to measure

Like counts do not show whether content was useful. Sharper signals: extra questions under the piece (people got interested), saves and shares (they found it useful), the same question appearing less often in discussion, or people linking to your content. The last two are the strongest: your content has entered the conversation.

Limitations

Public discussion shows the active part of the audience; quiet readers may have different interests. On medical, legal and financial topics, content must be checked by a specialist — popularity in a discussion does not make it right. Anonymise quotes when using them in content, and do not copy long passages without permission.

Common mistakes

• Choosing topics only from internal ideas.
• Ignoring the ability score — a weak answer loses trust.
• Answering every topic in the same format.
• Hidden advertising on a contested topic.
• Measuring success by likes alone.

How this differs from search content

This article is about social and editorial content — posts, videos, newsletters. The same discussions can also yield topics for search content, but the criteria there are different: how people type in search, what search results already show, a page's long-term value. To collect category questions systematically, you can use the template in the category question bank.

Collecting topics with Vexvon Monitoring

Vexvon Monitoring searches the sites you add for category terms and shows each post's type — including "question" — a one-sentence summary and up to five topic tags. Exporting results to Excel makes it easy to filter by topic and count different authors for each. The team fills in the content card and the scores. More on the Vexvon Monitoring page.

Next step

This month, collect 15 topics from the four sources, score each on the four factors and put the top five into next month's calendar. For your audience's language, see customer language research; other articles are in the campaign, content and lead signals section.