What is share of voice explained

What is share of voice captures how much of the conversation your brand earns versus competitors, helping UK teams benchmark visibility, clarify positioning, and prioritise where to invest for faster growth. It translates disparate signals—mentions, impression share, organic visibility, and earned coverage—into a comparable competitive metric, so you can track progress, diagnose gaps, and act with confidence across social, search, paid, and PR.

Executive summary reimagined

What is share of voice describes your brand’s share of attention versus competitors across channels, turning scattered signals into a single competitive visibility metric. Knowing how to measure share of voice helps UK teams benchmark presence, prioritise spend, and spot quick wins across social mentions, PPC impression share, organic search visibility, and earned media. This article clarifies what the metric means in practice, shows how to calculate it with simple formulas and worked examples, and outlines channel-specific playbooks for social, SEO, PPC, and PR. You’ll learn how to weight SOV by reach, engagement, and sentiment for truer insight, how to track deltas before and after campaigns, and how to turn findings into action—whether that’s refining content pillars, tightening keyword baskets, tuning bids, or sharpening PR narratives. The goal is practical guidance you can apply immediately to plan, measure, and grow competitive visibility with confidence.

What is share of voice: Definition and core concept

At its simplest, what is share of voice is the proportion of category conversation or visibility your brand earns versus competitors across paid, owned, and earned channels. It translates disparate signals—ad impressions, social mentions, organic visibility, and media coverage—into a comparable metric that reflects competitive presence rather than internal performance alone. Practically, it answers whether your brand is being seen and discussed in the places that matter to your audience, and in what proportion relative to the wider market.

Share of voice spans channels by design. In paid, it often aligns with impression share; in social, it reflects mentions and engagement; in SEO, it maps to visibility or estimated traffic share; and in PR, it captures coverage volume and reach. This breadth makes it a strategic barometer for salience and positioning across the full marketing mix.

By contrast, Share of Market tracks realised sales and revenue, while brand awareness measures recognition independent of competition; SOV is competitive and leading, SOM is commercial and lagging. A concise share of voice calculation applies in all cases:

SOV% = (Your brand metric ÷ Total market metric) × 100

Where “metric” may be impressions, mentions, visibility, or coverage, provided the numerator and denominator are defined consistently across the same time window, geography, and competitor set.

The universal formula and variants (with examples)

What is share of voice: At the core, the share of voice calculation is a simple ratio applied consistently across channels: SOV% = (your brand metric ÷ total market metric) × 100. To use it well, define a uniform scope—time window, geography, competitor set, and metric—then apply the same rules to every brand. Below shows how to calculate share of voice for social, SEO, and PPC with clear numbers and interpretations.

Social mentions example

• Plug numbers: Your brand has 1,200 mentions in a month; the category totals 6,000 mentions.
• Compute: SOV=1,2006,000×100=20%SOV=6,0001,200×100=20%.
• Interpret: You own 20% of the conversation. If competitors cluster at 25–30%, your priority is to deepen engagement and expand listening queries before scaling content.

SEO visibility example

• Plug numbers: Your tracked keyword basket drives an estimated 18,000 organic clicks for you and 90,000 total across all tracked domains.
• Compute: SOV=18,00090,000×100=20%SOV=90,00018,000×100=20%.
• Interpret: A 20% organic visibility share suggests solid presence but room to grow via higher‑intent clusters and rich results. This demonstrates how to calculate share of voice in search without conflating it with rank alone.

PPC impression share example

• Plug numbers: Eligible impressions = 1,000,000; your ads served 350,000 impressions.
• Compute: SOV=350,0001,000,000×100=35%SOV=1,000,000350,000×100=35%.
• Interpret: A 35% impression share indicates frequent exposure, but lost share may stem from budget caps or Ad Rank; calculate share of voice by auditing lost IS (budget/rank) and tightening match types.

Channel mapping quick rules

• Social: Mentions or engagement share. SOV=your mentionstotal mentions×100SOV=total mentionsyour mentions×100. Emphasise clean queries and deduplication to avoid noise.
• SEO: Visibility or estimated traffic share over a fixed keyword set. SOV=your estimated traffictotal estimated traffic×100SOV=total estimated trafficyour estimated traffic×100. Weight by intent where possible.
• PPC: Impression share proxy. SOV=your impressionseligible impressions×100SOV=eligible impressionsyour impressions×100. Segment by campaign and auction to target lift.

What is share of voice? These worked examples show how to calculate share of voice consistently, allowing apples‑to‑apples comparisons across the mix while keeping the share of voice calculation transparent and actionable.

How to measure share of voice by channel

Before breaking SOV down by channel, lock a single framework so results are comparable over time and across teams. Define one scope (time window, geography, language, competitor set) and one normalisation rule: compute each channel’s percentage using the same period and consistent metrics, then aggregate only after channel‑level quality checks. Use a simple base formula—SOV% = your brand metric ÷ total market metric × 100—and pair it with quality controls: sentiment coding, engagement or reach weighting, deduplication of cross‑posts and syndications, and removal of spam or off‑topic matches. Finally, align each channel to the business question it best answers: social for conversation and narrative traction, SEO for organic discoverability, PPC for paid presence in auctions, and media/PR for earned authority and reach. What is share of voice: This sequencing keeps the analysis actionable and avoids double counting, ensuring each lift in SOV can be tied back to specific content, campaigns, or outlets and turned into concrete decisions on where to invest next.

a) Social media SOV

To measure share of voice social media, quantify brand mentions, unique authors, engagement‑weighted mentions, and sentiment segmentation across priority networks within a fixed time window and competitor set. Standardise rules for inclusions (owned vs earned) and normalise by platform to reduce channel bias; this ensures consistency in how to measure share of voice across fragmented conversations. What is share of voice: Micro‑checklist for query design: include exact brand names, common misspellings, product lines, @handles, campaign hashtags, and exclude generic or ambiguous terms that create false positives. Pitfalls include overcounting spam/bots, missing forum/review data, and ignoring sentiment—mitigate by deduping sources, filtering low‑quality posts, and weighting by engagement depth (comments > shares > likes). Output the SOV% per network and an aggregate view, then track deltas pre/post campaign.

b) SEO SOV (organic search)

What is share of voice: Define a tracked keyword set aligned to commercial intent and UK locale, then compute visibility or estimated traffic share across domains to demonstrate how to measure share of voice in organic search. Example (20‑keyword basket): sum estimated clicks you earn from current rankings (e.g., 12,400) and divide by total estimated clicks for all competitors on the same basket (e.g., 62,000) for a SOV of 12,40062,000×100=20%62,00012,400×100=20%; this is a transparent share of voice calculation. Enhance fidelity by segmenting head vs long‑tail, weighting by search volume and SERP features (Top Stories, PAA), and avoiding rank‑only proxies. Watch for volatility from news spikes and seasonality; stabilise with rolling 4‑week averages.

c) PPC/Ads SOV

In paid, map SOV to impression share and reconcile gaps via Lost IS (budget/rank) and top‑of‑page/absolute top rates to understand how to calculate share of voice accurately. Calculate share of voice by campaign or theme using: SOV% ≈ Impression Share%; investigate Lost IS (budget) to diagnose under‑funding and Lost IS (rank) to surface bid/ad quality issues. SOV can diverge from IS when auctions differ from your defined market (e.g., broad match spillover); align by restricting to the target query set and segmenting brand vs generic. What is share of voice: Prioritise pockets with high absolute‑top rate at efficient CPA to lift perceived salience.

d) Media/Earned coverage SOV

For PR, measure mention volume by outlet tier (national, trade, regional), the share of positive coverage, and reach‑weighted SOV to capture impact, not just noise. Compute outlet‑weighted SOV by multiplying each mention by publication reach or tier weight, then divide by the market total—this frames how to measure share of voice in earned media with fewer bias artefacts. Common pitfalls: counting syndications as unique hits, ignoring sentiment, and mixing op‑eds with neutral listings; apply deduplication, tone coding, and consistent inclusion criteria to maintain comparability.

What is share of voice: Data quality and sentiment weighting

Plain-volume SOV can mask reality: a spike of low‑quality or negative mentions may inflate share without improving salience or demand. To improve the share of voice calculation, weight inputs by engagement depth, estimated reach, and sentiment, then normalise across channels to ensure like‑for‑like comparisons of how to measure share of voice. A simple approach assigns multipliers to each dimension and aggregates a single weighted score before computing SOV as a percentage of the market total.

Weighted formula

• Let wE = engagement weight (e.g., comment 3, share 2, like 1), wR = reach weight (e.g., tier‑1 outlet 3, tier‑2 2, tier‑3 1), wS = sentiment weight (positive 1.2, neutral 1.0, negative 0.6).
• For each mention i, compute Weighted_i = wE × wR × wS.
• Compute brand weighted total B = Σ Weighted_i; market weighted total M = Σ Weighted_all_brands.
• SOV_weighted% = (B ÷ M) × 100.

Numeric example

• Brand A: 400 mentions with average weights yielding B = 1,080.
• Competitors combined: M = 4,200.
• SOV_weighted% = 1,0804,200×100=25.7%4,2001,080×100=25.7%.
• Unweighted SOV from raw volume might be 4001,400×100=28.6%1,400400×100=28.6%, overstating true impact. This illustrates how to measure share of voice with quality controls, ensuring the share of voice calculation reflects meaningful visibility rather than noisy volume.

Benchmarks, ESOV, and tying SOV to outcomes

What is share of voice: Extra Share of Voice (ESOV) occurs when SOV exceeds Share of Market (SOM), signalling investment above current brand size that can translate into future growth; in practice, expect effects on mental availability within quarters, and market share over 6–24 months depending on category purchase cycles. To operationalise how to measure share of voice, set baselines per channel: weekly for social and PPC, monthly for SEO visibility, and monthly/quarterly for earned media, then track pre/post‑campaign deltas against control periods with identical scopes. What is share of voice: Calibrate expectations by channel: social SOV moves fastest but decays quickly, PPC responds with budget and rank changes, SEO compounds slowly with content and links, while PR shifts with story quality and outlet tiering. Build an ESOV view by subtracting SOM from SOV at the same granularity and time window, and tag campaigns so uplift can be attributed. Close the loop with outcome metrics—branded search, qualified leads, and revenue—so SOV gains are connected to commercial impact, keeping the approach disciplined and comparable.

Step-by-step workflow to build your SOV dashboard

1. Define scope and taxonomy

Fix time window, geography, languages, and channels, plus inclusion rules (owned vs earned) so the framework for how to measure share of voice stays consistent. Map entity taxonomy: brand, product lines, executives, and key topics to enable clean aggregation and a reliable share of voice calculation.

2. Select competitor set

Build a tiered list: direct competitors, substitutes, and category leaders. Freeze this list per quarter to keep deltas attributable and ensure your share of voice calculation remains comparable month to month.

3. Design queries and keyword baskets

Create channel‑specific queries: brand names, @handles, common misspellings, product names, and campaign tags; for SEO, define a UK‑localised keyword basket aligned to intent. Document includes/excludes to standardise how to measure share of voice across teams.

4. Establish data capture cadence

Social/PPC: daily ingestion; SEO and PR: weekly snapshots with monthly rollups. Lock reporting periods (e.g., ISO weeks) for clean period‑over‑period comparisons.

5. Deduplicate and normalise

Remove cross‑posted duplicates, spam, and syndications; normalise metrics to percentages by channel to enable apples‑to‑apples share of voice calculation across sources.

6. Sentiment and weighting

Apply sentiment coding and optional weights for engagement depth and outlet tier to reflect meaningful visibility, not raw volume—key to how to measure share of voice with quality signals.

7. Visualise and attribute

Build a dashboard with SOV by channel, competitor, topic, and sentiment; tag campaigns and content pillars to attribute movements and connect actions to outcomes.

8. Decision loops and governance

Set a monthly operating rhythm: week 1 snapshot, week 2 review with channel owners, week 3 actioning (content, bids, pitches), week 4 pre‑close check. Governance tip: maintain a change log of query edits and competitor updates so shifts in the share of voice calculation are transparent and auditable.

Optimisation ideas to grow SOV (quick wins + long plays)

Before diving into tactics, anchor every move to audience relevance and channel fit. Use your existing analytics to identify where conversations already cluster, then set clear hypotheses for uplift tied to specific formats, topics, and placements. Prioritise actions that raise visibility where buyers actually look—social feeds, key SERPs, priority auctions, and trusted media—so gains compound rather than scatter. Keep a light, continuous test‑and‑learn loop: ship small, measurable experiments each week, scale proven winners monthly, and retire underperformers quickly. Finally, maintain a single measurement spine: the same scope, baselines, and weighting rules across channels. What is share of voice: That discipline ensures you can attribute changes in SOV to concrete actions, compare returns across social, SEO, PPC, and PR, and reinvest with confidence.

Establish defensible social pillars and creator partnerships

What is share of voice: Build 3–4 recurring social themes tied to buyer jobs-to-be-done, then layer micro‑influencers for credibility and distribution; this consistently lifts engagement and improves share of voice social media while keeping content costs predictable. To keep focus on how to measure share of voice, track pillar‑level mention share and creator‑tagged contributions.

Launch conversation‑worthy formats, not just posts

Prioritise formats that trigger replies and shares—live Q&As, data‑led carousels, duets/stitches, and polls—so every asset is designed for interaction velocity. Measure per‑format SOV lift and conversation depth to stay disciplined on how to measure share of voice.

Build SEO topic clusters around commercial pains

Ship tightly interlinked hubs targeting UK intent, refresh quarterly, and capture snippets/People‑Also‑Ask to widen query coverage. Attribute organic visibility gains to clusters to prove impact on how to measure share of voice in search.

Use PR narratives with proof

Package proprietary data, customer stories, and expert commentary into repeatable PR angles for tier‑1/trade outlets. Weight coverage by outlet tier/reach so improvements reinforce a quality‑aware approach to how to measure share of voice.

Tune PPC for salient visibility, not just clicks

Concentrate budget on high‑intent generics and competitor terms with strong absolute‑top rates; clean negatives, align ad copy with narratives, and cap frequency in display. Report impression share and incremental reach to connect spend with how to measure share of voice.

Activate employee advocacy with guardrails

What is share of voice? Provide monthly content kits, compliance notes, and simple prompts so staff amplify launches and insights authentically. Track attributable mentions and referral traffic as a distinct stream within how to measure share of voice.

Orchestrate moments, not bursts

Align social, PR, SEO, and paid around quarterly themes (reports, events, product milestones) to compound exposure across channels. Monitor rolling 4‑week SOV and post‑event deltas to verify uplift in line with how to measure share of voice.

Prune noise, double down on winners

Retire low‑yield topics and placements; reinvest in formats, keywords, and outlets with the highest SOV per pound. Maintain a simple scorecard tying each bet to how to measure share of voice so optimisation remains objective.

What is share of voice: Mini FAQ

What is share of voice vs share of market?

Share of voice shows the proportion of category conversation or visibility your brand earns relative to competitors, while share of market reflects realised sales or revenue; in short, SOV is competitive exposure, SOM is commercial outcome. Understanding what is share of voice helps teams link brand salience to pipeline and plan media accordingly.

How often should I measure it?

Match cadence to channel speed and campaign intensity: weekly during launches for social and PPC, monthly for SEO and earned media, and quarterly for strategic reviews. This rhythm keeps trends credible and aligns with how to calculate share of voice without reacting to noise.

Can SOV be 100%?

Yes, but only in very niche or branded contexts (e.g., a unique product name or a closed community), not in broad categories; in open markets, healthy shares are distributed among multiple players. Treat any near‑total result as a cue to widen the query scope for a truer read of how to calculate share of voice.

Do small brands benefit?

Absolutely—SOV exposes where challengers can punch above their weight by concentrating on high‑intent topics, underserved communities, or specific outlets. It guides how to calculate share of voice efficiently, proving impact without enterprise‑level budgets.

How to calculate share of voice with limited data?

Start narrow and consistent: pick one channel, define a clear keyword or mention set, compute SOV% = your metric ÷ total market metric × 100, and expand gradually. What is share of voice: Document scope so each update reflects the same rules, ensuring comparability as you learn how to calculate share of voice over time.

SOV as an operating cadence: from raw volume to quality‑weighted impact

Consistent, comparable tracking turns SOV from a vanity metric into an operating system for growth. The shift is from raw counts to quality‑weighted visibility—using clear rules for scope, rigorous normalisation, and sentiment and reach weights to refine the share of voice calculation. If you’re deciding how to measure share of voice next month, start with a fixed competitor set and time window, compute channel SOV using consistent metrics, then add engagement and outlet tier weights as your data matures. Implement the workflow now: lock definitions, automate collection, build a simple dashboard, and hold a monthly review to turn movements into actions across social, search, paid, and PR. What is share of voice: Done this way, SOV becomes a leading indicator you can plan against—linking narrative wins to pipeline and revenue with disciplined measurement.