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A social listening report helps you analyze conversations happening around your brand, industry, or specific keywords across social media. With this report, you can measure the overall results of your listeners, your potential impressions, as well as the sentiments of the engagements you have gained.
How to run a listener performance report
- You can immediately see the overall performance of your listeners when you go to the Listening section.
- To run an instant report from the Reports section, go to Reports → Listener performance.
- Select the listener you'd like to run a report for from the dropdown → Run report.
- At the top right, you can select a custom template you’ve created for this report type, adjust the date range, refresh the report data, or export the report using different options. Learn more here.
Metrics provided in the listener performance report
Summary metrics
These appear at the top of the report as stat cards:
- Total messages - total number of messages captured within the selected listening stream and date range
- Reviews - number of review-type messages detected
- Comments - comments associated with the stream
- DMs - direct messages tracked under the stream
- Mentions - number of times your tracked keywords were mentioned
- Unique authors - how many distinct users contributed mentions
- Peak day - the single day with the highest mention activity, including a signal count
Each metric also shows a percentage change compared to the previous period.
Mention quality
Located on the right side of the summary section, this panel breaks down the reach and tone of mentions:
- Possible impressions - estimated reach of all mentions combined
- Unique authors - unique voices contributing to the conversation
- Positive sentiment - percentage of mentions with a positive tone
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Note Impressions are only available for X, YouTube, and Reddit. |
AI summary
Below the summary stats, Vista Social surfaces an AI-generated insight based on your data. This includes:
- A summary of what the data shows (e.g. low engagement across platforms, dominant source networks)
- Bullet-point highlights with key numbers
- Suggested actions - clickable next steps based on the insight (e.g. "Reassess keyword strategy", "Explore new platforms for outreach")
The insight is generated automatically and updates when you refresh the report.
Activity pulse
A bar chart showing daily mention activity over the selected period. It tracks three signals:
- Mentions - keyword mentions per day
- Trend matches - days where content aligned with trending topics
- News - news coverage hits
Use this chart to identify spikes and correlate them with real-world events or campaign activity.
Sentiment trajectory
A stacked area chart that shows how conversation tone shifted day by day. Sentiment categories:
- Positive - favorable mentions
- Neutral - factual or non-expressive mentions
- Mixed - mentions with both positive and negative signals
- Negative - unfavorable mentions
This helps you spot sentiment shifts tied to specific dates or announcements.
Top authors
A ranked list of the most active voices in your listening stream. Each entry shows:
- Author name and platform (e.g. Instagram)
- Last seen date
- Message count (MSGS) with a sentiment bar indicator
Use this to identify your most engaged community members, advocates, or critics.
Source mix over time
A stacked area chart showing the share of mentions per network, normalized to 100% per day. Networks currently tracked include Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, Bluesky, and X (Twitter).
This view helps you understand where the conversation is happening and whether your keyword reach is concentrated on one platform or distributed across several.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What are Listener Impressions in Vista Social?
A: They’re based on the follower count of the author of posts that contained your listening keyword(s). This shows how many times audiences could have seen those messages. (Available for X, YouTube, and Reddit.)
Need further help?
If you have any questions or need additional help, feel free to contact our awesome support team. We are here to assist you! 💙
Related Reading:
Creating custom analytics reports
How to run or schedule reports
Social Media Performance Report
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