Do I need share of voice tracking, or is sentiment tracking enough for what I'm trying to do?

It depends on your goal — but in most cases, sentiment tracking alone is not enough.

Use sentiment tracking if you want to know:

• Whether people are speaking about you positively or negatively
• How reactions change after launches, incidents, campaigns, or product updates
• Whether issues are improving over time

This tells you how people feel.

Use share of voice (SOV) tracking if you want to know:

• How visible you are compared with competitors
• Whether your brand is gaining or losing attention in the market
• If your campaigns are increasing your relative presence in conversation
• Whether category conversations are being dominated by someone else

This tells you how much attention you’re getting.

Why sentiment alone can be misleading

A brand can have:

• Very positive sentiment but very low visibility → people like you, but few people are talking about you
• Negative sentiment but high visibility → lots of conversation, but much of it is criticism

So sentiment answers “What are people saying about us?” Share of voice answers “How much are they saying about us vs. others?”

Simple rule of thumb

• If your main question is brand health / reputation → sentiment may be enough
• If your main question is competitive position / awareness / market share of conversation → you probably need SOV too
• If you’re doing anything strategic or reporting to leadership, both together are usually strongest

If you want, I can help you decide based on your exact use case — e.g. PR, social listening, brand tracking, campaign measurement, or competitive analysis.