How to Calculate Share of Voice (SOV): A Step-by-Step Guide
Insight Curator:
DeepDive Team
Read time:
4
min
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September 10, 2025
Syed Mohammad Sharfuzzaman Nayeem
Measuring share of voice is essential for marketers aiming to understand how visible their brand is compared to competitors. In simple terms, Share of Voice (SOV) measures the proportion of attention, mentions, or impressions your brand receives across various channels.
For instance, how many people interact with your Instagram or blog posts?
A higher SOV typically means stronger brand recognition, better visibility, and potentially more market share. Because when people notice you more, the chances of them buying from you increase.
When you know how to measure share of voice, you can track your performance over time, identify competitive gaps, and optimize your marketing strategy for growth.
Before diving into the methods, you need to understand the share of voice formula:
SOV (%) = (Your Brand’s Metric ÷ Total Market Metric) × 100
It’s basic math.
Example: If your brand has 2,000 mentions out of 10,000 total industry mentions, your SOV is (2,000 ÷ 10,000) × 100 = 20%.
Whether you’re working with SEO, paid ads, or PR, the process of calculating share of voice generally follows these steps:
SEO share of voice measures your visibility in organic search results.
Metrics to track:
How to calculate share of voice for SEO:
For example, if your website gains 10,000 organic visits for a keyword, and competitors collectively gain 100,000, your SOV = (10,000 ÷ 100,000) × 100 = 10%.
Tools: SEMrush, Ahrefs, Moz, Google Search Console.
For paid campaigns, SOV is often referred to as impression share.
Metrics to track:
Calculating share of voice for PPC:
Google Ads also provides competitive metrics like impression share and lost impression opportunities.
This tracks how much conversation revolves around your brand compared to competitors.
Metrics to track:
How to measure share of voice on social media:
Social listening is a complete game-changer for brands. Tools like Hootsuite, Sprout Social, and Brandwatch provide sentiment analysis for deeper insights.
This focuses on unpaid mentions across news outlets, blogs, and industry publications.
Metrics to track:
SOV calculation:
PR SOV = (Your Mentions ÷ Total Industry Mentions) × 100.
Tools: Cision, Meltwater, Brandwatch.
Measures how your blogs, videos, or podcasts perform compared to competitors’ content.
Metrics to track:
Formula: Content SOV = (Your Content Metrics ÷ Total Industry Content Metrics) × 100.
Knowing how to calculate share of voice is only half the battle. Continuous measuring share of voice enables brands to:
Tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, Google Ads, and social listening platforms simplify this process with automated SOV calculation and competitor benchmarking.
Understanding and calculating share of voice equips brands with actionable insights to outpace competitors and build stronger market positioning. Whether you focus on SEO share of voice, paid advertising, or media coverage, the principle remains the same: measure, analyze, and optimize.
By mastering how to measure share of voice, marketers can turn visibility into long-term growth and create data-driven campaigns that resonate.
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