Social media monitoring is observational research based on analyzing conversations in social media, for example, Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and product review sites. The monitoring provides marketing researchers with a rich source of existing, authentic information from the ‘‘river of news’’29 that is being organically shared in social networks online. Blogs, social networking sites, and online communities provide a natural outlet for consumers to share experiences about products, brands, and organizations. The difference between social media monitoring and the MROC (covered previously) is that in social media research, the data (text, images, and video) already exist and were not created by interaction with researchers. Thus, one strength of social media monitoring is that researchers can observe people interacting with each other unprompted by the potential bias of interviewers and questions. Another advantage of social media monitoring is individuals who may not fill out surveys or agree to focus groups might nevertheless share their experiences with online social networks.