June 2007 Archives

News from the companies of social media analysis.

Companies and services

• 28 June - London-based Reputica launched ReputicaRating, a social media analysis service with an emphasis on defensive monitoring and reputation management.

• 22 June - The Nielsen Company completed its acquisition of NetRatings, moving a step closer to the announced combination of NetRatings and BuzzMetrics in a new Nielsen service unit.

• Digital Influence Group chairman Larry Weber has a new book: Marketing to the Social Web: How Digital Customer Communities Build Your Business (aff). You can read an excerpt from the first chapter on the book site and early reactions on the DIG blog.

• "The Talk About Phones," CIC. An overview of community and content around mobile phones on Chinese BBS. The charts that go with this brief paper are the real find. Nokia, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, Samsung and Dopod should look over this free sample that focuses on their market.

• Chinese blog search engine Blogool released its first report on blogs and consumer WOM (via Luyi Chen). This report focuses on domestic brands in China, or so I'm told (you'll need to read Chinese to get anything from the report).

I subscribe to a lot of RSS feeds. Too many, really, so there's a constant tension between the desire to read everything and the reality of finite time. Still, feeds offer a big efficiency gain over other methods of tracking events. So last week I spent some time looking for PR feeds on company web sites (not blogs), with mixed results. A lot of companies still need to work on putting the RSS in their PR.

To keep things in perspective, note that all of the companies I checked are in social media businesses. We're not talking about companies who haven't heard of RSS. This is what I found:

• Working feed
  You're in the game. Thank you.

• No feed at all
  Feeds make it so much easier to follow your news. You want people to see your releases, don't you? Oh, well, at least there's Page2RSS.

• Feed with no content
  The RSS icon is a head fake. Nobody's home.

• Live feed that doesn't match web page
  Click, subscribe, and—wait, something's wrong here. If your feed is obsolete, subscribers won't find out unless they go back to your site, which defeats the purpose of subscribing to the feed. New subscribers may not notice the disconnect as they subscribe.
  

Easy steps for RSS hygiene

1. If you have a web page with company news or press releases, give it an RSS feed. If you want to get fancy, set up separate feeds for press releases, press coverage and white papers. Yes, this requires some technical work behind the scenes—it's worth it.

2. Use FeedBurner for its insights into feed subscribers. Remember to configure the autodiscovery code to point to the FeedBurner version of your feed.

3. Subscribe to your own feed. Check to confirm that the content of the feed matches the page. Notice if items in your feed keep showing up as unread, so you can fix things.

4. If your feed moves, try to make the old address continue to work (easy with FeedBurner). Otherwise, post an address change message for subscribers to the old feed. The address change should always be the newest item on an obsolete feed.
   

I was listening to the presentation at this month's TIMA meeting—interesting stuff from this Internet company, Google—and I was struck by the labels we attach to the people we interact with. I kept hearing users, which has a very IT sound to it, and it took me back to my own IT days. But it got me thinking: what are the words we use to label the people we encounter in business, and how would it change our actions if we were to substitute person for, say, customer every once in a while?

So instead of doodling, I started a list of labels organizations use for outsiders with whom they have contact.

I realize that labels are useful, and these reflect the roles we play when we interact with various organizations. But does the use of labels like these in our business discussions tell us more about those people—or ourselves?

Today must be the day to think about online product reviews. With all the buzz about blog monitoring, it's important to remember other ways people share their opinions online. Monitoring product reviews is harder to automate than monitoring blogs, but their relevance is all but guaranteed.

Riva Richmond's article in today's Wall Street Journal points out the importance of online reviews to small business: Look Who's Talking. The key lesson here is that you don't have to have a high-profile brand to be reviewed online. Customers are reviewing local service businesses, too. The article includes practical advice on dealing with negative reviews (starting with fixing the problem).

Meanwhile, Greg Howlett relays key points from JC Whitney's Geoffrey Robertson in four things you should know about collecting user reviews:

1. User reviews have a huge impact on sales.
   
2. Companies need to aggressively solicit reviews.
   
3. User reviews do not necessarily improve customer loyalty.
   
4. User reviews do not necessarily drive more organic search traffic.
   

I wrote about an unhappy example of what you can learn from product reviews last October. Hasbro discovered a serious product problem by monitoring reviews on Amazon. At the time, the social media analysis vendors I was talking to generally didn't track product reviews. I still don't know of any tools to automate the process for do-it-yourself monitoring (aside from web-to-RSS services), but a number of companies in the Guide will monitor them for you.

Tags: social media analysis brand monitoring reputation product reviews

News of social media analysis.

New companies & services

• BlogMeter launched June 13th at Web 2.Oltre. A partnership of Me-Source, CELI and Convey, BlogMeter is a software platform specialized for monitoring and analyzing Italian social media (it also handles French and English). Emanuele Quintarelli interviewed Me-Source cofounder Sacha Monotti for Apogeonline.

• Critical Mention announced the beta release of a CGM monitoring module for their CriticalTV platform.

• "An analysis of aggressive online behavior targeted against corporations, their products, services, and brand," TNS MI/Cymfony. Results of sponsored research conducted by Urs Gasser and John Palfrey of Harvard Law School. The paper describes three types of online behavior, provides examples and recommends strategies for online engagement.

• "Influencing Technology Decision Makers," Hill & Knowlton (via Melanie Surplice). "The power of the blog" is one of three trends identified.

• "Responding to crisis using social media," Market Sentinel (PDF). Follow-up look at Dell's experience with blogs and how the online conversation has changed.

Doing something interesting? Tell me about it!

Tags: social media analysis brand monitoring

Here's a question that goes straight to the point: How do you decide when to spring for social media measurement?

Scott Bauman poses the question on his blog:

It's still so damn expensive and is especially prohibitive for smaller companies who could benefit, but can't yet spring for formal measurement. So my question is when does it make sense to start? What "value" does a client expect before the investment is worth it?

For small companies with relatively low exposure (mine, for example), vanity feeds from free search tools are adequate. I deal with the redundant items and noise, because the overall volume is low. I don't worry about metrics, either. At the low volume, all I really want is to read everything that mentions or links to me. An agency can provide this service with off-the-shelf software and entry-level staff.

At the high end—major consumer brands—the volume is overwhelming. Metrics become interesting because (a) there's enough volume to generate interesting data, and (b) it's the only way to digest potentially thousands of daily mentions. You're a long way from free services in this category.

Somewhere in the middle, there's a decision to make. To complicate matters, there's a wide range of services, with a rough, inverse correlation between cost and the amount of effort required of the client/agency. Let's meet over at Scott's post for that discussion.

Tags: social media analysis pr

You say you want all the information overload without loading up on individual subscriptions? There's a trend to build aggregator sites from the feeds of individual blogs, especially in the social media/web 2.0 headspace. I usually prefer to subscribe to the individual blogs, but the aggregators can be useful for finding the individual bloggers who write on a topic.

Here are a few I know of. Even this short list generates a lot to read, until you get practiced at skimming titles.

1. Enterprise Irregulars
   
2. Media 2.0 Workgroup
   
3. Planet Social Media Research
   
4. Planet Web 2.0
   
5. Social Media Today
   

Tags: social media blogging

This reminds me of a background display in the villain's office in a James Bond movie. A real-time view of blog posts on a spinning globe visualization. All that's missing is the holographic display that projects the globe above the coffee table.

This is a visualization of blog traffic from the Swedish social media analysis firm Primelabs, based on data from their Twingly blog search engine (via visualcomplexity). The real application for Twingly is discovering blog links for newspaper clients, but the visualization is fun (see the demo video).

As for the villain's lair—fire up Twingly, put a Digg visualization on another screen, add a real-time weather map, FlightAware and a few competing news channels (preferably international), and you've got Global Command Center 2.0.

Except Twingly doesn't run on my Mac. I guess world domination will have to wait.

Tags: social media analysis blog visualization Primelabs

Along with her kind comments about my work, Havi Hoffman wondered if half the money is wasted in social media/word of mouth metrics, too.

What if we really need to throw out half our metrics, half our assumptions? Which half would you pitch?

At least audience metrics are generally defined. In the social media/WOM measurement discussion, the definitions of some important terms aren't quite settled (quick, what's influence, precisely?). So, for now, we have qualitative measures and intuitive definitions that may vary across vendors. It doesn't mean they're not useful, but they're not yet standard.

Alan Wilensky's post raises some thought-provoking questions on the usefulness of social media metrics (read the related posts while you're there and at BlogWhine). Be sure to see Matt Hurst's response, including the comments.

Evaluating the current state of this young industry and its practices is an interesting topic, but for client decisions, three steps really matter:

1. Understand what you're trying to accomplish. What information do you want to collect, and what do you want to do with it?

2. Look at the existing companies and what they actually offer—services, analysis, deliverables and applications. That's what the Guide to Social Media Analysis is all about.

3. Look for potential matches between available services and your objectives. Those are the companies to ask for more information.
   

Tags: social media analysis brandmonitoring blogmonitoring

Today marked the first feedback on the Guide to Social Media Analysis. Havi Hoffman made my day with her summary— "immersed" is such a nice way to say that she's reading it. We haven't even met, but I think I have a new best friend.

Here's a little information overload for you. Links to blogs associated with social media analysis companies. Most are linked to companies in the the Guide to Social Media Analysis. Some are more work-oriented than others, but there are some good sources in here.

(This is not a ranked list—it's alphabetical by blog title. The entries are numbered for convenience.)

1. 1000heads, Staff, 1000heads
2. Andiamo Word of Mouth Marketing, John Hingley, Andiamo Systems
3. Applied Disruption, Jeffrey Stewart, Monitor110
4. Attentio, Simon McDermott, Attentio
5. Beyond Dante, Tim Wolters, Collective Intellect
6. BlogPulse Newswire, Sue MacDonald, Nielsen BuzzMetrics
7. Blogs et IE, Tarik Mousselmal, Scanblog (French)
8. Buzzcentric, Severin Wilson, Buzzcentric
9. BuzzLogic, Todd Parsons, BuzzLogic
10. CGM, Pete Blackshaw, Nielsen BuzzMetrics
11. China IWOM Blog, Sam Flemming, CIC
12. Collective Intellect, Staff, Collective Intellect
13. Converseon, Staff, Converseon
14. Customer Listening, Laurent Florès, CRMMetrix
15. CustomScoop, Staff, CustomScoop
16. Data Mining, Matthew Hurst, Microsoft Live Labs
17. Data World, Paul Alexander, Wigborough
18. DK the Business Guru, Darren Kelly, Collective Intellect
19. Converseon, Staff, Converseon
20. DIGtrends, Staff, Digital Influence Group
21. Distilled, Will Critchlow and Duncan Morris, Distilled
22. dna13, Staff, dna13
23. The Dooley Complex, Kevin Dooley, Crawdad Technologies
24. EmPower Research, Staff, EmPower Research
25. ethority, Sten Franke, ethority
26. filtrbox, Ari Newman, filtrbox
27. GottaQuirk, Staff, Quirk eMarketing
28. A Human Voice, Tom O’Brien, MotiveQuest
29. Implementing Web 2.0 in the Enterprise, Adam Steinberg, Techrigy
30. Influence 2.0, Staff, Cymfony
31. Information Arbitrage, Roger Ehrenberg, Monitor110
32. LexaBlog, Staff, Lexalytics
33. Market Sentinel, Mark Rogers, Market Sentinel
34. MarketIQ, Staff, Biz360
35. MediaMeter, Staff, BlogMeter
36. Media Philosopher, Marcel LeBrun, Radian6
37. Mouthpiece, Jonathan Carson, Nielsen BuzzMetrics
38. Musical Entrepreneur, Rob Crumpler, BuzzLogic
39. New Media Strategies, Staff, New Media Strategies
40. Observatoire Présidentielle 2007, Guilhem Fouetillou, RTGI (French)
41. On Innovation, Michael Osofsky, Accelovation
42. Onalytica, Flemming Madsen, Onalytica
43. Ondernemer in Gent, Bart De Waele, MetaTale
44. Own Your Buzz, Al del Castillo, NetEquity
45. Pardon the Disruption, Chip Griffin, CustomScoop
46. The Power of News, Matthias Hoffmann, Dow Jones & Company (German)
47. Power Shift, Staff, Radian6
48. PR Measurement Blog, Katie Paine, KDPaine & Partners
49. PR meets the WWW Constantin Basturea, Converseon
50. Primelabs (also Swedish blog)
51. Read Between the Mines, Glenn Fannick, Dow Jones & Company
52. RelevantNoise, Staff, RelevantNoise
53. RepuMetrix, Joseph Fiore, RepuMetrix
54. Reputation World, Andrew Jordan, Reputica
55. RepuTrack, Joseph Fiore, CoreX Technologies
56. Scanblog (French)
57. Scout Labs, Staff, Scout Labs
58. see i see, Staff, CIC (Chinese)
59. SentimentMetrics, Staff, SentimentMetrics
60. A Surplice of Spin, Melanie Surplice, Dow Jones & Company
61. Turning News Into Knowledge, Brett Serjeantson, MediaMiser
62. tweetpr, David Alston, Radian6
63. unstruc..., Daniela Barbosa, Dow Jones & Company
64. Veille2Com, Cyrille Chaudoit, Scanblog (French)
65. VICO Research, Staff, VICO Research
66. VisInsights, Staff, Visible Technologies
67. Young PR, Paull Young, Converseon

Tags: social media analysis brandmonitoring blogmonitoring

I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.
—Mark Twain

I imagined a marketing executive, interested in the value of following the online conversation, assigning a staff member to investigate the available services. The Guide is the finished report that staffer could deliver—if the company wanted to spend 5 months of staff time to collect the information.

The core of the Guide is the company profiles, which collect information beyond what's available on vendor web sites in a convenient package. It's meant to accelerate the initial information gathering steps for a company looking for a vendor.

Each profile includes:

• A brief statement of the company's business and 4–5 highlights for quick scanning.
  
• An overview of the company's services, including a discussion of what analysis they provide and how they do it.
  
• A checklist of which of the typical services the vendor offers (also summarized across all vendors in the overview section).
  
• A closer look at the deliverables and, when provided, pricing.
  
• Investor information: identifies ownership and announced investments in the company.
  
• Player stats: company size, when it was founded, how long they've offered social media analysis, percentage of revenue from social media analysis, geographical scope, language capabilities and company bloggers.
  
• Contact information, including office locations and direct contact for potential clients.
  

Tags: social media analysis brandmonitoring blogmonitoring social media marketing pr

It's ready. After 5 months and I really don't want to know how many hours, the Guide to Social Media Analysis is complete. This is my guide to the companies who monitor, measure and analyze social media for business worldwide. It's the most complete reference available, and it's available for download today. Finally!

The Guide to Social Media Analysis is geared toward answering three questions:

1. Who offers social media analysis services?
   
2. What do they really offer?
   
3. What makes one vendor different from the others?

What's in it:

• Profiles of 31 vendors based in 9 countries. Each profile includes a description of the vendor's services, investor information, company stats and full contact details.

• An overview of industry services and trends.

• A table summarizing which services each vendor offers.

• A matrix of vendors' language capabilities across 37 languages.

• Over 30 sample graphics and screenshots.

Update: I posted more details on what's in the profiles. A sample profile is available on the product page.

18 August 2008: The Guide to Social Media Analysis, Second Edition is now available. The new edition includes 63 vendor profiles, observations on trends since last year, and a new table summarizing vendor coverage of different types of social media.

Tags: social media analysis brandmonitoring blogmonitoring social media marketing pr

Does your organization have more time (and technical chops) than money? The World Bank today launched The BuzzMonitor, an open-source social media aggregator that provides a platform for monitoring and participating in social media in multi-user environments (via Pierre-Guillaume Wielezynski). The catch is, you have to install and run it yourself.

The Buzzmonitor promises some handy features:

• Elimination of duplicate items from multiple search feeds.
  
• Automated keyword extraction & tag cloud generation.
  
• Embedded Alexa and Technorati rank information.
  
• Digg-style voting within your user base.
  
• User tagging and bookmarking.
  
• Internal commenting (visible only to other users on your system).
  
• Internal tag and search feeds.
  

The Buzzmonitor's sponsors at the World Bank suggest the program for "non-profit organizations, NGOs, foundations and think-tanks to see and hear what people are saying about them, their programs and understand the perception around important issues." Its GNU General Public License makes it free for anyone who wants to try it.

Now, here's the catch. The platform requirements put The Buzzmonitor out of reach for marketing managers who want something quick and easy. You'll need a server (preferably Linux) and someone to configure it, so this is a do-it-yourself job only for the technically skilled. More likely, this is something for your IT department to experiment with before you roll it out to users.

If all you want to do is see how it works, take the tour, which offers limited access to a live demo. I'd post a screenshot here, but if you really care, you'll go through the demo, anyway.

Related:

• BuzzMonitor Refreshed as Tattler (app) (July 2009)
  
• Tattler (app) Entering Private Beta (August 2009)