CHAPTER 9:SOCIAL MEDIA FOR CONSUMER INSIGHTS

Learning Objectives

What types of data are used in social media research?

What are the qualitative approaches to social media research?

How can we apply quantitative methods to social media research?

What are the common errors and biases associated with social media research?

What aspects of business can benefit from social media listening?

What can researchers monitor in

social media spaces?

Qualitative Research

Observational Observing and recording behavior or

residual evidence of behavior Especially useful for social listening

Ethnographic (Netnographic) Using ethnographic study of

communities to online environments Especially useful for deep understanding

of a specific community or target audience

Social Media Listening Tools

Social mention Same point Whos talkin Blog pulse Google alerts Google trends Howsociable

Category distribution of offline and online WOM for most talked about brands

For Discussion

Is it ethical to mine social conversations?

Steps in Netnography

Identify online communities Select those with high traffic, high

levels of activity Learn about the group’s culture Select material for analysis Classify material Keep a journal of reflections about the

data collection Use member checks to assess

accuracy of interpretation

Quantitative SM Research

Monitoring and Tracking Sentiment Analysis Content Analysis

Monitoring and Tracking

Listening with a systematic approach Answers these questions:

How many times was search term found?

When was search term found? Where was search term found? Who mentioned the search term?

Systematic approach means to specify the research design in terms of questions, type of data needed, sampling plan, and so on

Sentiment Analysis - Steps

Fetch, crawl, cleanse Extract relevant data points Extract sentiment using sentiment

indicators Aggregate the data into a summary

Problems

Volume of conversation Cultural factors in the meaning of

language Multiple meanings – e.g., BP Accuracy in the categorical data

Content Analysis

Deep insight into the text (or other content)

Pieces of information are classified and analyzed for themes

Content Analysis Codes

Context codes Respondent perspective codes Process codes Relationship codes Event codes Activity codes

Case Study – Dove Pro Age http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vil

UhBhNnQc&feature=related

Visualizing the Themes

Caution! Errors and Biases

Coverage error Sampling error

Echo effect Participation effect (including social

media zombies) Nonresponse bias

Let’s Try It

Identify one or more videos on YouTube mentioning a single brand

Read the accompanying comments How do you approach analyzing the

comments? What insights can you glean? How confident are you in your

results? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky

c3Icum4Dc

Sample of Social Media Monitoring Providers Radian 6

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8i6Exg3Urg0&list=PLC252F7845BE744AE&index=7

NetBase http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErCyFmvzpFc

ScoutLabs Sysomos Harris Interactive

Example of Primary Research

Language of Love in Social Media by Firefly MB http

://www.fireflymb.com/libraries/social_media_study/2010_socialmediastudy_summaryreport.sflb.ashx

Recap Discussion

Reminder: Visit www.zonesofsmm.com to read daily news and search for examples related to each chapter.