Social Intelligence Stories that Caught Our Attention: Volume Thirty-Two

In the stories that caught our attention this week, we’ve got politics from Brandwatch, Thinknum with the DocuSign declining social media, and a whole lot of questions about developing consumer insights.

Brandwatch Blends Data Sources to Predict the Election Results

On the 11^th of December, Brandwatch published their research around the UKs general election (a day ahead of the polls). There was a prediction on the results from a Qriously poll, deeper insights into opinions and a lot of social data.  Their result? The Conservatives were going to come out on top.

Read the full article and insights here.

Thinknum Sees DocuSign Social Decrease and Questions Future Success

I usually quite like reading the short analysis pieces from Thinknum. I think I know why too, it’s all about the “share price”, but this piece on DocuSign misses the mark a little. Employee numbers and share price is up but Twitter followers are down, and Facebook engagement hits a plateau – there’s a number of reasons why this could have happened. What to do you think?

Read the full article here.

Clear as Mud – Where Does Our Social Data Go?

Tara Beard-Knowland and Sophie Wilson from Ipsos explore the “value exchange” from visiting and engaging in online spaces and the data from these exchanges being sold. We all work in this environment; we analyze the data being generated through this exchange? But, what does the public think about this?

Read the full article here.

Moving Fast Works for Engineering, Not Understanding People

Across on LinkedIn Pulse, Indi Young an independent qualitative data scientist argues that “move fast” and agile environments work for engineering not understanding people. What're your initial thoughts? I have to agree when we consider a deep understanding of people. This doesn’t run in quick product cycles when brands invest in “the least effort for the greatest clarity” – you don’t get deep insights this way and the insights are always focused on the project objectives rather than getting a deep understanding of customers.

Read the full article here.

Step Aside Market Researcher, Make way for Insights

Across on LinkedIn Pulse, Bala Rajan, research and consulting at Vision Critical says it’s time to step aside with “market researcher” and make way for the insights professional. How do you describe yourself and the work you do with social data? Do you see yourself as a market researcher or something else? The growth of social data analysis has led to a new group of professionals who mine for “customer insights” but have no formal background in market research. There’s a tension there for some, they are not market researchers, they are something else. Take a read at this article for a broad view of the topic.

Read the full article here.

Which Qualitative Techniques are in Decline and which will Evolve and Shine?

Research World reports on the results of the latest ESOMAR Global Report… If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a hundred times, social data is qualitative data but on a quantitative scale which is why this article caught my attention.  It seems that qualitative research is on the rise in the digital era with a slight decline in quantitative. This is good news and shows the need to “humanize” the data and find out the "why". I feel that quantitative data can dehumanize the behaviors you're trying to study… Good news all round.

Read the full article here.

The Power of the Crowds Versus the Individual

Across on LinkedIn Pulse, Dr Chris Arnold explores the need to move from the “individual” to the “crowd”. Interestingly, this focus fits in really well with our ability to analyze social data and look for discreet segments to understand smaller crowds instead of focusing on individuals. A nice article looking at the history and psychology of “group mind”.

Read the full article here.

Boosting the Impact of Consumer Research in the World

In social intelligence and even in consumer insights in general, we can feel like our work isn’t always integrated properly to have the impact we thought it would. It seems like this is a universal issue. So, researchers from the University of Southern California, Columbia, London Business School, George Washington University, University of Colorado-Boulder, and the University of California Irvine published a new paper that examines the narrow impact of consumer research and they suggest a way to change the situation.

Read the full article here.

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