Social Media Analytics

Social media analytics refers to the gathering of data from social media pages and websites, and transferring this data into usable information in order to make business decisions. The primary use of these social media analytics is for marketing purposes and to improve customer service.  Companies can use software tools to analyze potential consumers, or the success of their own social media pages, for instance, a company can measure how many followers, retweets, and mentions their company twitter account receives in order to gauge customer engagement.

A type of software that is commonly used to analyze social media data is one that students of Temple’s Data Analytics class are quite familiar with, SAS. The intelligence produced through a SAS analysis can address issues such market tacking, reputation and threat tracking, and customer feedback. A company can use this information to avert escalating issues, reduce criticisms, and classify market feedback over many dimensions. SAS allows you to filter out “noise” in order to focus on the customer segments that are of interest for a specific company.  SAS’s website claims that a company using their social media analytics tools are able to, “go beyond understanding the frequency of words or phrases used by applying text analytics to get the most accurate indication of how people feel about products and services across multiple channels. (SAS Website)” Clearly, the messages transmitted over social media can be turned into valuable informational assets for companies to utilize and integrate with their enterprise data.

WassOnline, and online gambling website, successfully used social media analytics to break into the online gaming community. To compete with huge public companies such as Ladbrokers and Partygaming, WassOnline needed to demonstrate to potential customers that they plan on being a serious participant in the gaming industry. Using software to analyze the industry, and claimed that, “From [Their] analytical testing [they] knew how to remove every hurdle which could prevent the customer doing what [WassOnline] wanted them to do. [WassOnline] needed them to glance at the website and see that it is easy to register and complete the form – [They] simplified the sign up page to just 4 fields, which could be completed within just 30 seconds.”  In taking these steps to analyze the social media landscapes of the industry and adjusting accordingly, WassOnline was able to increase poker forum signups by over 450% within the first 30 days of their new signup process, and continued to attract new customers at this rate. This increase in clientele has led to advertising deals between several large companies, and boosted the immediate overall health of WassOnline.

“SAS® Social Media Analytics.” SAS Social Media Analytics. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 May 2014.

“Wass Poker Going Down.” Poker Forums RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 May 2014.