I’m increasingly disturbed by the accuracy of Topic Bearing Word of Mouth (WOM) algorithms. A previous study, published in this space, expressed dissatisfaction with standard sentiment analysis. My mind has since turned to the difficulty in expressing massive amounts of WOM into simple metrics that are actionable and decomposable. So let’s just go beyond the realm of evidence based pre-optimization of marketing messages, and set the entire area of sentiment-bearing word polarity aside for awhile. It’s relevant and important. Just not the focus tonight. Let’s turn to topic bearing WOM. Imagine you could listen to the world, and assume that Burke’s reality is now…a reality. If you haven’t seen the video from my ‘about’ section – here it is again.[…]
Category: Social Analytics
Social media data. Huge amount of volume. Huge amount of complexity and simplicity in structure. Time for a radical metaphor. It’s like the night sky. With the naked eye, you can see thousands individual dots of light. And, humans being human, if you look long and hard enough, you’ll see patterns and start associating events with those patterns. See below. I offer some evidence to back up that claim. Of course, those relationships are one possible interpretation. (And fine. I accept where they’re coming from). If I used something significantly more powerful, like the Hubble, and trained it at a fairly dark part of the sky – (and they did) – you’d see this: Right there – next to the[…]
The Quest for Simplicity in Social Media Measurement (#smm) is one that will dominate the year. Trying to produce something simple out of something complex is…complex. There are seven axioms that are guiding a lot of my thought in dealing with that complexity: 1. The purpose of analytics is to derive competitive advantage for the organization / firm / entity. It follows that the purpose of Social Media Measurement is to drive competitive advantage. If the end result isn’t competitive advantage – then it has no value. That unto itself is a value statement. Simplicity drives competitive advantage because simple is more actionable than complex. I’m often asked questions that have very complex comprehensive answers. I have to sort out[…]
Jim Novo wrote in response to the last post: This is an interesting line of thought Christopher, perhaps I can help with a bit of a framework. And you’re right, product is the root of Marketing decision making. I hope my attmept at a chart below makes it through the CMS without breaking… Brand for any product is a continuum between Product-centric and Image-centric, example: ……….Product Centric………..Image Centric Beer…….Sam Adams………………Budweiser Image-Centric Brands tend to have commodity status, which begs the need to differentiate by creating some kind of unique Image. Product-Centric Brands differentiate on hard Features and Benefits. If you think about the Marketing for Sam Adams, it’s all about ingredients and customization. If you think about the Marketing for[…]
I’ve been fairly obsessed as of late with quantifying Social Media Return on Investment, or sROI for short. At the root of the issue is a clash of belief systems. Marketing thought is dominated by two rather large models of thinking. You have the Direct Paradigm and you have the Brand Paradigm. By Paradigm, I mean simply a way of looking at the world. Let me take one step back, and then one step forward. People, in general, can only hold so many variables in their heads at the same time. So, we abstract. We’re supposed to derive some forms of causality that are important, throw that into some overarching architecture, and then use that framework to make decisions in[…]
The cleanest way I could explain the Butterfly Effect was to say: “Let’s say my shoe is loose. So I decide to bend down and tie it really tighter, inadvertently creating a knot. Let’s say the next morning, I have a hard time getting my shoe on – for let’s say, four minutes. Then let’s say that I miss my bus by just one minute. And the bus has a frequency of thirty minutes. Well then – one seemingly unrelated decision, made 16 hours before and taking all of 2 minutes to execute, has a 30 minute tardiness impact 16 hours later. That’s pretty much like the Butterfly Effect. Writ Small. And Mundane. Without bad acting.” The Star Trek: TNG[…]
I’ve just learned of eScience as a result of a book entitled “The Fourth Paradigm”. While I don’t have that much to say about the essence of the Fourth Paradigm yet, I have to admit that I feel immediately at home with this group within eScience. One of the best quotes in the book is: “Need driven versus curiosity driven. Basic science is question driven; in contrast, the new applications science is guided more by societal needs than scientific curiosity. Rather than seeking answers to questions, it focuses on creating the ability to seek courses of action and determine their consequences.” Substitute ‘societal needs’ with ‘business needs’, and I have myself a nice bridge between eScience and commercial eScience. I[…]
I’ve spent a lot of time this week managing complexity. And it’s gone well. I think looking for simple and remembering the end goal are two key ingredients. Backcasting happens a lot. Expecting exogenous shocks instead of being all outraged when they happen is another. That’s all that’s really on the mind. That and how much code I have left to write. 🙂
I published seven axioms over the past week – in a not so humble fashion. I’m taking the James Burke line to heart and just putting it out there. The Seven Axioms are: 1. The purpose of analytics is to derive competitive advantage for the organization / firm / entity. 2. Data alone does not yield competitive advantage. 3. A sequence of progressive hypothesis testing is the most efficient and effective method to derive competitive advantage from data. 4. Predicting the future requires an understanding of cause and effect. 5. Correlation is not always Causality. 6. Accuracy over Precision. 7. It is possible for there to be two optimal, equally true, answers to a problem. (And Sometimes More!) (X^2 =[…]
I’m reading Sam Ladner’s thesis. It’s strong work, and quite possibly one of the best reading experiences I’ve had since “Reading Virtual Minds”. On Page 149, there’s a quote in explaining the common occurrence for ‘fires’ to occur as a result of low-ball estimation: Curt: Why do they have the fires? Sam: Yes Curt: There could be a million different reasons if you think about it, I mean, clients coming in with aggressive timelines period or everybody will come in with big dreams, right?…Like you never lose the champagne dream even if you’ve got a beer bottle budget, right? You always dream big but you might not be, like, okay…” And I’m in awe. What a gem. And I ask[…]