Collective Intellect today announced the launch of Media Intellect, the only real-time monitoring and predictive intelligence service for social, traditional and corporate media.

“Understanding whom is saying what about your product or company online is now critical business intelligence,” said Collective Intellect CEO, Don Springer. “Media Intellect provides marketers with the real-time data and analysis they need to optimize campaigns and manage corporate reputations. Collective Intellect gives brands real-time access to the largest focus group on the planet.”

Media Intellect expands upon Collective Intellect’s experience in providing social media monitoring to more than 70 hedge funds. Media Intellect features analytical tools and custom reporting for marketing and PR professionals to measure and track brand reputation in social media over time. By monitoring these changes, companies gain a clearer understanding of how to evaluate campaigns and engage online.

Continued Springer, “Collective Intellect hopes to enable a whole generation of corporate communicators and agencies to identify, rank and engage directly with the advocates most responsible for shaping public opinion within their communities. Collective Intellect is the most customizable solution available.”

The Media Intellect system evaluates sources of unstructured data including blogs, social networks and message boards through algorithmic “Topicnets.” The data is then ranked and organized through 20 different filters including influence and importance. A single desktop provides a full-suite of analytics such as tonal sentiment, volume of conversations, and maven identification in addition to a real-time running list of ranked and filtered active conversations.

Prior to launch, the Collective Intellect beta was utilized by Fortune 500 brands such as Chrysler, as well leading agencies such as Fleishman Hillard and Poke.

About Collective Intellect
Collective Intellect specializes in comprehensively tracking, filtering, ranking and analyzing media content. Founded in 2005, Collective Intellect is based in Boulder, CO.

Tags: Public Relations // Add Comment »

Earlier this month my post “Ethanol bust documented on blogosphere?” revealed a change in public opinion regarding the ethanol boom as witnessed via the blogosphere.  Over the past two weeks, however, the blog traffic I monitored appeared more positive on ethanol and its future as a source of renewable energy in the US– until I caught glimpse of an article from the Des Moines Register business section about venture capitalist John Pappajohn’s decision to abandon his purchase of multiple rural ethanol plants. Pappajohn originally planned on placing a fleet of plants under one management structure.

“The move by Iowa’s best-known investor is another sign of troubling news for the ethanol industry, which is suffering from low prices and profits and a potential glut of the biofuel.”

Tags: Blog Analysis // Add Comment »

It seems like just as I wrote a post about the WSJ article, I see another article in the New York Times adding to the flames of publishers and vendors squaring off on measurement.

Along the lines of the what I wrote before, every vendor (ComScore, Nielsen) does measurement in their own way. Publisher server data doesn’t remotely match. Vendors who use panels do have problems with measurement because they are extrapolating based on the small number of hits their panelists make. and, since these are consumer panelists — not business panelists working behind a company firewall — they really can’t be getting all the data they need to extrapolate well.

The rub is that online advertising will grow more slowly if measurement isn’t standardized in some way.

Tags: Social Media Metrics // Add Comment »

Monday’s Wall Street Journal had an article about the current workarounds that advertising agencies are using to give them better metrics than just click-throughs. It seems that finally, companies are demanding from marketers better metrics to provide results.

Today, there exists no true standard for measurement online, even for just measuring click-through — Omniture will give you different data than your own data, or data you might get from another vendor. This doesn’t even begin to address the issue of ad blindness — where more and more people are tuning out ads online and offline.

Social media adds to the mix of things requiring measurement, and in some ways the conversational nature of it could offer more meaningful metrics than ad responses.

How does your monitoring firm measure social media engagement? We are right in the thick of this effort to map data to results.

The problem is that most monitoring firms are only giving you data after the fact, and are doing all of the measurement for you. I was speaking with one of our customers yesterday who had serious issues with this, because these are the same people who are making suggestions as to whether or not to engage with social media participants. Her problem? Why should I believe the monitoring firm that something is heating up and is worthy of engagement when they are also being paid to do the engagement? Isn’t it in their best interest to find ways to increase their income by creating work for themselves?

The better way (from my customer’s perspective) is to look at the posts yourself, in real time, to know whether a conversation is worth engaging in. So, this is a real-time measurement — something that is very subjective to the person viewing it, and probably won’t ever have anything but a company-specific standard.

Tags: Social Media Monitoring // 2 Comments »

Part Two of Two:

When I wrote the first part of this post, I wondered how, if at all, Ron Paul’s army would react. I hoped that his supporters would read the post, and comment rationally– to tell me why I was wrong about their chaotic message board responses to anything Ron Paul-related. But what I honestly expected was more of the same. I did get a few reasoned replies, but the overwhelming response was what I feared. Some samples of the more outlandish comments:

“What if we don’t want to be the slaves of usurers and thugs? The End is nigh! Can’t stop the freedom train! Vote RON PAUL!” - Max

“NAU, UN and NAFTA are NOT ‘conspiracies’ for those who read. They are things that are happening with which we disagree. For example, UN treaties now control what is taught and done in our public schools. Ask any teacher about that! They even dictate what books we can read or how we can line up the children for the bathroom…” - Fed up with bloggers like you

“Your obvious attempt at misinformation about the Ron Paul supporters will result in the same type of blowback that accompanies every attack on his freedom message: more people supporting Ron Paul…” - Scott Mitchell

“if you shut out the truth for too long it rises up and explodes in many surprising ways……” - Paul Weber

“Keep it up msm your showing the world your biased ass!!” - American

A handful of readers did put up reasoned counter-arguments, like Brian:

“I post comments and donate money and vote in polls because I love what RP stands for. And I do sometimes give back a bit of attitude whenever a blog or news story is patently ridiculous and insulting to RP. However I haven’t seen much of the cringe-worthy bad behavior that you referred to, though I’ve seen a lot of references to it…No matter what RP supporters do, they and he will be marginalized. If they do nothing, he’s a fringe candidate, and if they are passionate, well that can be spun in a million bad ways.”

Other commenters simply re-gurgitated their usual online talking points about biased polls, and repetitive talk about “libertarian principles”, foreign policy, and the bias of the mainstream media — which I suspect they simply copy and paste to each Ron Paul post they read.

This is not an effective technique. I was a bit surprised that none of these commenters corrected me when I said that I don’t know if they have a leader. Ron Paul does in fact have an e-campaign manager named Justine Lam. She is at least partially responsible for the initial flood of online Ron Paul support, which of course is an overall boon to the campaign. But it’s since gotten out of control — chaotic, sporadic, and quite frankly, annoying. Granted, a lot of money has been raised online. But the e-campaign has become a parody of what online campaigns should be — organized grassroots efforts with a real shot at locating and convincing new supporters utilizing technology to the greatest effect. I hope Ms. Lam has recognized this, and has an E-Campaign 2.0 in the works that will surprise us all.

Tags: Social Media Best Practice, Social Media Insights // Add Comment »

Since the dawn of Napster in the late 90s, the Internet has been an all out free-love-bearing orgy for music and media in general. From heavy metal goliath Metallica to major record labels such as SONY, the industry has constantly been living in fear of the consumer, rather than embracing the consumer’s versatility. While the immobile giants have stumbled and faltered trying to combat the new age of the Internet, many independent labels have formed — taking advantage of the new ways of connecting with listeners and those whom would never have otherwise crossed the label’s music. Record labels were started by “big suits” with big pockets to take the coffee shop-tarnished faces to the masses and reap the real benefits, while the artist retains only the face.

A record label doesn’t play music, usually doesn’t write music (unless it’s a boy band, etc.), doesn’t book shows; it doesn’t do anything artistic whatsoever. So what exactly does a record label actually do? The answer is short. A label essentially stamps a name on an album and markets and distributes the releases. On the other hand, big suits can move people to big places quickly. But this is the 21st Century and suits are rarely welcome in music anymore.

From P2P networks to digital downloads to viral videos, people have consistently found a way to obtain free music as fast as they can think of a title. Music can be passed for free faster than one can hear it. It’s the case of realizing you can leave the big bully behind and go it alone. And that’s exactly the chain that the British rock trailblazer Radiohead broke last week as it released its new album, In Rainbows. Bands can send their music across the world for free until they catch on somewhere; they don’t have to worry about getting onto a label that will painfully take on this task these days. In Radiohead’s case, they’re already huge, so when they move, fans follow. In an age when iPods outnumber CDs for most young hipsters, Radiohead has not only taken advantage of digital downloads, but also the big suit business in selling it themselves to take all the profit, cutting out the middleman. In addition, Radiohead avoids manufacturing costs, shipping charges, and damage costs by embracing the digital release. Much to the dismay of record labels, already
more giants in the music business are rumored to jump onboard to follow
Radiohead, including Nine Inch Nails, Madonna, Jamiroquai, and Oasis (yes, the
band still exists).

Today music fans don’t live on the radio, they don’t live on Rolling Stone, they don’t even live on MTV anymore. They live right here: the Internet. They harp on blogs, they watch videos on YouTube, they damn writers on websites like Jambase and PitchforkMedia, and they download music anywhere and anytime they can. So, advertising and following music in general has become a function of the Internet and social media as well. The world is only beginning to see the end of the hard copy and the following of the online trail. In addition to music lovers flocking the keyboards, for the first time in history, artists and the like can follow the happenings, sentiment, and commentary of fans and critics alike through media monitoring. Finding the music online is only a fraction of the power of the Internet’s ability to connect the music world. If the tables are turned, the tables and reigns are handed to the artists; it’s a two-way street. What’s the reaction to the new album? What about the new video? The general word on the band?

People all over the Internet offer up their own analysis, often with great research. Hitwise Intelligence analyzed website hits relative to Radiohead traffic and many blogs such as Phawker and iLounge discuss the nature of the release as I have. Message boards constantly provide a mountain of short personal accounts and reflections that can be valuable feedback to marketing or company and product reactions in general.

So in 2007, sell it yourself and track it yourself. It’s the best time to be an artist, the worst time to be a label.

Tags: Mass Media/Culture // Add Comment »

A little less then a year ago we commented on how Michael Mace, an industry expert, posted on his personal blog that Research In Motion’s stock price was mistakenly battered by the announcement of the iPhone last January. He also made the argument that Palm faced the greatest threat from the iPhone.

A few days ago research group NPD released a report that seemed to practically quote Mace.

Here is what Mace said last January:

The iPhone as currently designed is a lousy device for RIMM’s
communication-centric users because it doesn’t have a keyboard and
because it can’t handle Outlook attachments.

the Treo has benefited mightily in the US from its image of being the
coolest smartphone. It has been a status symbol in Silicon Valley and
beyond. Judging from the reactions of the people I spoke to today, I
think that position is profoundly at risk.

Here is what NPD reports:

The iPhone’s lack of corporate email support appears to make it less appetizing to current Blackberry owners

Initial iPhone buyers were 10 times more likely to previously own Palm’s Treo.

Since the announcement of the iPhone, Palm’s stock price has been stagnant and trailed the S&P. Over this same period RIMM is up a staggering 133 percent.

Tags: Mass Media/Culture, Social Media Monitoring // Add Comment »

Toyota made us believe that they want to create a world where we can live in harmony with nature. Some ardent Prius owners’ faith in their brand and the company behind the brand may have been shaken over the past weeks. Across the blogosphere posts have been popping up which bring into question Toyota’s environmental stance:

• Thomas Friedman took a jab at Toyota in a NYT op-ed piece, Et tu, Toyota?, causing Toyota to defend itself on their own blog saying: “…there’s a point at which the bar [CAFE standards] is set too high for all competitors… But you can’t bankrupt the industry if you want it to invest in our environmental future.”
• Reports have come out of out-of-date MPG measures used to market the Prius
• The National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has come out against Toyota wanting consumers to pressure Toyota into lowering their defense against higher CAFE standards. And a conglomeration of environmental groups has launched a site called challenge is to grab as big of a slice of the truck market as they can get their hands on.Toyota has no doubt gained a green reputation (”halo” is the term floating around the blogosphere) from the success of the Prius; however, when looking at the heavier classes of vehicles an irony emerges with GM’s better mpg performance than Toyota. So why the surprise when Toyota steps up against CAFE standards? Trucks are not marketed on fuel-efficiency; they are marketed on power, the antithesis of fuel efficiency.

  If the truck market is in Toyota’s cross-hairs, then fighting the Hill-Terry bill on CAFE standards is natural move. However, does Toyota have a real risk of alienating their eco-friendly base?

  

  In an effort to make heads or tails of all of this, let’s break down the prevalence of Prius and Tundra discussion in the blogosphere as part of the whole Toyota discussion since the beginning of September. The graph above shows that Prius commands much more attention than Tundra; perhaps that’s because eco-friendly Prius gurus spend more time gathering online than the rough-though pick-up truck gurus? Regardless, Toyota ran the risk of alienating their eco-friendly following, but did they?

  Below we can see that sentiment for Prius and Tundra took a hit during the fire storm of the CAFE squabbling. However, positive Toyota sentiment overall has remained surprisingly strong. Arguably more importantly, the Prius followers seem to have a short and forgiving memory as the sentiment for the Hybrid has rebounded quickly and strongly.

  

  So if the Prius owners are happy again, how’s Toyota doing pushing the Tundra with their 13 new Tundra models? The next graph shows that Toyota has been relatively successful in raising Tundra mentions, at least temporarily, since a September 1st baseline.

  

  The Big 3 no doubt love that Toyota is catching more flack as it grows. However, consumers seem to have a short, forgiving memory. Thus, in the end, as Toyota and Toyota brand mentions increase, perhaps there’s no such thing as bad press.

  Brandon Line

  Disclosure: The author currently does not hold any positions in Toyota. He does however drive a Scion.

Tags: Analyzing Consumer Generated Media, Brand Management, Mass Media/Culture // 1 Comment »

One reason social media continues to experience growing popularity is its ability to quickly disseminate information, especially that which is often overlooked by traditional media. This is especially relevant for a nano-cap company such as Palatin Technologies (PTN), that may receive little or no coverage in traditional media outlets. Social media not only rounds out the story, but sometimes provides the only story.

PTN is currently stalled in its objective of proceeding with phase III clinical development for its feature sexual dysfunction drug Bremelanotide. As is typically the case, traditional media have covered the major “newsworthy” events surrounding PTN:

• Bremelanotide’s stalled development
• an earnings event
• data for a study indicating a new application for Bremelanotide

All valuable stories certainly, but social media takes this coverage a step further, delivering context about these stories with ongoing discussion that enable a reader to gain a more comprehensive analysis. Here at Collective Intellect, our ability to track these conversations in both social and traditional media helps me gain a greater picture of the “real” story about Bremelanotide.

The chart to the left shows just how much PTN coverage is dominated by social media (this graph shows results over the past two weeks).
Only 6% of media coverage comes from traditional news sources.

Example data

This message board post references a relevant deal with AstraZeneca that has long been forgotten by traditional media — but, it actually warrants further consideration because PTN’s stock has been battered by the news of Bremelanotide’s delay. Another board poster points out a number of reasons Bremelanotide would logically proceed to phase III studies, furthering the discussion of anticipated off-label use once approved. Although off-label drug use tends to enter a realm of moral dubiousness, it is common practice, and very relevant to the discussion, but more than likely avoided by the journalistic standards of traditional media. These comments, of course, are left to be translated by any prospective trader, but their simple existence provides a platform on which to proceed.

Ultimately, if a trader or analyst were to rely only on traditional media coverage for context to PTN’s financial picture, that picture would find a depreciated stock with little information available to forecast future developments. In addition, if PTN were to only look at traditional media for earned coverage, they’d be missing part of the story that makes up the full view into outside opinion, insight and corporate sentiment. Social media provides other insight for further analysis and inferences.

Tags: Blog Analysis, Social Media Insights, Social Media Monitoring // 1 Comment »

Ever since Apple released the most recent iPhone software - which deletes all 3rd party apps on hacked iPhones - the blogosphere has been in an uproar. In fact, (here is a shameless corporate plug) according to our data, iPhone sentiment is currently down 30 percent compared to last week.

So, has Jobs finally blown it? Despite what some hackers may have you believe, it’s probably not that big of a deal, albeit still bad form on Apple’s part. I mean, keeping hackers from adding their own apps to the iPhone is akin to an Orangutan taking out a restraining order against Primate Legend Jane Goodall.

While the iPhone is attracting plenty of early adopters from Geek Nation, if this device is going to become truly successful it needs to attract the same mainstream crowd that has embraced the iPod. Really, when was the last time you heard a major outcry over not being able to load third-party software onto the iPod?

Still, Gizmodo is giving the iPhone the thumbs down because they think 3rd party apps are important:

the Navizon GPS app, a hack, was downloaded 80k times. That’s almost 10 percent of all iPhone users, who we know to have been using installer.app, likely the smartest of all iPhone users.

This is a good point, but it’s still, its just 10 percent of iPhone early adopters. As more conventional users buy iPhones, the number using third-party apps will surely decrease, and the lack of 3rd party apps will not deter them, which Gizmodo freely admits.

By the way, the most recent software update for the iPhone just got hacked. Looks like Steve Jobs was only able to set the hackers back a week and a half.

Tags: Analyzing Consumer Generated Media, Mass Media/Culture // Add Comment »