Harvard and Northeastern University have partnered to create a “mood map” that depicts happiness levels across the U.S. throughout the day using data pulled from millions of Twitter accounts. While the research is interesting, the opportunity for ABM members to apply this level of analysis to brand and relationship management is truly exciting.
University researchers attached rankings to certain keywords in more than 300 million tweets in order to measure levels of happiness; noted the locations of the Twitter users; then constructed density-preserving cartograms (thematic maps) to depict their findings. The result is a way to measure how audiences react to any given event or brand, geographically and emotionally – a potential tool for both editorial and marketing teams.
Engaging in Conversation
A large part of editorial is anticipating which stories audiences want to talk about and delivering them before something else captures readers’ attention. Now that most brands are actively posting articles to their websites on at least a weekly basis, consider the power of the editor that can use Twitter to search trending topics, and then turn on a dime to write and post related content in response to audience interests.
Audiences fired up about these topics might be more likely to comment on those stories, and share them using social media. In this way, the editor could engage audiences with his/her brand in a highly-targeted and personal manner, while building website traffic at the same time.
Tweeting for Better Brand Management
Likewise, marketers could use Twitter similarly, to monitor how a brand’s products are resonating with audiences. The ability to gauge public sentiment yields powerful information that could be analyzed to determine how and when to deploy messaging and offers, and to steer potential customers toward promotional events.
Marketers could determine when budgets are tight rather than robust, for example, before setting business meetings or offering paid subscription services. And the service could be used to evaluate when tweaks to a brand’s image or products should be implemented.
