Monthly Archives: December 2011

Marshall Sponder’s Social Media Analytics – “Content is Free – Context is Where the Value IS.” ~Robert Lavigne

As far back as April 20, 2010, I have stipulated that “Content is Free – Context is Where the Value IS.”

In Chapter 3, Marshall Sponder states “the challenge of social media monitoring is to act as a twenty-first-century Rosetta stone, decoding the online chatter and revealing its relevant meanings.“

This statement is compounded exponentially when we understand that only a very, very, very small portion of the available digital content is currently indexed/accessible.

Finding relevant meaning to the online chatter is even more of an issue when we realize that much of that content is devoid of context or semantics.

As we expand the tools to aggregate and disseminate content beyond the current repository, we are faced with a challenge that sees a serious decrease in value of said content as its supply grows.

This reduction in value is not due to a decrease in demand for quality content. The reduction in value is directly tied to the lack of context that much of this new content will likely bring.

As such, when we compound this new content with our existing repository, the current mechanism that was used to decipher its value is unable to scale adequately.

The Dunbar Number (150) hints at a theoretical limit to the number of quality active connections we can manage. Similarly the brain, our primary semantic engine, is only able to provide so much valuable context to the content we are digesting.

So not only are new tools and algorithms required to allow us to scale with this new supply of content, but furthermore, a new content creation mindset is needed as our role as prosumers expand during the Social Media Era. Continue reading

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Marshall Sponder’s Social Media Analytics – “Deep within Foreign Territory, the need for Human Intel is Critical” ~Robert Lavigne

In my review of Chapter 2, I pointed out how complex of an undertaking analytics can be when factoring international/slang/trends.

Well, no time was wasted to start addressing the very concepts and challenges of internationalization. Chapter 3 addresses the importance of properly applying context to Multicultural Social Media.

Marshal Sponder quotes Sam Flemming as recounting that “the Chinese language represents 10 percent of blogs.” Unlike Web 1.0, which could get away with being mostly English, Web 2.0 is by its very nature a far more cultural and diverse entity.

The simple fact is that there is another world outside of our pre-defined view of where our business transcends. Whether we accept that local can become global at the speed of a tweet reply, or we alienate a potential market by remaining an alien in a foreign land.

The key to surviving any foreign travel or incursion is to reach out to your established community and seek out trusted guides within the region.

These are your “HUMan INTelligence”.

These are your “people on the ground”.

These are the ones that have the context to make your brand more native.

No amount of “intellectual property”, “internationalization algorithms”, “multicultural monitoring platforms” can replace the context of someone who lives, breathes, and infuses the culture you wish to engage.

To not integrate this crucial element into your “machine learning” and “fuzzy logic” is a mistake that has cost lives in multiple wars, let alone impressions in Social Media Campaigns. Continue reading

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Marshall Sponder’s Social Media Analytics – “Your client is in front of you, not in a database” ~Robert Lavigne

I actually finished reading Chapter 2 on the same night as I blogged about Chapter 1. I was tempted to blog about it on the same night, but needed to put it down to make sure I wanted to post what was truly on my mind about that chapter.

You see, I was looking forward to this chapter. It is important to target your customers. It is even more important to use the data that is available to you to ensure they are truly a potential customer as opposed to just another unqualified lead.

Unfortunately, what I got instead was what felt like an infomercial for Integrasco. Eight pages of the Twenty in this chapter were dedicated to recounting “The Integrasco Story”.

Maybe it was the fact that Seven of the other pages were Case Studies, but I left the chapter feeling like a huge opportunity was missed in a key topic relevant to Social Media Analytics.

What I did get however out of this chapter, which I deemed valuable, was that all analytics are at the mercy of their collection system. Continue reading

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Marshall Sponder’s Social Media Analytics: A Life@42 Review by Robert Lavigne, The Digital Grapevine @TDGv.net

I found that opening salvo ironic, given that I first heard about Marshall Sponder through Olivier Blanchard, who wrote “Social Media ROI”.

To make it even more ironic, I am putting down Avinash Kaushik’s Web Analytics 2.0 in order to read this book. Avinash wrote the foreword to Social Media Analytics.

After reading the first chapter, I can already see how all three books will work so well together to answer that very question that is asked by so many.

As a side note. I was reminded once again how important and influential Trey Pennington was to the Social Media community. His name came up twice within the first few pages of Marshall’s Social Media Analytics. This is also something that is noticeable in Olivier’s Social Media ROI. Continue reading

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