“Unless you can extract meaning, all you can do is count it”

timbarker (2)Big data has been one of the big trends of 2013 and its presence and power has been felt in the television industry perhaps more than anywhere else.

The Only Way is Essex has consistently seen the largest share of social chatter, revealing the nations love of ‘guilty pleasure’ programming, while reactions to Man United losing to Real Madrid in the Champions’ League and Andy Murray’s Wimbledon victory sealed Twitters position as the top place to share both national celebration and commiseration.

Meanwhile, a whole ecosystem has sprung up to help organisations deal with data of this scale, the social miners. Datasift, which just received $42m in in Series C funding, is one of the coveted ‘fire hose’ companies plugged into the endless stream of information generated by the world’s largest social networks, the likes of Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr, as well as companies like Bit.ly. Tim Barker, the company’s chief product officer, says he is working in a thriving industry – where they are dealing with 75,000 data items every second – that is now able to help companies ‘market to the moment’.

Earlier this year, Datasift partnered with Second Sync to help the BBC understand and improve its audience share for the Attenborough series Africa. “Previously, the data simply didn’t exist, but data-driven decision-making is what companies are increasingly having to get better at doing,” Barker said.

“Unless you can extract the meaning, all you can do is count it”

After the first airing of the show, the BBC used Second Sync to analyse not only the volume of tweets that it had generated, but also the text inside them to find the peak moments of engagement. Identifying a fight between two giraffes as one of the most talked about parts of the show, the organisation then recut its promotional material for the repeat.

“We’re seeing for the first time that social is providing a real-time feedback loop, where broadcasters can analyse and adjust the format of their shows, and attract advertisers, by analysing the social conversations around it,” Barker said. “But unless you can extract the meaning, all you can do is count it. ”

The company has just unveiled the newest addition to the DataSift platform, VEDO, which uses machine learning to understand in real time the sentiment behind social chatter, enabling businesses to quickly react  to complaints or people potentially churning as a customer.

Of course you can also be overly sensitive towards a social audience, Barker admits. “There is also a criticism of social is that it’s not representative – it’s only angry people shouting,” he said. “So you do still have to blend social with traditional market research data.” Datasift is committed to ensuring there is no silo of social data separate from other business-critical information, so its platform is increasingly being integrated into existing in-house platforms by brands and other businesses.

“Of course, not all TV is created equal in terms of social but in competitive areas it can give you the edge on how you can tweak your programme to appeal to a bigger audience,” Barker said. “Now what we’re seeing is companies actually creating content that is social – like the X Factor – and increasingly integrating social into the content of its programmes.”

Will consumers choose no data brands?

But is the future all bright for big data companies? A forecast by Trendwatching.com of seven things to look for in 2014 predicts a win for ‘no data’ brands. Barker doesn’t buy it. “If you look at companies that have been most successful over 10 to 15 years – Tesco Clubcard, Amazon, Netflix – they offer a fair exchange around the data they collect and the value you get as customer. We expect more and more from companies we deal with and if they know nothing about me how can they offer things I’m interested in?”

And its not just commerical organisations that can use data to improve what they do. Datasift is even working with the UN to help it identify and respond to disasters around the world. In 2014, we can also expect the company to start expanding into other areas, namely Internet of Things device data, so brands can understand their products and marketing better. Datasift already helped Dell to increase customer loyalty by 39 per cent by iterating their products and changing their marketing based on the feedback they got via social networks.

Looking to Twitters lead, we will also see companies like Tumblr double down on creating an ecosystem and model similar to what Twitter is doing. “We are increasingly working with our social network partners that want to build a bigger business. If you build ecosystems that point towards social networks, that ultimately drives brand activity and advertising dollars back into those networks – its a virtuous circle.”

And adding further weight to the importance of social data mining, Datasifts biggest rival Topsy just got bought by Apple, hanging its brand halo on this growing industry. “The idea of companies that know nothing about their audience is a very hard one to believe will be successful,” Barker said. “The businesses that will win will ensure theres a fair exchange of data – so the data collected works best for improving the value or experience you get as customer.”