Big Data

Sometimes, I wish that I had done something in my undergraduate or graduate degree that was related to big data. Big data is a big phenomenon at this moment in the world, what with Facebook and Google accumulating data from almost all of the population worldwide.

It is also a sector in which there has been phenomenal progress, as the Lohr article states.

For example, there are now countless digital sensors worldwide in industrial equipment, automobiles, electrical meters and shipping crates. They can measure and communicate location, movement, vibration, temperature, humidity, even chemical changes in the air.

I had no idea that automobiles had all these sensors put in. But it makes sense because there has been such a huge change in automobile technology, and this has resulted in more fuel-efficient cars.

Big data has been useful in earning companies like Facebook and Google a lot of money via ad revenue through tracking user preferences. There is, and has been for a little while, a huge demand for data scientists. Data scientists are people who help interpret the trends that statistics that Big Data generates.

Interpretation of Big Data is responsible for the development of artificial intelligence, and machine learning. All of this is helping humanity craft ingenious technologies that will benefit mankind, and increased the chances of developing technology that was previously thought impossible, like driver-less cars.

Siri is an excellent example of artificial intelligence, an offshoot of the interpretation of Big Data. Started off as a Pentagon research project, it is now a self-sufficient AI.

I am a huge fan of English football, and having followed it for well over a decade, I know the importance of statistics in the prediction and betting that takes places in the sport (betting is legal in Britain). The predictions of who will win the Champions League or the Premier League also happens because of an analysis of Big Data, which is all of the data that has been accumulated over the 26 years that the Premier League has existed.

Almost every company is involved in data mining and the collection of data from consumers or through every section of their selling process. All of this data helps in understanding what consumers want or how the company can streamline their process and save or make money.

Big Data and the subsequent creation of artificial intelligence is a scary prospect, but that’s only because I have grown up watching Terminator. SkyNet is an impossible entity to create, but the benefits that AI and Big Data have created supersede anything bad that has come of it, like privacy concerns.

Google Analytics and What They Tell Us

Google Analytics, like most products Google provides, is a useful tool in understanding the influence a person or organization wields on social media. If I had the money or cared too much about my social media presence, I’d sign up on Google Analytics. But even if my social media presence doesn’t worry me, I’m sure there are organizations worldwide for whom this matters. There’s also people who care about their social media presence; if you earn your living off social media, you definitely should.

So, Google Analytics gives us a few useful reports that can be set up quickly and which can be used consistently for a long period of time. I’ll only explain how they are useful and not how to set them up, since that is something that can be easily found on a search engine as powerful as Google. The reports are listed below:

Traffic By Social Channel

Just looking at this, it is easy to say which social media page sent the most number of people to your site. Here, Twitter seems to be the most active in sending visitors to the organization’s page.

Design-wise, the pie chart is helpful in representing the quantifiable data easily and the percentage of visitors from each social media is useful in understanding what you should focus on.

If you click on each of the social networks, it will give you the breakdown of the exact links on the social network and the percentage of people who clicked on them, which is a really useful metric to keep track of your audience.

Social Media Traffic

Google Analytics also gives you a barometer of what part of the internet your audience comes from. From the image above, most of the organization’s audience comes from an organic search (fancy term for people searching on Google), followed by social media , followed by Direct (people typing out the organization’s URL in the URL bar), and so on and so forth.

Social media still contributes to 150,000 views a month, which is great to know.

Landing Pages

This analytic gives you an idea of what pages of your website get shared most often on social media. You can click on the links given on the page to see the specific breakdown of networks where this content was shared.

Multi-channel reports

The Venn diagram that shows up on this Report shows the various paths (social media or otherwise) that people take to come through your website or blog. For this example, a lot of people come through the search engines and actually stay on the site, whereas a slightly smaller number come through social media and stay on the site. The overlap of the diagrams is an indication of the overlapping that might occur if a person comes through an organic search but then converts through social media.

These are a few brilliant ways that you can use Google Analytics to analyze how your website is doing in order to create or refresh your content strategy.

How important is Twitter in the corporate industry?

Twitter is one of the most crucial social media resources available to companies nowadays. A social media presence is required for companies to monitor what is being said about their brands online.

Just having knowledge about what is being said does not help. Acting upon that knowledge, by thanking positive commenters or helping negative commenters with customer service related issues is a very good way of showing customers that you actually care.

There are many other ways in which you can make your brand stand out on Twitter.

Creating a Twitter Presence

Posting on Twitter is a good way of keeping your fans aware of new products or just reminding them of how good your brand really is.

This is a tweet from Taco Bell:

I think Taco Bell talks to its biggest customers, college students, and mixes in the right facts to create this phenomenal tweet.

Creating a Twitter presence is also possible by announcing your latest products on Twitter, a good way of getting more customers to try out your product. This works especially well in the food industry.

Solving Customer Service Issues

When people complain on Twitter about the poor service they might have received from the company, a good way to gain brownie points for your company (from the customers) is to make sure that person gets excellent service.

Such a simple thing to do, and Virgin Trains managed to do it and satisfied a customer, thus maintaining their excellent customer service credentials.

Responding quickly in this case was excellent. However, some problems require a more hands-on approach, which might work by actually sending someone over to the problem area.

Interesting Banter

Interesting banter between two companies without it getting out of hand and descending into incivility is the best way to market both brands. Sometimes, companies talk about other companies on Twitter, and if each company can get in a snappy retort, it works in favor of both companies.

Now, Taco Bell had the advantage here, but it meant that both companies got some publicity through this harmless banter.

These things keep the products alive in the minds of the people and help with customer retention.

They might also help in creating new cocktails that benefit both brands.

Using Twitter in a variety of unique ways helps companies raise their brand value and sell more products. Twitter can be a valuable resource for any company in any way they see fit. I’ve listed some of the ways above but there are a variety of ways companies can improve their Twitter presence.

Hopefully, the list above helps you with improving your Twitter presence!