This week, Nextness is home to ‘Five trends disrupting the communications industry,’ an in-depth report by James Collier (@james_collier), Head of Digital and Partner at STW’s Bohemia Group. This is Part Three.
The ongoing ‘Big Data’ conversation can often spiral out of control – and although enterprise data is a rich seam of intelligence, it’s the largely unstructured and chaotic world of user generated data that is of most immediate value to marketers.
In fact 70% of the world’s data is currently being created passively by individuals and their daily digital and social actions1. Facebook is unsurprisingly the biggest beneficiary of this with its 1 billion odd users creating 500 terabytes of new user data each day2. In isolation each of these seemingly small data points (a like, check-in, photo tags etc) is inconsequential – but combined can build a really rich audience picture. Interestingly, the #2 social network, Twitter, generates a small-in-comparison 12 terabytes of new user-generated data each day!
The value of this user generated data (UGD) is starting to find traction with traditional and emerging organizations alike. Nielsen recently bought Social Guide3, a social TV analytics platform and have in fact shifted their entire social media strategy to focus on analytics as opposed to monitoring. Twitter on the back of creating the Nielsen Twitter TV Rating have also acquired a social TV analytics technology in Blue Fin Labs4, so expect more movement in this space is it continues to mature.
As the value of UGD is more thoroughly explored we’ll start to see its impact felt in different ways;
- Brands and agencies will need to invest in increased data rigor and processing. With up to 60% of the social signal categorised as noise UGD will need to be subjected to the same level of cleansing as other consumer sources.
- The increased levels of data confidence that will come with this rigor will help drive a shift in campaign measurement. Traditional media currencies will come under pressure as more insightful and meaningful alternatives emerge.
- The UGD set will grow in prominence and value to brands as they look for an immediate source of insight and feedback to power real time marketing trend.
Sources.
- IDC Whitepaper – The Diverse & Exploding Digital Universe 2008
- Gigaom Facebook Report 2012
- Nielsen Press Release 2012
- Twitter Press Release 2013
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James Collier (@james_collier) is Head of Digital and Partner at STW’s Bohemia Group. This is Part Three of his report, ‘Five trends disrupting the communications industry.’ Part One: Real time marketing | Part Two: The web leans back.