Analysing Social Media With An Impact

To truly extract value from big data, information needs to be parsed, sifted through, and allocated with a value for it to have meaning to our lives.

- Liu Hongzuo

Many media consultancies, market researchers, and business analysts use such monitoring tools to separate quality data from noise, but things get a little trickier when feelings are involved. Are discussions with traction meaningful, simply because people are commenting on it? Are these positive vibes a sign of collective sarcasm, or is the negative discourse a much-needed look in the mirror? Can Artificial Intelligence even begin to help policymakers and researchers quantify emotive language around the social affairs of today?

We spoke with Roger Do, founder of search, a social media intelligence company that helps quantify and analyze social media conversations through their social listening tool.

How is QSearch different from other social media monitoring tools out there?

ROGER: Our most unique feature is a behavioural index where we rank content based on readers’ reactions, rather than a post’s shares or likes. This allows our users to quickly identify powerful content, rather than widespread content, to make impactful decisions. The below graph shows Facebook data from March 2020, with two notable anger spikes that are both abnormal and above the post content. The first one is regarding a Muslim pilgrim gathering (during a Covid-19 outbreak) in Indonesia. The second one is a TODAY post regarding nightclub closures.