Turning News Into Knowledge

As November comes and goes, so too do thoughts of Christmas lists, holiday shopping and the much-anticipated Black Friday – an annual event that regularly spawns footage of eager shoppers being trampled underfoot.

With that in mind, we at MediaMiser have undertaken that most pressing of holiday tasks: a list of the most popular toys this year in online news and on Twitter!

After a month of analysis, we’ve found that tablet computers that emphasize learning such as the LeapFrog LeapPad Explorer have dominated this year’s online conversation thus far.

But not only have kids caught tablet fever – perhaps not a surprise, considering the popularity of gadgets with most parents – but they’re also personalizing their tablets, the report shows. The words “pink”, “green”, and “case” are three of the top-mentioned words associated with the LeapPad on  Twitter.

The Leapfrog LeapPad Explorer.

And though all toys in MediaMiser’s top five have some kind of technology component, the report also shows kids will always be kids and that parents can’t go wrong with purely fun toys such as interactive robots and radio-controlled fish.

MediaMiser’s 2011 Hot Toys in Media report – based on the Toys”R”Us® Fabulous 15, billed as “the 15 best toys of the season” – has used MediaMiser patented software to monitor mentions of the retailer’s list of must-have playthings since late October, along with overall mentions of the “#toys” hashtag. The report has monitored both online news sites and Twitter.

We’ll release bi-weekly updates of activity on Twitter and in online news regarding the Fabulous 15, with a full report due just before Christmas.

The most popular Fabulous 15 toys on Twitter, as of 10 p.m. on Nov. 21, were:

1)       LeapFrog LeapPad Explorer Learning Tablet: Tablet computer for kids ($99.99) (4276 mentions)

2)       Air Swimmers: radio-controlled toy fish ($19.99 – $39.99) (1749 mentions)

3)       Fijit Friends: Interactive, robotic toys ($7.99-$47.99) (1369 mentions)

4)       My Keepon: Interactive dancing robot ($34.99) (1026 mentions)

5)       Skylanders: Spyro’s Adventure Start Pack for Wii ($49.99) (984 mentions)

The five most Tweeted-about toys of the Toys"R"Us Fabulous 15, including the LeapFrog LeapPad Explorer.

Total Twitter mentions of any of the Fabulous 15 or #toys hashtag.

Online news coverage trends of the top five since late October.

Last Thursday I attended Mobile Marketing: It’s still not too late to be early, with Google Canada’s Agency Lead Nectar Economakis taking us through trends and new technologies in the rapidly-developing world of mobile.

The event, held at the Hard Rock Cafe in the ByWard Market, was hosted by WebFuel with McGill Buckley and SEMPO Ottawa.

Mr. Economakis pointed out just how connected people are to their mobile devices. Since they’re always with us, many of us constantly rely on them for everyday tasks like finding directions, price-matching or simply killing time. A lot of time. According to Mr. Economakis, the equivalent of around 125 years of Angry Birds are played on mobile devices each day.

Mobile technology is moving extremely fast, Mr. Economakis said, adding that mobile users will soon exceed desktop users. Mr Economakis said those who utilize mobile technology already exceed desktop users at several points throughout a typical day, as well as on many holidays.

When it comes to marketing our clients, our brands and ourselves, Mr. Economakis said the focus should be on mobile first.  Since mobile is always on, brands are constantly able to connect with customers.

Mr. Economakis also shared some projects going on at Google, and one of my favourites was Google Translate. It connects people around the world by removing language barriers, and works with many languages to save valuable minutes when timely communication is essential. Mr. Economakis shared how it was used during the recent, devastating earthquake in Haiti to spread updates quickly and efficiently across the globe.

While Google Translate is still a work in progress, it’s amazing to see the difference it has already made.

Mr. Economakis stressed the importance of understanding the role of mobile in our lives, to properly know how to market to our target audiences. Whether creating websites designed for mobile viewing, mobile advertisements, or new apps, it’s important to remember that anything mobile should entertain us, help us stay informed, and perhaps most importantly allow us to interact and transact.

As I sat in a particularly interesting session at the recent Social Capital Conference, I was reminded of the difference that exists between the public and private sectors.

Entitled “Building the social organization” and led by public servant and blogger Nick Charney, along with Joe Boughner of non-linear creations, it was one of the lead sessions at this past weekend’s gathering at the University of Ottawa.

In 2006, I was an employee in the public sector. The debate about open data existed back then, and is still raging today – should we publish all our content on the web? Should we allow two-way conversations with our organization via social media?

Joe Boughner, a speaker at Ottawa's Social Capital Conference on July 23.

If these questions were a growing concern back then, they’re even more important today.

I work in the private sector now, and for a media monitoring and analysis company, no less. So I’ve developed a completely different perspective on social media. I’m encouraged to share information with the community-at-large, and to blog, tweet, and upload interesting posts about the company on Facebook.

It’s probably not surprising, but I wasn’t encouraged to do any of this when I worked in the public sector.

During the session Mr. Charney, who seemed to play for the more radical team, said organizations should post virtually everything online without much moderation on the part of the company. His argument was if “we don’t change our business model soon, we will fail soon.”

Mr. Boughner agreed, though he said companies should at least have some kind of moderation policy for certain instances.

Someone then asked during the session: “How do I walk into my CEO or manager’s office tomorrow and propose social media to them?”

The answer: Take some leadership, and take the initiative.

Instead of blindly suggesting the use of social media – which will, more often than not, be met with a simple “no” – he advised finding a common problem within the company and attempting to solve it via social media. That way, you’re able to show the boss that social media isn’t just a toy and that it has actual business benefits that can improve the organization.

Granted, upper management might not agree with your solution… but at least you’ve given it a shot.

Nick Charney, another speaker at the Social Capital Conference.

One thing’s for sure, if you’re going to approach your CEO or manager tomorrow proposing a social media initiative or campaign, make sure you’ve researched what platform might work best for your audience or potential customers.

Blogger and social media consultant Dani Donders said it best: Listen and engage. Look at what tools your competitors are using, and what tools will best suit your needs to achieve your goal. Don’t sign up for every tool, choose wisely.

Finally, make sure you’re prepared to invest the time into managing this beast. Because though social media might be free, the cost associated with managing it is certainly not.

Social media is indeed another world, and can be intimidating for those with which it’s not familiar.

But if you’re going to partake, just make sure you have fun in the process!

Twitter users – and, it would seem, large contingents of foreign media - are already all in a tizzy over the upcoming Royal visit to Canada by Will and Kate, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. And why not? It’s not every year a celebrity couple touches down in places like Ottawa and the north shore of Prince Edward Island.

So we at MediaMiser thought it would be fun to track what those tweeters are saying, using the hashtags #royalvisit, #willandkate and #royaltour. Check it out!

June 28, 2011′s top Royal Visit tweeters, by volume: @WillandKateCD, @Globaltvnews and @mel_coulson

Top links, by number of tweets:

Ottawa Citizen’s Royal Visit page

Canada.com: Royal visit a chance to show off Canadian culture, cliches and all

Globalnews.ca: Canadian love story rivals royal romance

@PhotoJVideoJ

#Ottawa already a zoo for #royalvisit. NBC already has microwave truck and broadcasting.

@SusanDelacourt

RT @louisataylorCIT: Find your #Ottawa royal-spotting spots in today’s@OttawaCitizen or on our #royalvisit site: http://bit.ly/jfljZz #katemiddleton

@ChrisJai

Has already started to see American media trucks in various Ottawa parking lots for the Royal visit #royalvisit #ottawa #news

@DrumAssign

Foreign media is starting to arrive in #ottawa for the #royalvisit. @jaimiek and Sandra Abma are catching up with them. #ottnews

@AyaMcMillan

Just booked my @VIA_Rail tix for Ottawa a day early – evidently every seat was snagged for the #royalvisit

@OttawaCitizen

We  have a big day here today – live blog on the #lansdowne hearings (day 6) continues, and of course there’s the #royalvisit

@NahayatT

Ottawa today – let the #RoyalTour begin! #WillAndKate

@RichardMadan

#RCMP says Musical Ride Horses in top shape for #RoyalVisit, unlike last year they had bad case of Strangles on Jul 1.

@PaulRushforthRE

Anyone else as excited as my family is? RT @OttawaCitizen: Good morning! #royalvisit preview section http://deck.ly/~sPvBo

@DaveCHale

Had a fun interview with Rebecca at #GlobalNews about the #RoyalVisit marketing strategy this afternoon

@GlobalMaritimes

If you’re headed to #PEI and have absolutely no interest in the #royalvisit check out these tips to avoid the #royals http://ow.ly/5spQq

It probably shouldn’t come as a surprise that when a group of razor-sharp communicators are tossed into a room, communication – and lots of it – generally ensues.

Such was the case at this year’s IABC World Conference in beautiful, beachy San Diego. The busy communicators both in attendance and following along in other locales from their laptops, tablets and other devices set Twitter alight before, during and after the assemblage of June 12 to 15.

Lindsay Polak, Brett Serjeantson and Tara Lalanne of MediaMiser.

Being a social and traditional media monitoring and analytics company, we used our software to track the conference’s voluminous Twitter activity over the past couple of weeks.

Curious as to what we found?

Read on to find out.

Just how many tweets were there?

MediaMiser collected 5,197 IABC World Conference-related tweets from June 1 to June 18. However, more than 50 per cent of all tweets (2,667) were collected June 13 and 14, the two busiest conference days. By June 17, activity had dwindled to around 60 tweets per day.

Who were the most active tweeters?

Other than the official Twitter accounts of IABC (131 tweets) and IABC Phoenix (218 tweets), the top 25 posters on Twitter were individuals – and the top individual Tweeter, it turned out, was from MediaMiser’s hometown of Ottawa. Basia Vanderveen (@BasiaV), an IABC-accredited communications strategist who works in the dentistry industry, led the pack with 180 tweets during MediaMiser’s 18-day analysis.

She was followed by Burbank, Calif.-based Christopher Swan (@mechristopher) with 123 tweets, Oakville, Ont.’s Donna Papacosta (@DonnaPapacosta) with 116, Indianapolis-based Chuck Gose (@chuckgose) with 111 and Salt Lake City’s Erin Hallmark (@erinhallmark) with 102.

Out of the top 25 tweeters who were individuals, eight (nearly 35 per cent) were from Canada.

Who had the most followers?

The only top tweeter measured by both posts and following was the official IABC Twitter account (@IABC), which recorded the third-highest number of tweets and had the 10^th-highest number of followers of all tweeters with 10,565.

London, U.K.-based social media coach and trainer Barbara Gibson (@Barb_G) had the highest number of followers of all tweeters, with 19,779, and Austin, TX-based Aaron Strout (@AaronStrout) was second with 17,053 followers.

Who was mentioned the most?

At nearly 400 mentions and retweets, @IABC was the most mentioned Twitter handle during the study period. Conversely, at more than 200 retweets and mentions, Shel Holtz (@shelholtz) of Holtz Communications + Technology, an IABC fellow and panelist at the conference, was the highest-mentioned individual.

Oy, mate – which tweeter flew the farthest?

If we eastern Canadians thought we had a long flight home, we were sadly mistaken. In fact, Linda Johannesson (@abroadabroadeh) was the most far-flung of IABC 2011’s Twitterati, having slogged all the way from Sydney, Australia.

Honourary mention goes to Daniel Munslow (@munslowd), hailing from Johannesburg, South Africa.

What were the top mentioned hashtags?

You’re likely going to say “I told you so”, but #IABC11 was the most-used hashtag during the conference, garnering more than 5,100 mentions.

All other related tags were dwarfed by the sheer volume of #IABC11’s mentions – but that didn’t stop the #mediamiser hashtag from placing fourth, with 92 mentions during the period.

What were the most Tweeted web links?

The IABC website’s general information page was the most Tweeted link (14 tweets), followed by the IABC website’s news release section (13 tweets).

When did the analysis take place?

MediaMiser analyzed IABC World Conference-related tweets from June 1 to 18. The conference was held June 12 to 15, with June 13 and 14 being the peak conference days (these days also recorded the highest number of tweets – 1,462 and 1,205, respectively).

We had a great time at this year’s conference, and are anxiously looking forward to next year’s production in Chicago! Well done IABC for putting on such a great – and, apparently, much talked about – event.

Dave Carroll has a message for customer service representatives everywhere – and this time, it’s not even in video form.

Yes, the mastermind behind 2009’s series of staggeringly successful United Breaks Guitars videos – his first video, a protest against United Airlines for allegedly breaking his Taylor guitar – has garnered nearly 10.5 million views on YouTube – has recently taken his show on the road. He’ll be presenting at the CPRS national conference in Saint John, N.B. this June on how those in customer service, PR and marketing can harness the power of social media (MediaMiser reps will be there too!).

Indeed, the success of Mr. Carroll’s uncontrolled video experiment has led many companies and academic institutions – including MediaMiser, which released its report in August 2009 – to actively evaluate its effects on the social media landscape. In fact, Mr. Carroll says there have been over 100 reports penned on the topic since the summer of 2009.

We caught up with Mr. Carroll recently for a brief Q&A session on his social media philosophy, and how his life has changed since his video protest went viral.

MM: What will you be speaking about at this year’s CPRS national conference?

CARROLL: Most people will be expecting to hear the background of United Breaks Guitars and the implications surrounding it, because it’s really become a story with a lot of different elements to it – customer service, social media, branding, and so on. But with that particular audience, I’ll tailor my message to the public relations world and how social media can be used more effectively by companies today. It’s not about creating one message for the masses anymore – it’s about creating a two-way conversation.

MM: Did the wildly popular United Breaks Guitars videos, and ensuing social media frenzy, change your life at all?

CARROLL: United Breaks Guitars was at the height of its popularity in July and August of 2009, but it’s still evolving and opportunities are still manifesting themselves from it. I’m writing a book now. I’ve been offered record contracts because of this. I’m doing other music videos for other companies. My career has exploded in all different directions, and it’s really based on this video that I made.

So I’ve been trying to address this while also trying to make sense of it. It’s been estimated that around 150 million people have viewed that video or at least heard the story. And I think that fact has huge implications for how PR people can interact with customers, and how businesses can use social media to interact with the public.

MM: Did you ever expect the videos to take off the way they did?

CARROLL: I did have a strong sense that people would be interested. My goal was to get a million views, with all three videos combined, within one year (Mr. Carroll’s first video alone has now racked up nearly 10.5 million views). My criteria, really, was to make a video that looked good, sounded good and made people tell their friends about it.

I didn’t really have any expectations, but I thought if it got some momentum, it might give some companies an impetus to change the way they do things. And through doing the video, I really regained the power that I’d lost when I was in that customer service maze.

MM: How does it feel to have something go viral like that? A bit surreal?

CARROLL: It was pretty overwhelming in the first few weeks, yeah. Because of the authentic nature of United Breaks Guitars, there wasn’t really a master plan or anything. My whole social media strategy was putting it up on YouTube – so in the first few days, when we were pressed for calls and swamped with interview requests from around the world, we weren’t really prepared for it. I made a conscious effort to be myself, be authentic and not take credit for things I didn’t deserve. And the one thing I also did was that I made myself available for any interview requested, from the smallest papers in northern Ontario to large media outlets like CNN.

MM: How did the entire experience change your view of the power of social and traditional media?

CARROLL: It amplified it exponentially, and as an independent musician…  I’d been waiting for these times to be here for the better part of my career. And in the last hundred years there has been a million-dollar music industry that has emerged, but the irony is that industry is often an impediment to musicians who want to be heard.

But social media allows the cream to rise to the top, if you have good content. It democratizes the music industry. People who would like to be full time musicians, they can have a career now much easier than they could before. Justin Bieber is a good example of someone who lucked out that way, and now he’s got that whole music industry machine behind him (Mr. Bieber was discovered on YouTube and is now signed to record label Island Def Jam). But when it happened to me I was independent, and I’m still independent, and I think this is why customer service people are so interested in my story.

MM: What other PR, marketing and customer service lessons can be drawn from United Breaks Guitars?

CARROLL: One of the key themes is this idea that music brings us together as people. It’s a great way to cut through culture and language, and United Breaks Guitars is a great example of this. I’m really jazzed about this idea that we’re all connected at the deeper levels, and this is an example of that. The videos resonated with people because of that – on the surface, we’re stuck in the day-to-day, fast-paced world, and we convince ourselves that we’re separate. But these videos, really, proves that we all have more in common then we might think.

This has implications for customer service… because when you start thinking this way you’re operating from the perspective of connection, rather than separation.

www.davecarrollmusic.com

The only prediction I will make regarding tonight’s federal contest is that while there will be some winners, there will be mostly losers – and this goes beyond the politicians.

Many pollsters and pundits, as well, are staking their reputations on tonight’s outcome.

The 2006 Canadian federal election essentially made Nanos Research what it is, after Nik Nanos accurately predicted a conservative minority. But the game has changed.

Tonight could also be very historic. If the polls are right, for the first time the NDP may be in opposition – might even have an outside chance of forming a government. Recently, EKOS research tabulated a three-point difference between the Conservatives and NDP. But other pollsters, such as Nanos, have a bit wider spread.

But what role have phenomena such as vote mobs played, and has social media had an effect?

At the beginning of the campaign activity on Twitter and other social was predictable. Early on Mark Blevis wrote an article in the Ottawa Citizen, stating that this was “not the Twitter Election”:

Anecdotally, the political discussion on Twitter is still taking place within an echo chamber. That is, most of the political discussions involve journalists, pundits, interest groups, the politically engaged, and – yes – even politicians. The average Canadian? Not so much.

Personally, I agree with him. But there also seems to be a major call to action for political change on Twitter, leaning heavily in the NDP’s favour.

By far, the most linked web page over the last two days (1000-plus links so far) is an open letter by Jack Layton urging people to vote NDP and vote for change – essentially a call to action. However, as Mr. Blevis wrote, it’s bouncing around in that “echo chamber” we talked about.

How many opinions are really being changed? Or is it instead helping to engage a demographic predisposed to voting NDP, but not necessarily predisposed to voting in general? If that’s the case, Twitter and other social media is more of a call to action – much like vote mobs.

Or maybe social media is encouraging other, already politically engaged people to engage others.

No one knows for sure. Most do believe vote mobs have had an effect – but for which party? The Liberals were polling ahead of the NDP at the height of the vote mobs’ popularity.

Also, we know that media does have an effect on behaviour and at last count, 31 publications had endorsed the Conservatives and only two the NDP. Yet overwhelmingly, social media has been pro-NDP according to our data.

All I know is I would hate to be a pollster right now. It seems this is a high-stakes game of predictions, with everyone doubling down on their reputations.

Regardless, there will be a lot to learn from this election and MediaMiser is happy to sit back with its data and analyze the tea leaves after the dust settles, and along the way. This is what motivated us to set up the MediaMiser Twitter Publication Elections counter – we’ve learned a great deal already through trial, error and experimentation with the collected data.

That said, to all candidates good luck and to all eligible citizens, get the vote out.

Health care and the issue of getting out the youth vote turned front and centre over the past six days of election talk on Twitter, according to MediaMiser’s most recent Issues Index.

The issue of students and young people, in particular, rose over the past few days thanks to media coverage of an unauthorized ballot-casting exercise at the University of Guelph. Fueled by this event and the frenzy of interest that ensued, mentions of keywords related to the issue spiked 214.5 per cent from April 12 to April 15.

By late April 18, however, chatter on the issue had decreased nearly 60 per cent. But it was still the second most-popular issue tweeted during the past week as of 11 p.m. Monday evening.

Health care, the public’s number-one issue in this Issues Index, also received a recent boost in Twitter interest – most likely due to Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff’s pledge on Sunday to hold a national health care summit if elected.

Interest in health care on Twitter has trended quickly upward since then, with popularity surging 52.3 per cent since late Saturday.

The top two issues of the April 14 Issues Index, ethics/accountability and the economy, stayed strong and among the top five issues of Canadians tweeting about the election but did lose some steam.

As of the end of April 18, ethics and accountability had dropped 84.8 per cent from its April 11 high at the time of the leaked Auditor-General’s report of G8 spending. The issue of the economy and jobs, as well, dropped to middling status, sinking 25 per cent in popularity since Saturday.

The issue of democracy and democratic values, as well, has dropped by more than 44 per cent in the past two days. The issue had received a spike in popularity thanks to the related news item of the University of Guelph polling station and the right of such unauthorized polling stations to collect ballots.

Other issues such as the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, crime and prisons, campaign advertising, the coalition and the environment had each trended out of the top five as of 11 p.m. on Monday.

The MediaMiser analysis is comprised of a sample of Canadian federal election-related tweets as defined by keywords, and the hashtags #elxn41 and #cdnpoli, and was conducted using the company’s patented monitoring and analysis software.

Check out last week’s Issues Index here.

Issues trend meter

HOT: Student voting, health care

NOT: Crime and prisons, environment

When Boston Bruins defenseman Zdeno Chara slammed Montreal Canadiens forward Max Pacioretty into the edge of the Bell Centre’s glass divider on March 8, 2011, he did more than injure a well-known fellow hockey player.

He also reignited a long-running controversy in the NHL – namely, that of blows to the head and just what on earth the league should do about them. Enter the latest questionable hit by Vancouver Canucks forward Raffi Torres, which occurred in a game on April 17, and the NHL headshots debate has once again flared up.

Which is why we at MediaMiser figured it would be a great day to release our latest social media report, entitled “The NHL headshots issue: A social media and online news analysis”.

In the report (which analyzed  Twitter, Facebook and online news activity from March 12 to March 27), we look at which news events, news outlets, journalists and other tweeters drove the headshots debate in March.

Here’s a brief breakdown of some of the report’s findings:

The incident to cause the most social media and online media activity was the Matt Cooke hit on New York Rangers defenceman Ryan McDonagh, and subsequent suspension.

The journalist that wrote on headshots the most: Joe Yerdon, NBC Sports

The Canadian journalist that wrote on headshots the most: Damien Cox, Toronto Star

The Canadian media outlet that wrote on headshots the most: Ottawa Sun

Some of the most prolific Twitter users in regard to NHL headshots: @NHLSpies, Greg Wyshynski (writer for Puck Daddy on Yahoo! Sports), Dave Stubbs (Montreal Gazette), Renaud Lavoie (RDS) and Jeff Marek (CBC)

The Twitter user to have his post retweeted the most: George Stromboulopoulos (CBC)

Click here for the full report.

According to MediaMiser’s first Issues Index for the 2011 Canadian federal election, ethics and accountability holds a slim lead as Twitter’s most talked-about election issue.

Several issues trended up and down in the aftermath of this week’s French and English leaders’ debates. But concern on the subject of ethics and accountability spiked dramatically around April 11 – jumping in volume by 845 per cent – when news broke of the pending Auditor General’s G8-G20 spending report.

And though that issue has trended downward since peaking that day, dropping 70.8 per cent by April 12 and another 66 per cent from April 12 to 13, it was still garnering hundreds of tweets per day by April 13.

The data – collected and analyzed by MediaMiser’s patented media monitoring and analysis software – indicates that between April 3 and 10:30 p.m. on April 13, chatter centering on the economy, jobs and economic issues was a solid second in terms of election issue-related tweets.

Indeed, tweets focused on the election and the economy increased 310 per cent since April 6 to propel that issue into second place. Earlier in the study period, the economy had sat below the issue of democracy and democratic values within Canadian society.

The concept of democracy and democratic values is the third most-talked about issue, according to MediaMiser’s analysis, though the issue trended slightly downward (by 18 per cent) since April 12.

Health care and health care-related issues sit in fourth spot, more or less unchanged from April 12 but up considerably from the day before. Health care’s real spike on Twitter came on April 8, when it jumped 152.5 per cent on the same day the Conservative Party of Canada released its election platform.

Crime and prisons, a hot-button issue in the lead-up to the election, rounds out the top five but was apparently losing steam by the evening of April 13.

Issues such as the environment, the coalition, leadership and character, Afghanistan and the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter purchase currently sit out of the top 10 as of the evening of April 13.

The MediaMiser analysis is comprised of a sample of Canadian federal election-related tweets as defined by keywords, and the hashtags #elxn41 and #cdnpoli.

MediaMiser issues trend meter:

HOT: Ethics, economy

NOT: Afghanistan, F-35 Joint Strike Fighter