Finger Lutz - Ask, Measure, Learn

Ask, Measure, Learn

Using Social Media Analytics to Understand and Influence Customer Behavior

Lutz Finger

Soumitra Dutta

Beijing Cambridge Farnham Kln Sebastopol Tokyo

Praise for Ask, Measure, Learn

Big data will soon become one of the most important assets of most companies. Using big data will be an integral part of many business models. Right now, though, the vast majority of companies simply sit on a heap of dark data, without strategy, uncertain how to interrogate them and unable to interpret the signals they might receive. In Ask, Measure, Learn , Lutz and Soumitra give companies key pointers to understanding the big data challenge, and for asking the right questions when it comes to tackling it.

Tim Weber, SVP Edelman, former business and technology editor, BBC News interactive

Big data is an opportunity that individuals and enterprises alike are grappling to comprehend and leverage in its entirety. The book skillfully takes readers on a journey from understanding the concept of big data to deriving value from it.

N. R. Narayana Murthy, Cofounder, Infosys

Big data is a mystery, with too many answers to see the real one that you need. This book may change that. And it is fun to read as well.

Ben Verwaayen, Former CEO, Alcatel-Lucent

This is an essential read for anyone who has to introduce big data into their company; it gives a balanced and complete view of the problem, and is written by people who not only have their finger on the pulse but are also able to see the changing coming through their extensive, worldwide network of connections.

Alex (Sandy) Pentland, Professor, MIT

Big data is perhaps the newest concept that everyone is talking about, but few really understand. Ask, Measure, Learn will go a long way in helping us grasp big data but also learn how to use it.

J. Frank Brown, Managing Director and COO, General Atlantic Partners

Insights, insights, insightsthis is the most essential component of any kind of analytics. No matter whether it is in social media or on big data. Business leaders need insights and this book shows how to get there. Ask, Measure, Learn is a very helpful framework and a great collection of case studies. Use it and you will avoid any paralysis by analysis.

Loic le Meur, CEO, LeWeb Conference

This book blows away all the myths around big data and is an excellent guide on how to use big data to create true business value. A must read for all companies facing the challenge to incorporate big data in their business strategy.

Annet Aris, Adjunct Professor of Strategy, INSEAD

I think this is the right book at the right time. The data revolution has just started. Every company that is dealing with big data or trying to become a data-driven business is searching for the Vvaluein the massively growing amount of data available to them. I found very useful information in Ask Measure Learn and strongly recommend this book for anyone looking to define their data-driven strategies.

Uwe Weiss, CEO, BlueYonder

A great framework and a must read for every organization. Too often, business intelligence shoots off with data and graphs, forgetting that essentially, we are looking for insights. Ask, Measure, Learn helps put the business value back in the driving seat. Using very practical case studies, the authors show how easy and fun data science can be.

Stephan Roppel, Director of e-commerce, Tchibo

This book helps with great examples to go from pure data to actionable Insights. A must read for everyone talking about social media or big data analytics. The concepts put forward by Lutz and Soumitra show how important it is to get the question (ask) right in order to successfully learn from the data.

Bjrn Ognibeni, CEO, BuzzRank

Recent breakthroughs in technology and the massive adoption of social media give access to unseen amounts of data. The problem: we suffer from a sensory overload and are incapable of capturing the business value of this data to effectively augment our decision making. Ask, Measure, Learn tackles that problem and helps business leaders to leverage this untapped opportunity to drive business value.

Bjrn Hermann, CEO, Compass.co

To my loved Isabelle, who supported me in every line in this book. Lutz Finger

To Lourdes and Sara, whose love and support have made my life complete. Soumitra Dutta

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Introduction

In April 2011, United States Special Forces descended on the hideout of Osama bin Laden, leader of the terrorist group al-Qaida. The ensuing raid killed bin Laden after over a decade of living in hiding and directing attacks by his followers. So who knew where he was located?

The answer may surprise you: we all did.

According to .

Figure 1. Geocoded social media articles describe the location of Osama bin Laden. (Courtesy of Kalev Leetaru.)

Most likely the US forces did not rely on crowdsourced wisdom like this. We know today that US governement agencies like the NSA are tapping into all kinds of different data sources, from spying on the phones of top-level politicians to tapping into everyones communication from email providers. However, the principle is the same: actionable intelligence was derived from an aggregation of individual, and in this case, seemingly random, data points.

Herein lies the promise of what we call big data . It has become one of the trendiest digital buzzwords of the new millenium. It involves gathering business intelligence from the heretofore forbidden territory of data sets that are too large to curate or maintain as databases, often encompassing terabytes or even petabytes of information. One of its most compelling forms today is the use of social media data, a mirror that reveals what each and every one of us wants, needs, and prefers. This data, enriched with our clicks in the Internet, our mobile phone usage, and our location data, will create amazing insights about us and our future.

We, the authors, have for more than half a century been helping governments and NGOs draw conclusions out of big data, especially social media data. We built a company called Fisheye Analytics that offers a software as a service that analyzes media data around the world. We analyze about 70 TB of textual data monthly for our clients. But we have learned as well that it is not the size that matters, but rather the right question and the right data .

In this book we want to serve you as well and show you on a case-by-case basis how to gain insights out of data. It is not about data as such. It is not about size as such. It is about the value that data can bring.