Here’s a new word for the digital marketing lexicon: “Netnography.” It’s a five-dollar word that describes one of the holy grails of current marketing measurements, which is the ability to determine people’s behavior via the internet. More specifically, netnography is applicable to social networking which is where consumers are showing their feelings, behaviors, and passions. That’s where a company called NetBase is making its mark.
NetBase’s flagship product, ConsumerBase, gives marketers the ability to measure the consumer passion expressed on social media networks, general Internet content, and internal company reports. It already counts among its customers five of the top 10 CPG brands and in the last month of limited release, has added numerous brand-name customers, including several more Top 50 consumer brands. Last week it launched a product called the Brand Passion Index, which takes that data and measures the intensity of consumer passion for brands expressed in social media using a proprietary semantic analysis tool.
Accoding to CMO Lisa Joy Rosner, ConsumerBase reads and understands what people are saying online and surfaces the likes and dislikes as well as the emotions and behaviors associated with brands. For example, as consumers headed out for Memorial Day shopping according to the Index, the most loved store with the highest emotional involvement is Costco, closely followed by Whole Foods. Walmart is the most hated of all the brands analyzed, while consumers are dispassionate about Safeway and Kroger, and merely like them.
Rosner says the “netnography” term came from its advisory council of CPG partners. Unlike other companies that measure the effectiveness of content for publisher monetization goals, NetBase is concerned with helping marketers understand the sentiments expressed about their products and images. The CPG category has been particularly fertile as they continue to explore social media strategies.
“CPG companies are very excited about the social media opportunity, not as cautious as some people think,” Rosner says. “They are aware that the fastest growing segment of social media users are baby boomer women and one of the loudest voices are mommy bloggers. Those are two important audiences they really want to understand.”
Netbase CEO Jonathan Spier says the social media research field has taken the pressure off focus groups and the endless procession of online surveys. “The CPG companies want to get information from social networks not necessarily for their own social campaigns, but to inform their entire brand positioning,” he says.
