2. Context
The social media revolution has changed the
way that researchers conduct research and
the way that people communicate
Millions of people contribute to social media
databases everyday
The qualitative researcher is already equipped
with many tools, and now we will learn of
another one to add to our toolkit – Social
Media Research (SMR)
3. What is Social Media Research
(SMR)?
It is research using naturally occurring social media
conversations as your primary data source
It is not online surveys, online focus groups, or online
communities
SMR mines information from existing rich data such
as posts or blogs from Tumblr, Twitter and other online
platforms
Variables are also identified based on the existing
data
Researcher checks off the boxes for participants
A Facebook status update might read, “Feeling frustrated
by the weather” and it is up to the researcher to translate
that into useful data; ie. Code that the weather is what
frustrates that individual
4. Who Uses SMR?
SMR is used in many spheres
It is greatly utilized in marketing so that
organizations and companies can understand
public opinion and adjust their product and/or
programs accordingly
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3GPHV5Kp_I
It is used in social psychology to understand
human trends, beliefs, behaviours and attitudes
It is used in every aspect of academia as a
qualitative and quantitative research tool to gain
insights on how the research topic is being
understood by the public (Branthwaite, A. and Patterson, S., 20
5. Traditional Processes in Survey
Research vs. Processes for SMR
Retrieved on March 13, 2014 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1o8WSMpQsU
6. The Advantages of Social Media
Research (SMR)
The researcher has the ability to jump back in
time to understand a trend, reflect on an
incident or remember significant events
Daily tracking; we can monitor day by day
what people are talking about
Thousands of variables; you have access to
millions of people and an endless amount of
content areas
7. The Disadvantages of Social
Media Research (SMR)
Not a lot of geo-deomgraphics available with
social media, especially in Twitter with a limited
character count per post
If researchers aren‟t able to obtain demographic data from
social media, it is essentially „missing‟ data
Certain topics have very little coverage on
Facebook or Pinterest, so if your research is
something that is not widely talked about, you will
have limited data
SMR cannot measure awareness of the issue,
topic or product
8. When conducting SMR, remember
to:
Maintain your data quality
When putting an acronym into your search engine in
Facebook or Twitter, ensure you are searching the
appropriate acronym to obtain your full set of data
HFCS High Fructose Corn Syrup and HFCS
Hydraflouracarbons
Double check meaning of words during the
content analysis phase of your research
Has your informant used the word „new‟ but really
meant to use „knew‟? Misinterpretation of language
could skew results
Ensure that you understand and correctly interpret
the sentiment behind each emoticon
:) means good; :( means bad; :-S means worried
9. Ethical Considerations for Social
Media Research
Remember that social media is a personal
domain, and often times people say things
they may not have meant
Respect for privacy is very important
Ethical guidelines are very similar for social
media research as with traditional research,
with some additions; visit the following sites for
more info:
10. Feeling Lost?
If you‟re feeling a little overwhelmed by all of
this information, and could use a little help,
there are a multitude of organizations,
companies and software that can assist you!
Abbott Research & Consulting
Applied Marketing Research, Inc
Campos Inc
Doyle Research Associate
11. … Or you could try this company:
The „Qualitative Data Analysis
Company‟
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Qualitative-Data-Analysis-Program/16982737303931
12. … Or try „Simply Measured‟ – A
Facebook Content Analysis
Software
A free program, in exchange for your personal
statement of using this program through your own
Facebook page
This program will analyze content of any
Facebook Fan page with „likes‟ between 50,000
and 250,000
„Simply Measured‟ analyzes Facebook posts to
understand the content that performs the best &
the content that generates the highest
engagement
It makes recommendations on how to increase
the numbers of „shares‟, „likes‟ and comments onhttps://freebies.simplymeasured.com/freebies/facebook-content-analysis
13. Discussion
How do you feel about the using social
networking sites to mine data from the public?
How do you feel, knowing that very little you
post online is confidential, and that the
majority of what you post and engage with on
social media sites is used in market research?
Do you think that Social Media Research is a
viable form of primary data in qualitative
research?
14. References
Branthwaite, A. and Patterson, S. (2011). The power of qualitative research in
the era of social media. Qualitative Market Research: An International Journal,
14(4), pp.430 – 440.
Correa, T., Hinsley, W., and Gil de Zúñiga, H. (2009). Who interacts on the
web?: the intersection of users‟ personality and social media use. Computers in
Human Behaviour, 1186, pp. 7.
Social Media Research Foundation. (2014). Retrieved on March 10, 2014 at
http://www.smrfoundation.org/
Zaltzman, J. and Leichliter, B. (2013). Social media-related qualitative research.
New Qualitative Research. Retrieved on March 10, 2014 at
http://www.newqualitative.org/qualitative-research/social-media-qualitative/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Qualitative-Data-Analysis-
Program/169827373039318
https://freebies.simplymeasured.com/freebies/facebook-content-analysis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1o8WSMpQsU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3GPHV5Kp_I
