IBM Applies Analytics to Social Media

According to Erick Brethenoux, head of creative analytics strategy for SPSS , the upgrade to the text analytics capabilities of the SPSS Modeler data mining and text analytics workbench represents an advance in that the software can detect the contextual nuances between references such as "orange," which in some instances may refer to the fruit, while in other cases may be referring to the French provider of telecommunications services. The software, he said, can also identify images such as emoticons, he added.

Brethenoux said that while there are a number of text analytics tools available, the IBM offering is the most comprehensive in terms of its ability to analyze text from a variety of sources beyond social media networks to give users a fuller picture of any given trend or set of data.

However, Brethenoux added a note of caution in terms of how text analytics is applied to social media in terms of only accessing data that is publicly available, versus harvesting all the information available on social media networks such as Facebook.

The text analytics capability is only available in the premium edition of the SPPS Modeler.