We are all in banks. Data, glass and financial
Everything changes: generations, perceptions, methodologies. Even conservative English financial institutions. More about that below, but as an example, let's start with two flash mobs: “ for adults ” (pictures from the 90s) and the answer “males” (“scream”).
When you look at the billions of public cries of millions of people, you realize how predictable and social we are. Bored “ pre- pensioners ” started a long flash mob “When we were young” in social networks (share photos from the 90s), to which generation Y responded in their own spirit: it caught fire and went out.
Let psychologists argue about the causes and effects, for this material, two graphs are sufficient that show the difference in the speeds of generational explosions and attenuation:
Photos from the 90s:
“Umora”:
It’s significant, isn't it? And now the translation of the article, how the Bank of England uses the analysis of social media data banks to pump people’s finances from glass jars of cash into financial non-cash banks.
It should be noted that:
How the Bank of England Predicts Economic Trends Through Social Media Analysis
( source )
In 2014, the Bank of England hired Paul Robinson, a former senior currency analyst at Barclays, to lead a fundamentally new data processing unit designed to analyze long-term financial and economic risks. Paul’s task is to “marry” the results of the headed structure with data from financial analysis, market stability in the areas of the bank’s activity, i.e. improving the quality of financial information for bank management.
Earlier, we already considered the issue of forecasting economic trends based on the statements of people in social networks, therefore we are interested in a real example of monitoring social media in the financial sector.
Talkwalker was able to get in touch with Paul, who kindly shared with us his thoughts on how the bank uses social media analysis systems.
Social media has become an important topic for all industries.
What was the motivation of the Bank of England in analyzing data from social media?
There are three main reasons why you should monitor social networks. First of all, social media has become a much more important source about society than, for example, 15 years ago. People discuss all aspects of their lives on Twitter and other networks, which gives us important information about future economic development. Secondly, technology has taken a big step forward in recent years, both in terms of social networks and in terms of monitoring tools. And finally, the area of responsibility of the Bank of England has become much wider, since we are now also responsible not only for banking and insurance regulation, but also for other, much more extensive financial aspects in society.
What is the monitoring and analytics department at the Bank of England? Do you already have your own team
c internal analysis system, or do you have some kind of more specialized approach?
We want to know how much social media affects economic development and how much it reflects in them. If, for example, we can find out how many people are interested in or discussing unemployment benefits, then this can help us make a prediction of where the economy is going.
There are things that cannot be completely covered by software solutions. For example, an automatic analysis of tonality must necessarily be checked by a person, since computers cannot recognize certain speech structures, such as sarcasm.
What tools do you use to monitor social media?
If we talk about tools, then we use in combination both some internal solutions and various software packages that we use for different purposes. We realized that different tools have their advantages and disadvantages, and each tool has its own specific area of application. Since we are interested in a broad understanding of the state of the economy, the constant updating of our monitoring tools helps us not to miss out on anything that people say online.
Regarding the monitoring results, we have created a special mechanism that groups various topics according
to the needs of our departments.
What is your overall impression? Are you completely satisfied with the reliability
and effectiveness of the data received?
I would say that it greatly depends on what exactly we are looking for. I also noticed that if we approach a topic with a positive attitude of people, then usually we get significantly better results. In terms of economics, there are three groups of topics that we want to understand. First of all, we need an objective point of view on what affects the market. Then, of course, it is important for us to know what is happening with the financial system itself to more accurately predict trends. And finally, we do thematic analytics on current events that seriously affect the economy.
Obviously, we need an integrated approach in which we can “listen” to people. Although monitoring social media helps us a lot, we rely on it as part of a wider analysis of sources, which helps us to get a clear picture of what drives people at any given moment. Social media monitoring is a key part of this process.
Due to the ever-increasing number of people sharing their thoughts on social media, the use of centralized platforms for research on social networks is becoming necessary. Development is needed - from simple monitoring of social media to the full collection and in-depth analysis of social data.
People share their emotions and thoughts on the open spaces of social media. In the current state of affairs, social media are the largest focus group of the Earth. Therefore, for banks and financial organizations, social data is an excellent source of information about the thoughts and opinions of people, their impact on economic development.
========
Our practical advice : do not hesitate to speak about the quality of services of banks, insurance companies, government agencies, telecom operators, manufacturers of telephones, cars and pans - we confirm responsibly, more and more business and government agencies are carefully listening and begin to respond (including through social networks). For the first half of 2015, half of Brand Analytics customers moved from the “ pure monitoring and analytics ” phase to the phaseactive work with responses and answers.
Speak - and they will hear you! :-)
When you look at the billions of public cries of millions of people, you realize how predictable and social we are. Bored “ pre- pensioners ” started a long flash mob “When we were young” in social networks (share photos from the 90s), to which generation Y responded in their own spirit: it caught fire and went out.
Let psychologists argue about the causes and effects, for this material, two graphs are sufficient that show the difference in the speeds of generational explosions and attenuation:
Photos from the 90s:
“Umora”:
It’s significant, isn't it? And now the translation of the article, how the Bank of England uses the analysis of social media data banks to pump people’s finances from glass jars of cash into financial non-cash banks.
It should be noted that:
- Russian and Kazakh banks (Brand Analytics customers) have overtaken the Bank of England for years and have been using social media analytics for a long time (since 2012), proactively (not only watching, but also encouraging) and, hopefully, successfully. So conservatism - even in finance - is not always good.
- We have repeatedly indicated the weakness of linguistic decisions in the West ( here is the latest recent material ), therefore the skepticism of the British about the accuracy of automatic tonality should be considered in the framework of this weakness. When it comes to dozens of analyzed messages, nobody is better than a person, of course. But if you need to process thousands and millions of messages (the release of a new iPhone or the Fed does not raise the interest rate), then you need to pull the ostrich's head out of the sand and solve the problem.
How the Bank of England Predicts Economic Trends Through Social Media Analysis
( source )
In 2014, the Bank of England hired Paul Robinson, a former senior currency analyst at Barclays, to lead a fundamentally new data processing unit designed to analyze long-term financial and economic risks. Paul’s task is to “marry” the results of the headed structure with data from financial analysis, market stability in the areas of the bank’s activity, i.e. improving the quality of financial information for bank management.
Earlier, we already considered the issue of forecasting economic trends based on the statements of people in social networks, therefore we are interested in a real example of monitoring social media in the financial sector.
Talkwalker was able to get in touch with Paul, who kindly shared with us his thoughts on how the bank uses social media analysis systems.
Social media has become an important topic for all industries.
What was the motivation of the Bank of England in analyzing data from social media?
There are three main reasons why you should monitor social networks. First of all, social media has become a much more important source about society than, for example, 15 years ago. People discuss all aspects of their lives on Twitter and other networks, which gives us important information about future economic development. Secondly, technology has taken a big step forward in recent years, both in terms of social networks and in terms of monitoring tools. And finally, the area of responsibility of the Bank of England has become much wider, since we are now also responsible not only for banking and insurance regulation, but also for other, much more extensive financial aspects in society.
What is the monitoring and analytics department at the Bank of England? Do you already have your own team
c internal analysis system, or do you have some kind of more specialized approach?
We want to know how much social media affects economic development and how much it reflects in them. If, for example, we can find out how many people are interested in or discussing unemployment benefits, then this can help us make a prediction of where the economy is going.
There are things that cannot be completely covered by software solutions. For example, an automatic analysis of tonality must necessarily be checked by a person, since computers cannot recognize certain speech structures, such as sarcasm.
What tools do you use to monitor social media?
If we talk about tools, then we use in combination both some internal solutions and various software packages that we use for different purposes. We realized that different tools have their advantages and disadvantages, and each tool has its own specific area of application. Since we are interested in a broad understanding of the state of the economy, the constant updating of our monitoring tools helps us not to miss out on anything that people say online.
Regarding the monitoring results, we have created a special mechanism that groups various topics according
to the needs of our departments.
What is your overall impression? Are you completely satisfied with the reliability
and effectiveness of the data received?
I would say that it greatly depends on what exactly we are looking for. I also noticed that if we approach a topic with a positive attitude of people, then usually we get significantly better results. In terms of economics, there are three groups of topics that we want to understand. First of all, we need an objective point of view on what affects the market. Then, of course, it is important for us to know what is happening with the financial system itself to more accurately predict trends. And finally, we do thematic analytics on current events that seriously affect the economy.
Obviously, we need an integrated approach in which we can “listen” to people. Although monitoring social media helps us a lot, we rely on it as part of a wider analysis of sources, which helps us to get a clear picture of what drives people at any given moment. Social media monitoring is a key part of this process.
Due to the ever-increasing number of people sharing their thoughts on social media, the use of centralized platforms for research on social networks is becoming necessary. Development is needed - from simple monitoring of social media to the full collection and in-depth analysis of social data.
People share their emotions and thoughts on the open spaces of social media. In the current state of affairs, social media are the largest focus group of the Earth. Therefore, for banks and financial organizations, social data is an excellent source of information about the thoughts and opinions of people, their impact on economic development.
========
Our practical advice : do not hesitate to speak about the quality of services of banks, insurance companies, government agencies, telecom operators, manufacturers of telephones, cars and pans - we confirm responsibly, more and more business and government agencies are carefully listening and begin to respond (including through social networks). For the first half of 2015, half of Brand Analytics customers moved from the “ pure monitoring and analytics ” phase to the phaseactive work with responses and answers.
Speak - and they will hear you! :-)