Thanks to
blogs, online forums, and product review sites, companies and marketers now
have access to a seemingly endless array of data on consumers’ opinions and
experiences. In principle, businesses should be able to use this information to
gain a better understanding of the general market and of their own and their
competitors’ customers.
Yet this
wealth of consumer–generated content can be both a blessing and a curse. A new
approach, described in a study by Oded Netzer, the Philip H. Geier Jr.
Associate Professor at Columbia Business School, offers a way to efficiently
aggregate and analyze this content.