Evaluating Buzz Monitoring Tools - Suggestions?

My team is currently in the process of evaluating buzz monitoring software to get a better grasp on Jive, its competitors, and the enterprise software industry in general. When I say "buzz monitoring," I mean a tool that tracks blogs, wikis, discussion forums, news sites, and other online communities for specific keywords, and helps aggregate and analyze that data to determine trends, supporters, product feedback, etc. I'm hoping some other folks out there may have feedback for Justin and I?

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Right now, here is an initial list of products being reviewed:

• BuzzLogic - we were also evaluating this when I was at Anvil Media
• BuzzMetrics - BrandPulse/BlogPulse (by Nielsen)
• BuzzPerception (by CustomScoop)
• Orchestra (by Cymphony)
• Radian6 - thanks to @davidalston, @RichardMcinnis, and @lebrun on Twitter
• SEER (by VML)
• TruCast (by VisibleTechnologies)
• Umbria

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The basic requirements are as follows:

Track/Monitor

• Track social media by site and by source (some bloggers post on multiple sites)
• Allow for both branded search ("Jive"), competitors, and general industry terms ("collaboration software")
  • Including advanced search operators (and, or, not) to filter noise
• Weighting/ranking of posts -- some are high impact (ZDNet) some are low impact (personal blogs)

Analyze

• Allow for trend analysis
  • Data import/export to integrate with Google Analytics, Eloqua, and SalesForce traffic & lead data
• Record tone of post (positive, neutral, negative)
• Record meme of post
• Record product discussed in post (Clearspace, Clearspace X, Openfire, etc.)
• Allow for human intervention in automated processes
  
  • Weighting
  • Tone
  • Meme

React/Participate

• Tools for getting involved in external conversations
  • Track replies to comments
• Track offline/back-channel communication (a.k.a. CRM when conversation ends up on email)
  • Depending on the CRM capabilities of the tool, we might also consider integration with SalesForce.com to manage blogger relationships

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Does anyone have experience with these products and services? Any recommendations? For example, Jason Falls has a great video over on his blog about his visit with Radian6.

Comments

[Marcel LeBrun]

Hi Paul,
One person that you might want to connect with who has this experience is Jason Falls at http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com

We met with him today and he has evaluated several providers (including many of those above). Jason really knows his stuff and he is a great guy to deal with. Disclosure: Jason does use Radian6 for certain client work, but he really does have a good balanced view of each product's strengths depending on your needs and would certainly give you the straight goods.

[Tom O'Brien]

Hi Paul:

We do this - feel free to take a look at:

www.motivequest.com

Our take is less about data presentation and more about a deep understanding of the core human motivations and drivers as well as competitive dynamics.

Thanks -

TO'B

http://humanvoice.wordpress.com

[Paul Biggs]

Great feedback, thanks!

@Marcel - I'll reach out to Jason.

@Tom - what software do you use (or is it homegrown) to track social media?

[Blake Cahill]

Thanks for including us in the evaluation process. We look forward to our demo next week. Will send over an NDA in advance.

Blake
Visible Technologies

[Jason Falls]

Paul -- Just sent an email that may help. I've gone through the same process and applaud your wide net to find the right folks. One good firm that wasn't on your list I would say is worth a look see is K.D. Paine and Associates. I think they are at diydashboard.com.

I have one client whose needs are somewhat similar to yours and for them we use Radian6. What I learned through the vetting process, though, was that no firm is right for every client all the time. I know that doesn't help you narrow it down, but since you're looking for just you and not a list of different clients with different needs, once you're done, you're done.

I think Radian6 is most definitely capable of providing you with what you need. And I can attest that the staff there are some of the best folks you'll ever meet. They listen and they're helpful. Oh, and there software is pretty darn strong, too.

Good luck and please let me know if I can help further.

[Hal Newton]

A few more for the list.

http://www.sentimentmetrics.com/
http://www.scoutlabs.com/