Invited to sit on a panel together with Paul Holmes at the PR Forum held in Bucharest March 26, Pascal shared thoughts about the Big Data tsunami which is deeply transforming marketing, communications and PR. What is "Big Data" exactly, what does it mean to businesses, why does it matter to us, and what potential issues could arise from it?

1. What Big Data
means for PR,
and why it
matters to us.
Pascal Beucler, Senior Vice President & Chief Strategy Officer,
MSLGROUP – PR FORUM BUCHAREST, March 26, 2014
@pbeucler

3. Agenda
1. Big Data?
2. The Now > How organizations are using data today
3. The Next > What’s in-store for the future
What Big Data means for PR, and why it matters to us.

4. Part 1: Big data?

5. 1.
We are creating data all the time.
Sometimes consciously,
increasingly not.

6. People-generated data
Social-generated data
Object-generated data
Location-based & personalized online data that is implicitly shared
during transactions, or explicitly shared such as on social media
Big Web Platforms are aggregating data, thus mining collective
intelligence for their own use & for third party apps
More and more sensor-based devices (such as phones, wearable
fitness trackers or smart appliances) help track & share real-world data
Broadly speaking,
three kinds of data
exist:
1. We are creating data all the time. Sometimes consciously, increasingly not.

7. “Data Never Sleeps”
infographic by DOMO
Here’s an idea of
how much data
we create
every minute

8. 2.
Data is influencing people’s behavior
and purchase decisions.

9. 2. Data is influencing people’s behavior and purchase decisions.
People are using
data to track,
compare and
change their own
behaviour
People are accessing
news & information
that have been
selected by
algorithms
People rely on
aggregated ratings
& reviews when
making purchase
decisions
Wearable tracking devices for blood
pressure / fitness
Algorithms decide what appears in
Google search results, Twitter
Trends, Facebook newsfeed
Aggregated ratings appear on review
sites like IMDB and e-commerce
sites like Amazon and eBay

10. 3.
Big Data is Good for Business.

11. Organizations that tap into Big Data
are said to have better productivity
rates and higher profitability than
peers that don’t, by helping them
discover hidden insights and enrich
information for decision makers.
3. Big Data is Good for Business.
McKinsey: “Big data: The next frontier for innovation, competition, and productivity”

12. And… more businesses are investing in it,
day after day.
A survey of 100 senior executives at Fortune 1000
American companies found:
• 91% have a big data initiative planned or in progress
• 88% expect to spend > $1 million on big data by 2016
• 50% expect to spend > $10 million!
NewVantage Partners Big Data Executive Survey 2013

13. Bottom line: Data is the new currency.
Data is the currency of the Information Age:
what we need to extract value from.
The value of social data to businesses can’t be
expressed by a single number.
But when companies take the right social data
and apply the right analyses to improve decision-
making, they create social data equity.
Jon Iwata
SVP - Marketing and Communications
& Chairman of the IBM Strategy Team,
at the Holmes Global PR Summit in Miami
“Whether on transactions,
interactions or content creation,
data is what's helping us
understand the behavior of
people.”

14. Part 2: The Now > How
organizations are using data
today

15. Organizations are using data to… identify behavioral patterns
Companies & social networks
with large amounts of social &
transactional data are
analyzing it to understand
people’s behavior…
facebook.com/data

16. Organizations are using data to… identify trends
Companies & social networks
with large amounts of social &
transactional data are
analyzing it to understand
trends…
Overview – Google Flu Trends - youtube.com/watch?v=6111nS66Dpk

17. Organizations are using data to… predict future behavior
… and to predict people’s
future behavior (and like
Target did, send them ads for
products they don’t even know
they need yet!)
How? By identifying about 25 products
that, when analyzed together, help assign
each shopper a “pregnancy prediction”
score, including a due date to within a
small window, so Target could send
coupons timed to very specific stages of
her pregnancy.
forbes.com/sites/kashmirhill/2012/02/16/how-target-figured-out-a-teen-girl-was-pregnant-before-her-father-did/

18. Organizations are using data to… help us track our behavior
Organizations help track our
energy consumption:
Opower tracks people’s
consumption an compares it
with their neighbors – to
help them manage their
consumption.
opower.com/

19. Organizations are using data to… help us track our behavior
And our physical activity:
Nike+ products measures
people’s activity and presents
them as Fuel Points – which
people can compare with
friends and peers.
Introducing Nike Fuel - youtube.com/watch?v=bvMohoDFZ30

20. Organizations are using data to… help us track our behavior
And even our finances:
Intuit’s Mint.com helps people
aggregate all their financial
accounts into one
dashboard and set goals –
and shows how they are
performing against peers.
opower.com/

21. Organizations are using data to… crowdsource insights
They also help us track traffic
and road conditions.
Waze crowdsources data
from millions of users and
uses it to compute the best
routes – in real time.
Introducing Waze - youtube.com/watch?v=R8WKW0xeBxU

22. Organizations are using data to… crowdsource insights
And business opportunities.
KBC Bank in Brussels
crowdsourced ‘gaps’ in the
market to help entrepreneurs
identify where their services
would be most needed.
KBC Bank’s Gap in the Maket - youtube.com/watch?v=U76EIiTW_LE

23. Part 3: The Next > What’s
in-store for the future

24. The Scope of Big Data is very wide.
Today, we have
Big Data-driven….
Web
Intelligence
Business
Intelligence
Trend
Analysis
Competitive
Intelligence
Technology
Intelligence
Collective
Intelligence
Audience
Intelligence

25. Big data is transforming the future of insights generation and reputation
management, core parts of our business.
Data-driven insights are
crucial for the PR industry:
they provide credibility to our
strategic planning, research
and insights.
Such a capacity is a must-have
nowadays.
Data is a transcript of
companies’ reputations, a
wealth of comments that are
preserved, growing daily and
evolving over time.
It is the norm today to monitor
social data to feel the pulse of
stakeholders and identify crises
early on.
Insights
Reputation

26. With tools including:
We have already begun using Big Data in PR, to…
• Identify our audience’s
interests and
sentiments
• Identify the real
influencers, by
geography and interest
• Analyze brand’s
position in the
competitive landscape
• Monitor what people are
saying, in the past and in
the now (to identify
crisis)
• Measure engagement,
conversations and shift in
perception (to measure
response)
Generate
Insights Safeguard
Reputation

28. MSLGROUP’s indexSocial
MSLGROUP Espalhe’s
indexSocial helps brands compare
their social performance against
competitors & discover insights
about their strategy.
Overview: indexSocial - youtube.com/watch?v=P6yveCvN1vM

29. MSLGROUP’s Social Hive Index
MSLGROUP’s Social Hive Index
allows brands to select relevant
parameters and compare
performance of brands.
In Action: The PurPle Index studies how
the Fortune 100 brands engage people
around health, environment, education &
human potential.
Introducing the PurPle Index - mslgroup.com/insights/publications/2013/purple-index/

30. Big data offers solutions not just for consumers but also for employees.
Several organizations are using Big
Data to engage employees – with
initiatives ranging from data-driven
training and retention strategies
to personalized intranets,

31. How we should continue to use Big Data in 2014
Big Data is a new field, one that didn’t exist 20 years ago. As we re-define the
boundaries of PR today, there is an opportunity for us to become the custodians
of Big Data.
We should embrace data to:
• Generate better insights - using pre-existing data or crowdsourcing fresh data
• Evolve storytelling tactics – with personalized messages based on real time/predictive analysis
• Identify & celebrate new milestones – with new measurable metrics like NikeFuel
• Measure brand promise and citizenship initiatives – using sensor devices or crowdsourcing
• Design better engagement programs – personalize experiences for consumers & employees
alike

32. To deliver on this, it is important for us to become data analysts.
Hal Varian
Chief Economist, Google
“The ability to take data—to be able to
understand it, to process it, to extract value
from it, to visualize it, to communicate it…
“that’s going to be a hugely important skill in the
next decades.”

33. But: We must also pay attention to Security & Privacy concerns.
People are worried about:
• Illegal surveillance of data
• Data breaches
• Privacy breaches
• Marketers’ using their data
Source: theguardian.com , cnbc.com, huffingonpost.com, blogs.wsj.com

34. And let’s be clever and engaging.
• We know people dislike intrusive messaging, and are seeing their weariness as
social networks push out more intrusive messaging (such as YouTube ads that
can no longer be ‘skipped’).
• We have an opportunity to shape the direction of the new industry. We shoudn’t
use the old way of broadcasting, but instead should respect people’s ethos and
deliver clever, respectful and engaging experiences.
• Let’s shift from intrusive and creepy, to create delight and added value for all.

35. MSLGROUP.COM
@mslgroup
pascal.beucler@mslgroup.com