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Polluting the River of Information: Contaminated Social Media Research

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Social media content does not always authentically reflect the views of the people who posted it, and social media market researchers would do well to learn from the dark side of public relations. While ethical publicists avoid the following activities, which are prohibited by the codes of PR associations, these activities do contaminate the river of information:

• Hidden intent
  • False flags – Pretending to be with another organization or supporting a competitor and making comments that will be used against it.
  • Sock puppetry – Creating a fake account on an Internet site specifically to engage in propaganda. Sock puppet accounts may be used to promote brands, detract from competing brands, or even engage in conversations with the account of the real user behind the sock puppet.
  • Shilling – Marketing or selling goods without making clear that there is a close or affiliate relationship with the seller.
• Misdirected intent
  • Astroturfing – Simulating the appearance of a grassroots campaign for or against a brand or policy.
  • Roach baiting – Engaging in hidden marketing campaigns designed to jumpstart viral awareness.
  • Spamdexing – Creating social media comments solely for the purpose of building links that will improve a site’s ranking on search engines.

Unfortunately, the market researcher turning to social media needs to keep these unethical behaviors in mind. When researching comments about the Atkins diet on Twitter, for instance, I encountered and excluded comments from a number of shills (affiliate marketers, in this case). Of course, every method has its problems with data quality – survey screeners typically try to exclude respondents who may have conflicts of interest, and survey questions needed to be worded to avoid social desirability bias, where people lie about their true attitudes and beliefs out of a desire to get along. And group dynamics can cause people to hide their true feelings when participating in a focus group.

My point is not that social-media research can’t be done because of such misleading content; only that it needs to be taken into account when analyzing social content. The volume of polluted content will vary significantly by brand and topic. Researcher, beware.