This ‘strata’ visualization shows a stratification of the top topics of discussion by volume and how they evolve over time. Using Pulsar‘s semantic analysis tools we have clustered the messages around a few topic areas.

The content of the conversations between researchers on Twitter is highly self-referential, i.e. researchers talk a lot about social media itself. Large strata include “social media”, “Twitter”, “social media marketing”, “Facebook”. This demonstrates that many people in the industry are still going through a learning phase when it comes to using social media.

Sharing and accessing content is the main reason why researchers use Twitter and the significant uptake of content filtering tools by researchers such as Paper.li (“Daily Personal Twitter Newspaper) is a clear signal of this.

Blogging does have a presence, however, so aside from status updates there is still a place for longer-form writing in the industry and Twitter is where you promote it or self promote it e.g. “Personal Branding”

[Privacy Disclaimer: SMinR analysis and results based exclusively on data publicly available on Twitter]

More on the study here “Social Media in Research Study: is the research industry lagging behind?“

Researchers seem to have a clear perception of the key benefits of using social media for research purposes. Social media offers a window into naturally occurring behaviours and in this sense is seen as an invaluable observation tool to get an understanding of consumers (“people”)

“People” ranking second – success! Perhaps market researchers are getting keener on talking about people as people, rather than using slightly alienating terms such as ‘consumers’ or ‘respondents’. Then again, “consumer’ is #5 so we’re not cured yet…

Having quick access to valuable information is still seen as the key benefit of using social media in research. Social media seems to be all about keeping up to date with fast moving trends, shape-shifting segments and real-time flows of content. (“Trends” “Information” “Quick” “Fast”)

Beyond content sharing/gathering, social media is seen as a key tool to keep in touch with or “checking out” clients. In this respect many see social media as something they have to be seen to be involved with or at least show an understanding of in order to impress clients: “they want to know about it so we have to show that we know about it”.

A selection of verbatim comments on the benefits of using social media in research

Finger on the pulse
“An immediately available feel for what’s going on out there; it allows me to gain a quick perspective on all sorts of different targets and markets”

Targeting youth
“Connecting with younger audiences, who are less responsive to traditional research methods”

Industry networking
“As a freelance researcher I find it a great way to connect with other researchers. [Twitter] is like a surrogate office for me”

Getting stuck in…
“Need to be aware of the tools people are using in their lives, understand options for communicating with people, learning is extremely important – constantly learning about everything”

…or not
“We try and stay on top of the social media trends so we understand what new things our consumers are up to (e.g. Foursquare) but I don’t necessarily sign up to them myself”

Client demand
“Clients want to know about it so I make sure I know about it”

Lingering scepticism
“Unconvinced as of yet, appears to be just a clique of people talking to each other”

Every man for himself
“I am very interested in getting work through contacts and spreading malicious rumours”

[Privacy Disclaimer: SMinR analysis and results based exclusively on data publicly available on Twitter]

More on the study here “Social Media in Research Study: is the research industry lagging behind?“