Business Social Media Analytics: Definition, Benefits, and Challenges

Based on a review of 27 research papers related to social media analytics (SMA), we develop an integrated, unifying definition of Business SMA, providing a nuanced starting point for future Business SMA research. Our definition goes beyond being entirely customer-focused, encompasses both the external and internal organizational environs, and goes beyond intelligence gathering to also accommodate activities such as sense making, insight generation, problem/opportunity detection and solution/exploitation, and decision making. Further, we identify several benefits of Business SMA, and elaborate on some of them, while presenting recent empirical evidence in support of our observations. The paper also describes several challenges facing Business SMA today, along with supporting evidence from the literature some of which also offer mitigating solutions in particular contexts. Accordingly, this research study helps further an understanding of Business SMA and its many aspects, grounded in recent empirical work, and is a basis for further research and development.