Digital Marketing Insights

We were sitting in the office (as usual), chatting in general (as usual too) about the ICC World Cup and India’s chances of winning (As you can see here below – please note, this is a reconstructed scene to give more drama to our blog post).

Suddenly, an idea sparked in our collective head.

We had heard about the collective wisdom being used to predict court cases and even a movie’s run on the box office – what if we try and see, if we can predict the match outcomes based on the general online chatter?

We tinkered with the algorithm and did a few dry runs, after a few iterations it started working ‘flawlessly’, and thus was born theEthinos Match Predictor. A simple tool which collated what people were talking online about various teams into the buckets of positive, negative and neutral data and predicted the match outcomes based on the respective chatter volumes.

The algorithm used for the Predictor was something like this:

The chance of winning for Team A = [{(A+)* – (A-)*/(Total A)} * {(Total A)*+(Total B)*}]%

Where in:
• (A+)* = Positive Chatter Volume for Team A
• (A-)* = Negative Chatter Volume for Team A
• (Total A)* = Total chatter with mentions for Team A
• (Total B)* = Total Chatter with mentions for Team B

It would not be an exaggeration to state that we had a dream run with the Match Predictor and managed to call 12 of the fourteen matches! Alas we aren’t into betting!

It was promoted online solely through our respective tweets, messages, threats and coercions and soon we were able to generate some interest!

Apart from the prediction, the tool was also measuring a few other ‘key’ details like the popularity of ‘Cricket’ the keyword, in comparison to a few other keywords like ‘Food’, ‘Movies’, ‘News’ and most importantly, ‘Sex’. It was re-assuring to see ‘Cricket’ going strong all through the tournament with an occasional week-end topple by ‘Sex’ (we are still wondering why the search volumes for ‘Sex’ went up every weekend religiously)

There were many other important revelations like the online interest for “Dhoni” went past even “Sachin” on the eve of the final match.

It is rumored that this tool resulted in huge losses to all those bookies who had not ‘liked’ the Ethinos page on Facebook and yes we DID get a few ‘pokes’ by super hot blonde fans but as you all may know, we were too busy with our work and clients to care!

In case you intend to check the Match Predictor again, do visit here.

Please Note: Next stop-> IPL Match Predictor – Watch this space for more!!!

Siddharth Hegde

Marketer, Maven, Mentor. 3 Ms that define Siddharth Hegde, a.k.a. Sidd, Managing Director of the effervescent and ebullient Digital Marketing Agency, Ethinos. He tucks in over 18 years of sales & marketing experience under his belt, gathered from Fortune 500 and other inspiring companies that he has worked with. Sidd is a technology zealot since almost two decades, keenly tracking the interplay between technology, design, and usability across products and services. He brings to the table an industry understanding & background in digital strategy formulation & implementation. In his free time, he enjoys sailing, scuba diving, white water rafting, trekking, and seeking out the outdoors.