Two researchers from HP Labs had a question: could you predict box office revenues for movies based off of the activity in social media? What they found is that their ‘social media analysis model’ was more powerful of a predictor than the Hollywood Stock Exchange.
Their model? Analyzing the tweet rates per movie, and then factoring in positive and negative sentiment with each tweet.
They found that the movie Blind Side made more money the second weekend than it did the opening weekend. The reason? More people talked about the movie that week than in the week leading up to release.
This paper raised a question in my mind: If social media can be used to predict box office revenues, what can studios influence social media to increase revenues?