It was only a couple of weeks ago that Youtube Founders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen bought social bookmarking service Delicious from Yahoo and announced the formation of their “internet company” AVOS. But it seems they are on a buying spree with acquisition of the real-time social media intelligence and engagement platform Tap11.
Tap11 analyses the Twitter fire-hose and provides a way for brands to monitor how people are interacting and engaging with their brands across the leading social networks. With most market research still done by telephone calls, consumer panels, and accosting people on the streets, the open discussion on social media offers brands new insights into how their products are being received and the information could be invaluable if analysed properly, which is exactly where Tap11 has positioned itself.
The combination, therefore, of the real-time comment analysis of Tap11 and link popularity and organisation of Delicious could be combined to provide in-depth analysis across a broad spectrum of web users. If AVOS stay on this path we may see them making a play for a web analytics firm like Quantcast and a website analytics such as Clicky or CrazyEgg to provide brands with a single stop solution for engagement across the wider web and funnelled into their own sites.
[via GigaOm]