Business Problem-Solving Case, Ch. 5
Text Mining for Gold?

1. What is the business impact of text mining? What problems does it solve? Text mining has had a large impact on business. Businesses are able to use text mining techniques to better understand their customers. It allows them access to unstructured data that were not available before, such as Facebook statuses, Twitter tweets, blogs, transcripts from call centers, e-mails, and phone calls. Text mining allows businesses to analyze that information for better decision making and it allows them to consolidate that information at lower costs since the cost of text mining programs is much less than the cost of paying hundreds of people to go through the information manually. It allows businesses to determine their weaker areas of customer service and begin improvements with their customer relations.
2. How does text mining improve operational efficiency and decision making? Text mining improves operational efficiency by use of software programs that analyze the available data and consolidate it. It removes the possibility of human error and allows businesses to save money in wages by reducing the number of employees necessary to manually analyze the information. Text mining improves decision making by allowing businesses access to information that was not available before. For example, according to the textbook, Kia was able to analyze the affect of its Super Bowl commercial by using text mining techniques to determine the level of "auto conversations" that occurred after their ad appeared. They were able to determine that Kia's name was mentioned 5% more often after their ad aired. By using the text mining techniques, they were able to determine what type of advertising most appealed to their consumers.
3. Is text mining more effective than humans doing the work manually? Explain your answer. Text mining programs are more effective than humans doing the work manually because it removes the possibility of human error. When manually done, analysis takes a lot of time and humans could possible bypass or overlook information that is important to the business. Humans also may have the inability to determine if something said in a telephone conversation is questionable or normal. With text mining, a computerized system is programmed to pick up on verbal nuances or key phrases that have been determined to be questionable. A computer program is also much less likely to miss important information as long as it is programmed correctly.
4. What are some of the drawbacks or shortcomings of text mining? One of the major drawbacks of text mining is that it could lead to higher unemployment. If businesses need less employees to get the job done, then it could lead to layoffs or lack of hiring. Another drawback is that it removes the human quality from the process, which is something that many customers prefer. Although many customers balk at taking a survey or receiving a telemarketing call, those types of information gathering at least show that there's a human side to the business. Another drawback to text mining is also privacy issues. Although people who use Facebook or Twitter, or write blogs, know that their information is public, it is a questionable practice to derive information without the user's permission.