The National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (Nectec) yesterday introduced a Thai language-based social media analytical tool to evaluate product popularity among the online population.
Social media analytics have captured 10% of the Thai research market over the past three years thanks to the popularity of social media.
Thailand has 18 million Facebook users, ranking the country 13th in the world, and 1.5 million Twitter accounts.
Chai Wutiwiwatchai, the head of Nectec's speech and audio technology laboratory, said the centre has developed S-Sense (social sensing) as a tool rather than relying on global technology.
The lab uses its unique ability in natural language processing and artificial intelligence to analyse Thai slang or jargon to increase its accuracy and understand the feeling when the slang is used.
Only a few tools can analyse language sentiment. Most mainly analyse the number of users and keywords.
The six players offering social media analytical tools are Google, Obvoc, ThoughtBuzz, ZocialEyes, ThothMedia and Cloud's marketing unit.
Nectec researcher Alisa Kongthon said S-Sense will collect, monitor, analyse and process information through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the popular web board at Pantip.com. Result accuracy will be about 85%.
Mr Chai said the lab is looking to partner cloud service providers to provide the analytical tool through web services so that small media enterprises will get data at affordable prices.
S-Sense also offers a customised system that businesses can install in their internal systems to analyse employee sentiment and plan business strategies.
Moreover, advertising and media agencies can use the tool to enhance customer relations and product development. The tool can assess brand and product popularity, particularly in the telecommunications, consumer goods and banking sectors.
A mobile application will be launched this month at Thailand Online Expo 2013.
Consumers can check the social media mood at http://pop.ssense.in.th.