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American Idol Finale: Can We Predict the Winner Once Again?

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On last night’s episode Crystal Bowersox and Lee DeWyze competed for the final time for the coveted title of American Idol.  Each performed 3 songs, the first was their favorite song of the season, the second was chosen by executive producer Simon Fuller and the third is the first single they will release if they win tonight.

 
For his favorite song Lee chose “The Boxer.”  The judges were pleased, for the most part, with his performance.  Simon Fuller chose “Everybody Hurts” for his second song.  The judges again gave Lee some positive feedback but Ellen said she wished he would have let go a bit more and Simon said he seemed nervous.  For his final song, and possible single, Lee sang “Beautiful Day.” The judges were pleased with his final performance to which Simon said that the competition was designed for someone like him.

For her first song Crystal chose “Me and Bobby McGee” for which all of the judges gave Crystal positive feeback.  The song Fuller chose for Crystal was “Black Velvet,” the judges were again impressed. And finally she sang “Up To The Mountain” for her last song, and potential single.  The judges also praised her for this performance.  In fact Simon said “I thought that was by far the performance and the song of the night. And since this is going to be the final critique I’m ever going to give, that was outstanding.”

In order to determine who is most likely to be named the Season 9 American Idol; we looked at social media and search data. Who do you think will win tonight?

If you have been keeping up with Season 9 please share your thoughts by commenting below. But before you do, check out the facts from search and social media data that we have gathered below.
 

Chatter about Lee DeWyze is much stronger on Twitter and Google than it is for Crystal.  Tough Crystal has  stronger showing on Digg and YouTube.

Google Insights:
 

Google Insight data shows an overwhelming growth in popularity of searches for “American Idol Lee,” “Lee DeWyze” and “American Idol Hallelujah,” which is a song Lee performed on the show. 

Will Lee's sudden surge in online searches and social media mentions translate into more votes?  Tell us what you think.  And don’t forget to tune into tonight to find out who wins Season 9 of American Idol!

 **If you are a new reader to ymarketing's American Idol Prediction Project, check out our past blogs to understand how our Idol Prediction Project works, and how it led to the correct upset prediction of Kris Allen over Adam Lambert in 2009.

American Idol Judges Heat Up Google & Twitter | ymarketing.com

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Will Ellen or Simon Emerge as the Leader in Web Searches & Tweets

• Simon Cowell - Will he leave after this season? What about that contract?
• Ellen DeGeneres - Will she bring value to the viewers and How much will her Twitter Army affect this year's outcome?
• Paula Abdul - Will America miss her? Did she get a raw deal?
• Randy Jackson and Kara Dioguardi - How much attention can they attract amongst these dynamic personalities?

American Idol Trend & Research Methodology

Readers that followed this ymarketing Predicting Idol Winners blog series last year are familiar with our approach; we use online research tools that measure the impact and scale of searches, comments and buzz around an individual (or a brand) and assess their relative popularity online. While some of our much larger competitors used only search engine data to compile their predictions last season - and got it all WRONG, picking Adam Lambert as the winner - we focused instead on a much broader picture of online interest, factoring in data from Digg, Facebook, Twitter, iTunes, blogs and other social media.... and arrived at the documented CORRECT prediction that Kris Allen would win Idol.

Who's the Judge On Fire?

As USA Today's recent article and Idol Chatter Blog noted, the buzz this season is "all about the judges as Ellen arrives" and "Simon Cowell's exit." You might think that Simon Cowell would lead all judges in terms of popularity and buzz - especially with all the contract talk of late - but by Google and Twitter standards it's all Ellen. Worldwide interest in Ellen appears to have its epicenter in Canada, followed by the US, Singapore, Australia and South Africa.

The Most Tweets?

Ellen DeGeneres is by far and away the leader on Twitter as well. Hmmm, with three Twitter accounts of her own including @TheEllenShow (4 million followers), @Ellen_DeGeneres (85K) and this fan site @EllenFans (34K), I guess this Twitter thing actually works, huh? Simon, in contrast, appears to have just 21K followers @Scowell1 and four tweets to his name (lame, come on Simon!).

Twitter volume with the first names of the judges

Twitter volume with the full names of the judges

Digg

Digg - with a large following of over 40MM unique visitors - is another quality measure of online popularity. And the Idol Heatmap for Digg clearly shows Simon out front, followed by Ellen and Paula, with Randy and Kara bringing up the rear. 

Paula Interest Still High

Paula Abdul pulls in the 3rd place rank overall in interest in search and social media with relatively strong showings in both Twitter and Digg, while Randy and Kara are nearly non-existent.

Idol Interest

So what do you think? Will Simon and Ellen continue to dominate headlines throughout the year or will the contestant chatter takeover in coming weeks? Did anyone emerge in the debut show you think can draw significant interest?

If you are keeping score at home, for now it's:

• Simon Cowell - Digg #1
• Ellen DeGeneres - Google #1, Twitter #1
• Paula Abdul, Randy Jackson & Kara Dioguardi - So far in a clear trailing position
  

Now that GM stands for “Government Motors” – let’s look under the hood | ymarketing

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Can Search and Social Media data predict the value, the interest, the likelihood that an individual division of GM will survive? As readers of this blog know, we successfully used this very same data to predict winners and losers of American Idol. This time we turned our data and analysis to three key pistons inside the engine of GM that are likely to play a major role in the bankruptcy, sell-off and self-dubbed company "reinvention": Cadillac, Hummer and Saturn.

Cadillac - down but not forgotten

In the green we've charted Cadillac's unit sales over the last two years (annual volumes shown) and estimated a small downturn for 2009. The blue line indicates the relative interest in Cadillac as shown by volume of search queries across Google in the automotive category alone ("Cadillac Margaritas", for example, would not show up in these results). Using search volume as a proxy for consumer interest, we can see that interest in Cadillac has remained fairly high, with an index of 73 for Q2 of 2009 - nearly the same as the 75 index in Q4 2007. Although interest has been a bit higher (the peak was an index of 83 in Q1 2008) and a bit lower (the low was 69 in Q3 2008), it has remained relatively consistent across the last 7 quarters.

But what about Social Media? Using Facebook Lexicon as a proxy for Consumer Interest (what Facebook's 200 million members write about on each other's "walls"), we see a slightly different picture. Cadillac mentions peaked in Q4 2007, had a brief resurgence around the Holidays of last year, but have been falling ever since. With an index of 41 now vs. 73 in 2007, Cadillac's Social Media index is now off more than 40%.

Since a careful analysis of both Facebook and Google data revealed the winner of American Idol, we're going to keep close tabs on both of these disparate data sources for now. However, if we follow the assumption that Facebook represents consumer perception, higher up the sales funnel than Google search, one might assume that Cadillac search and purchase interest might wane in coming quarters.

Hummer - a lost cause (but you knew that)

Hummer interest is off the charts... in a bad way. Google search interest is way off, down to an index of 39 from a high 67 in Q1 2008 (off more than 40%).  Facebook chatter paints the same picture: In Q2 2009 the index is 64, down from the high in Q2 2008 of 97 - a drop of nearly 35%. It seems that the oil crisis of Summer 2008 may have doomed this brand for good. Sales figures from GM confirm this fact as well, as Hummer posted less than half the 2008 sales as in 2007.

Saturn - sales holding steady, but interest is falling out of orbit

Studying the search and social media around the Saturn automobile brand by sticking to just automotive categories - carefully excluding the search mania centered around "Viewing Saturn" as it approached Earth in July of 2008 - shows us that while sales volume drop off (22% drop from 2007 to 2008) Saturn has fared better than most GM divisions. But, this particular division just doesn't seem to get people "talking" (or more accurately put, searching or writing wall posts).

Worldwide Google search volume for the Saturn brand peaked last Summer (while fuel approached $5/gallon) but has dropped off considerably since that time; from a high index of 65 in Q3 2008 to just 42 in Q2 2009 (a drop of more than 35%).

The Facebook index paints a similar picture: The most recent quarter's index of 29 is down more than 35% from last Summer's high of 45.

What's even more interesting?

You can compare the Facebook indices between the brands, and you see a picture that emerges like this for the most recent quarter:

What's Surprising? Hummer has by far the most interest among Facebook's masses, and Saturn has the least; the inverse of their sales figures. What we've learned from analyzing Facebook for some time now is that the TRENDS are far more important than the overall volume of data, and trend-wise it doesn't look good for any of these three falling brands.

What about Google? We can compare the indices for 2009 here as well:

While overall interest among searchers is highest for Cadillac by nearly a 2:1 margin worldwide...

... Growth in searches is for Saturn is actually faring the best, with Cadillac making a surge in interest late in May 2009. Interest in Hummer has lagged the general category for all of 2009.

We're talking about Global data for Google Searches, so we asked the natural question: where are all these buyers?

Interest in the Cadillac brand is actually highest in Iraq (as measured by Google's weighted indices around the globe), followed by the US and Canada, with Estonia and Sweden rounding out the top 5.

The hot bed of Hummer searching is in Costa Rica, believe it or not, followed by three other Central and South American states. The US ranks 7^th, just behind Slovakia.

The Saturn brand appears to be almost entirely a North American phenomenon, likely owing primarily to distribution. Although there are pockets of interest in Europe and Mexico.

What do you think? How will Cadillac, Hummer and Saturn fare under the leadership - permanent or temporary - of the Obama Adminstration? Your opinion, comments and questions are welcomed here.

Google Insights Predicts Kris Allen Will Become the Next American Idol | ymarketing

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DATELINE: Los Angeles, Wednesday 05/20/09 @ 11AM PT

Regular readers of this blog know that we've been using search and social media data to predict the next American Idol. Since we began the blog we've identified Adam Lambert's overwhelming popularity within this data. You could even argue he's become a "brand" in and of himself. But several weeks back we also identified the rising popularity of Kris Allen. After the two faced off Tuesday, May 19 on the American Idol Finals performance show we knew this project begged for one last blog.

Who will be crowned Wednesday Night's Winner?

Looking at the cumulative data and trying to make the argument against Adam Lambert is like trying to argue that Simon Cowell has nice hair--not an easy task. But as we discussed in last week's Idol Prediction blog, The Search for an Upset: Could a Perfect Storm Propel Kris Allen into the Next American Idol, Adam seems to also be facing a mounting backlash. This seemingly happens to any favorite in just about any competition; America just loves an underdog.

In order to try to zero in on this idea of "momentum" playing a role in predicting the next American Idol, we turned to Google Insights. The results of analyzing both "kris allen" and "adam lambert" related terms were surprising:

• Looking at the Top 10 rising searches over the past 30 days, "kris allen" related terms have outpaced "adam lambert" related terms by 2 to 1
• Breakout terms, terms rising faster than Google calculates the rate of increase, show Kris with a 3 to 1 edge

Google Insights Top 10 Rising Searches - Past 30 days

• Looking at the same data over the past 7 days, Kris' lead of the Top 10 rising searches grows to
  nearly 3 to 1
• Breakout terms show Kris again with a 3 to 1 edge
• Terms rising at a rate greater than 250% show Kris with a slightly better than 2 to 1 lead

Google Insights Top 10 Rising Searches - Past 7 days

Beyond the overall numbers favoring Kris, there's even more evidence of Adam Lambert's popularity erosion when you look at the data on a ‘per name' basis. For instance, looking at just "kris allen" related terms over both the past 30 and past 7 days we see ONLY searches related to his name and Idol in Rising Searches.

However, looking at just "adam lambert" related terms over both the past 30 and past 7 days we see Kris invading these Rising Searches. This includes Kris owning the Top 2 and 3 of the Top 4 risers over the past 7 days. It's this Adam-related Kris surge that for the first time shows Kris not just near even with Adam, but instead as the dominant force.

The Prediction
If you look at all the data, as we stated in last week's blog this race is going to be close. Too close for ymarketing to predict the winner. But if you ask Google Insights, Arkansas' own Kris Allen will shock the world in the Finals Result show tonight, Wednesday, May 20, 2009.

NOTE: If you are interested in seeing some of our past data you can download it here:

• http://blog.ymarketing.com/idol-global-appeal/