Apple and Google announced plans to work together to provide tools that will help track the spread of coronavirus using apps that allow digital contact tracing and notification via Bluetooth. Social media reacted with tens of thousands of mentions of the collaboration within the first hour, according to international social media analytics firm Talkwalker.
In just one hour after the announcement, there were 34k mentions of the collaboration, Talkwalker reported. This excitement was best explained by Google CEO Sundar Pichai, who stated that he and Apple CEO, Tim Cook are “committed to working together on these efforts.” His tweet received 10k engagements in the first 2 hours of posting and had an 8/10 trending score.
Sentiment analysis shows people reacted positively to the privacy controls that would be built into the apps. Worries about civil liberties were more neutral and there was also a generally positive reaction to what this could mean for the public health as a whole.
Tim Cook’s tweet announcing the collaboration has received 44k engagements. Sundar Pichai’s has received 35k engagements so far.
The companies stressed the privacy controls they would use to exclude sensitive geolocation data. Overall the term “privacy” generated 16k mentions within the conversation.
And Apple and Google weren’t alone among brands doing good.
Among the other companies trending this week are:
NBA H.O.R.S.E tournament by State Farm: Donating $200,000 to COVID-19 relief efforts, State Farm brought back sports, at least a little bit. The tournament generated 20k mentions within a day of being announced, Talkwalker reported.
SNL at home: SNL’s fully at home episode generated 55k mentions. According to Talkwalker, sentiment analysis showed that of those conversations 23% were positive and 24% were negative – right in line with host Tom Hanks’ expectations.
Allstate and American Family are sending refunds to policy holders who are driving less. This is a very small conversation – just 2k mentions in the last 30 days. But the news has generated nearly 500k engagements as lots of people are excited by the possibility, Talkwalker reported. Here’s one sample interaction.
About Talkwalker
Talkwalker is a social listening and analytics company that empowers over 2,000 brands and agencies to optimize the impact of their communication efforts. We provide companies with an easy-to-use platform to protect, measure, and promote their brands worldwide, across all communication channels.
Talkwalker’s state-of-the-art social media analytics platform uses AI-powered technology to monitor and analyze online conversations in real-time across social networks, news websites, blogs and forums in 187 languages. Talkwalker has offices in New York, Luxembourg, San Francisco, Frankfurt, and Singapore. It is also the home of Talkwalker Alerts, a free alerting service used by over 500,000 communications and marketing professionals worldwide.
