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Best of CES 2016: The Innovations, Brands and People that Got Social Talking

For over forty years, CES (Consumer Electronic Show) has been the place to be for those wishing to discover new gadgets and innovations in the tech industry. From LG’s rollable screen to the latest generation of wearables, over 20,000 products have been released during this four-day event in Las Vegas. Here at Talkwalker, we used social media analytics to look at over a million social media mentions from the last week to give you a unique perspective of this global event and the products that generated the most online buzz.

5 Products That Captured the Attention of Tech Lovers on Social Media

Even if you were interested in some of the product releases, you might have been tempted to block #CES2016: the hashtag was used almost 500,000 times on social media over the last seven days!

Here is something you might have missed. Each year, CES honors the most innovative tech products released in 2015, from 3D printing to drones and smart glasses. Among the 24 recipients of the award, which were the ones that made the most noise on social media in the last 30 days? We used Talkwalker’s social media monitoring capabilities to find out.

  1. Samsung Gear S2 – a new smartwatch with innovative communication and payment functionalities
  2. Samsung Galaxy Edge+ –  the latest of the Galaxy phone series, with mobile payment capabilities and a 5.7 inch display
  3. Ricoh Theta S – a spherical imaging camera with a 360° view
  4.  Belkin’s Charge Dock for Apple Watch & iPhone
  5. The Lily Camera – A hands-free drone camera that will follow your every move once you have thrown it in the air

How Influencers Built The Hype

What was the key to their success? Samsung benefited from its extensive Christmas marketing campaigns, but part of the answer also lied in finding the right influencers to help the brand promote its products. Talkwalker identified three key ambassadors on Twitter for this specific event:

Each of these influencers have very different backgrounds : Chris Morrow is an American Filmmaker & CNN iReporter, Jim Harris is a Canadian consultant and public speaker who has authored several books on environmental issues, and Joey Graceffa is a YouTube celebrity with over 5.6 million followers.

Here is a good example of a powerful influencer post for the Lily Camera we mentioned earlier:

 “I often travel solo, so most of my videos turn out to be from my point of view of whatever activity I’m doing, rather than of me being the subject. That’s great and all, but sometimes I want a video or picture of myself doing these activities. The solution? The new Lily Camera. Lily is a drone camera that will track and follow its user with no controller required, keep its user in frame at all times!” Travel Blogger Valerie Wilson for JetSet Times.

Click here to identify the real social media influencers for your brand 

5 Brands That Scored on Social

Hundreds of global tech brands are present at CES, showing off their latest products and prototypes. Using Talkwalker Smart Themes we were able to identify the most discussed brands on social at CES this year. Thanks to the heavy presence of smartphone products, Android was the brand most associated with the event with over 25,000 results in just seven days, while Lenovo, Samsung, LG and Netflix rounded up the top 5.

The Cuteness Award: BB-8 Goes Viral at CES 

As the Force Awakens has now officially become the top-grossing movie of all-time in North America,  Star Wars buzz is still going strong at CES with the release of a remote miniature BB-8 controlled by gestures when wearing the Sphero “Force Band”. The diminutive droid has conquered the hearts of online tech lovers with over 5,800 mentions on social media at this stage of the conference. One point of frustration: we still don’t know when it will be released to the public!

The Best Hype Award: The Mysterious Case of Faraday Future

When you think about an electronics show, cars may not be the first products that come to mind. Nevertheless, they are one of the most present industries at CES, with one quarter of the floor being filled with auto makers and two out of eight keynote speeches secured by the CEOs of General Motors and Volkswagen.
Yet among these giants, the most talked-about vehicle was released by a newcomer. For months, people had been wondering about Faraday Future, a secretive new company that had attracted the best designers from BMW and Tesla as well as the backing of Chinese investors, but had not released any information about the cars it intended to make.
 
A single official announcement from Faraday Future in this regard: the first prototype would be released at CES 2016. Slowly, the online buzz started growing. On January 1st, the company shared a ten-second futuristic video leaving us with just a glimpse from the shadow of their revolutionary car. The teaser immediately spread like wildfire on all platforms, as shown by Talkwalker’s virality map.
 
In the 48h surrounding the unveiling of the mysterious prototype on the stage of CES, the brand scored over 45,000 mentions on social media. Not bad when you consider that the FFZero 1 will not hit the roads before 2020 at best.
 
The emotions associated with these social mentions were equally interesting to look at. According to Talkwalker Smart Themes, the words ‘crazy’ and ‘special’ were amongst the most popular adjectives, with over 3,000 mentions each.

 

Building online buzz is an art, and no matter what you think of the end product, the Faraday Future social media campaign was successful. Events such as CES 2016 are great opportunities for brands to catch the attention of the public with innovation and new products. To learn more about the ways Talkwalker’s powerful social media analytics can help you assess the reach and ROI of your marketing efforts, sign up below for a free demo.
Which were you favorite products at #CES2016? Let us know on Twitter @Talkwalker and we will give you some insights about their online buzz!
 

 

Banner picture created with Freepik

 

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