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Valentine’s Day, or as we single people call it, Thursday, has arrived once again.  And with the big day comes plenty of social media conversation as people give public shout outs to their significant others and best wishes to their friends. What better way to celebrate the most romantic day of the year than with some data analysis; often cited as the most sensuous of all business practices.

Let’s take a look at the social media conversations swirling around like so many heart shaped bubbles regarding Saint Valentine’s special day.

Over 17 Million Love-Filled Conversations Flood Social Media

Over the past seven days, Valentine’s Day has been mentioned in 17,538,089 total social media conversations.  At least half of which are in my Facebook feed alone (Note: This is a rough estimate only).  Twitter leads with 90% of the volume with Facebook (5.8%) and Blogs (1%) following.

Men Aren’t Feeling the Love This Year

Using Insights to sort Valentine’s Day mentions by gender shows that women are far more vocal about Februrary 14 than their male counterparts.

Younger Demographics Tweet Their Hearts Out

Valentine’s Day is a hit with the younger demographics with 21-34 year olds producing the most love-themed social media discussions.

Most Loveable Hashtags

With Twitter responsible for the majority of the volume, hashtags are flying everywhere, like so many arrows from the quiver of Cupid.

Omitting the obvious runaway leaders, #ValentinesDay and #HappyValentinesDay, we see mostly positive hashtags in the mix though #ForeverAlone manages to land in the top 10 as well, unfortunately. This potentially speaks to the 26% negative sentiment towards the holiday, as mentioned in Audrey’s post.

Twitter Users With the Most Retweet Love

With the conversation dominated by younger females, the most retweeted username is fairly obvious.  Yes, “the Biebs” is top of the heap.

Other top tweets include:

 

The Top Romantic Cities

Sorting Valentine’s Day mentions by most active cities, The Big Apple reigns supreme.

The love is flowing on both sides of the pond, however, with London landing second just ahead of Toronto.  Los Angeles and Chicago round out the top five most active hot spots.  Looking at the USA only, the most amorous states are California, New York, Texas, Florida, and New Jersey.

Gifts With Buzz

Valentine’s Day is all about showing our love for our significant others by keeping the economy strong. Here’s the most mentioned traditional Valentine’s Day gifts.

Are you a brand specializing in any of the gifts above?  Have you been actively engaged on social media promoting your products, perhaps sliding those messages into the above noted hashtags?  Something to think about for the next big holiday. Remember, there’s only 314 shopping days left until Christmas.

For a look at brand’s taking advantage of Valentine’s day for messaging, including some great takeaways for marketers, check out our post from earlier today by Audrey Hungerman.

 

Free Ebook: Agile Market Research with Social Media