SONA seen more seriously this year

"#SOTNundress accounted for only about 10% of the total conversation. Last year @garethcliff's #SOTNdrinking occupied 45% of the total conversation around the State of the Nation. Certainly an interesting shift and possibly an indication that South African's are starting to take politics more seriously," says Tim Shier, MD of BrandsEye.

The mentions were tracked across the open web, notably on social networks as well as press sites, forums and blogs. Interestingly, the sentiment was almost exclusively neutral as it was a game and people were just passing information around.

"On Thursday 9 February 2012, BrandsEye found about 45 000 mentions relating to SONA. This is a nine-fold increase on 2011's data and about 18 000 more than during South Africa's Rugby World Cup games. We see this as a clear indication that the South African public are increasingly interested in politics - across the full range of demographics."

Analysis of the actual speech as well as real-time reactions expressed in social media can be accessed via www.brandseye.com/sona.