Big Data is no doubt the hottest buzzword among businesses these days. There are various aspects of Big Data that people talk about most of the times. However, one such sub field that is gradually gaining prominence is text mining.

Currently, in the nascent stage, text mining is expected to create a lot of buzz in the coming years.

So what is text mining?

Text mining is the process employed to extract useful insights from the plain text that has been gathered from various sources and is not totally organized. Text mining techniques can be used to hunt for patterns in newspapers, blog posts, website text, and research paper, and more – basically anything containing relevant textual information.

Statistical algorithms and methods are then applied for text mining and natural language processing. A combined result of various steps reveals underlying patterns and trends that are useful for further research.

How is text mining carried out?

There are various text mining techniques that are used like –

• Extracting information and retrieving patterns – This is the process of extracting meaningful data from unstructured or semi-structured texts and then identifying the patterns that lie in them.

• Categorizing the data extracted – This step involves the application of Natural Language Processing techniques to categorize information to predefined groups or topics.

• Clustering – Clustering involves grouping the intrinsic structures of texts into appropriate sub-groups which can help to streamline and optimize the text mining process.

• Summarization – This step includes advanced techniques like neural networks and regression trees, to generate a final compressed form of text that is insightful for the consumer.

How is text mining helpful?

To understand how text mining can be useful, let us consider a couple of text mining examples.

Firstly, sentiment analysis of clients deserves special mention, since keeping the customer happy is the primary lookout for any business to thrive. Be it the entertainment or software or travel or any other industry, spotting customer trends via text mining is crucial to indications of the likes and dislikes of customers. Such insights are sure of great value in both the B2B and B2C spheres.

Text mining can also be hugely beneficial in academic research, where journals can be processed using software for text mining. The National Centre for Text Mining in England has been established with the motive of contributing to the advancement of text mining.

It is hard to skip text mining applications and benefits in manufacturing drugs. Text mining is expected to contribute massively to the progress of research and development in pharmaceutical companies all over the world. Revelations from the mined text can help in deciphering the complex interactions between a certain enzyme and a specific drug compound. Experts believe that advancements in text mining can optimize the sky-high expenses of drug manufacturing companies to a great extent.

Apart from these few examples, text mining can be applied to almost all sectors of a business, including customer support, risk management, internet security, contextual advertising and many more.