If you’re into electric vehicles because they are a key solution to global warming, climate change, and many other environmental and health problems, you might be a fan of Tesla and the Toyota Prius. But you might also be surprised to hear that Tesla lovers and Toyota Prius lovers have very different interests.
First, here’s a summary of how these interest graphs were developed:
In this case, a minimal level of interest in a specific automobile model was used to define a set of users across the Gravity personalization network. A total of 900,000 Prius fans and 183,000 Tesla Model S aficionados met our selection criteria. Their individual Interest Graphs had previously been created for the purposes of personalization of content; every click on content or advertising within the network is analyzed semantically and augments the nodes and edge weights for the engaged user.
When analyzing audiences, the individual graphs are coalesced into a single graph reflecting the aggregated interests and attachment levels for the entire set. This allows for a holistic view of the audience which can then be compared against another audience or the general population of hundreds of millions of users. In this way, we are able to establish what defines an audience and what makes them special. The results are often quite surprising.
Yes, the general point is that the interests represented in the following interest graphs are those that Prius or Tesla enthusiasts have to a stronger or much stronger degree than the average person. (The bigger the circle, the more the Prius or Tesla enthusiasts diverged from the common human.)
Now, on to the fun!
Toyota Prius Lovers (Infographic)
As you can see, Prius enthusiasts are big into sales (wha?), music, computers, digital technology, Apple, philosophy, writing, smartphones, digital finance, the federal reserve system, health, social networks like Facebook & Twitter, health care, social change, and political science. Just as a reminder, they’re into these things much more than the average person. (Notably, they are also more into Earth, sustainability, nature, environmental technology, natural resources, and oceans — but those all fell into the “more interested” but not “much more interested” category.)
Pretty interesting. Not many surprises — except the sales thing. What’s that about?
Anyway, on to the Tesla enthusiasts!
Tesla Lovers (Infographic)
This is where it starts to get a little wacky.
Like Prius lovers (and probably owners), Tesla lovers are big into digital technology. There’s also a bit of overlap in other arenas — social issues, social networking sites, sales (what the hell is up with that?), health care, music, and philosophy. But that’s more or less were paths diverge.
Tesla enthusiasts are also, compared to the average humanoid, big into electronics, engineering, automobiles, corporatism, business, and business economics. Just a step down from that (when it comes to divergence from normal folks), they are abnormally into trucks (no wonder the push for a Tesla truck is so popular!), the iPhone, family, arts, commerce, the US economy, macroeconomics and monetary economics, economic engineering (I didn’t even know that existed), administration, public safety, political science, government, the internet, publishing, video, and the visual arts. Basically, there’s a strong love of business/economic-related topics, technology, and art-related topics — not all that surprising.
The Real Fun
That was fun, but where do these EV freaks really diverge from the public? Where are the big surprises? Here are the ones I thought were noteworthy:
Prius owners are big into…
- McDonald’s?!?
- Firearms?!?
- Waterfowl hunting?!?
- Hunting?!?
- Weight loss (and McDonald’s?… oh, well, I guess that makes sense)
- Health (and McDonald’s?…)
- Gold & Silver
- Violence (well, I guess some of the interests above indicated that)
That certainly paints a different portrait of Prius owners than I had in my head.
What about the Tesla fans? Well, ummm…
- Cannabis
- Victoria’s Secret (ok, not all that surprising)
- New Jersey (huh?)
- Russia (Russia?)
- traffic congestion (like a mug! check out the size of that bar in the infographic above)
- electronic warfare
- sex workers
- erotic dance
- elder law (I hope that has no relationship to the two above)
- wealth (well, that’s actually a big ‘duh‘)
- irrational exuberance
In all seriousness, that’s some pretty interesting stuff. Thanks to the folks at Gravity.com for putting it together.