For the third straight year, Networked Insights enjoyed dramatic revenue growth based on the growing number of deals we signed with companies of various sizes. We formed new client relationships with household names such as MTV, Samsung and MillerCoors. Through our work with these and other clients, we helped influence approximately $5 billion of advertising investments. Our clients achieved significant marketing performance gains in part because of the insights our work produced. They also benefitted from the exceptional customer experience delivered by Networked Insights, a result of the emphasis we placed on building a first-class client services team in 2011. Our client retention improved dramatically and was nearly perfect in 2011.

Overall, Networked Insights grew at a breakneck pace in 2011. When the year started, we had roughly 25 employees, nearly all of which were housed in our Madison office. By year-end, we had 73 full-time personnel, significant offices in Chicago and New York, and a strong presence in Toronto, Houston, Atlanta and Denver.

A national public relations effort produced new exposure levels throughout the year. There were frequent mentions across both large and niche publications such as Esquire, Mashable, MediaPost, AdWeek, AdAge, CNN, Wall Street Journal, Sports Illustrated, LA Times and the NY Times. Our company was also prominently mentioned in two hardcopy books published in 2011: Listen First!, by Steve Rappaport, and The Successful Marketing Plan, 4th Edition, by Roman G. Hiebing Jr., Scott W. Copper, and Steven J. Wehrenberg.

Finally, one of the most exciting developments for us in 2011 was the interest and support we received from the investor community. In addition to continued support from our great local investors who have been with us from the beginning, we also were fortunate to bring on Goldman Sachs Investment Partners as the lead investor of our $20 million Series B round of financing, which closed in July. Through the course of their due diligence, the team at Goldman Sachs was impressed by our staff, vision and underlying technology platform. They are now committed to being a part of our long-term growth plan. The success of the Series B financing was a great tribute to the way we have overcome challenges in the past and seized opportunities that have arisen, and it is a strong signal that there are many great things ahead of us in 2012 and beyond.

Read the full official release here.

Which NFL team is creating the most buzz on Facebook, Twitter and other social media outlets?

It’s the Dallas Cowboys, so-called America’s Team.

What may surprise you is that the woeful Detroit Lions are runners-up.

The first-time rankings, by Networked Insights, an analytics company of social media data, underscore that “you don’t have to be the best brand or NFL team to be included in the most conversations,” says Dan Neely, CEO of Networked Insights.

The company used an algorithm it created that analyzed the conversations of 300 million people on the web and 17 million websites over the past 30 days. It viewed number of posts on individual teams, retweets, viewed online content and activity around fantasy football teams.

“My expectations was the (Washington) Redskins would be tops, since they are the (second-most valued team (at $1.55 billion), according to Forbes,” says Neely. (Dallas is No. 1, at $1.8 billion.)

Most people associate Wisconsin with cheese and beer, but you should think about adding startups to that list. Led by a tidal wave of mostly young entrepreneurs, Madison, Wisconsin is staking a claim as the startup capital of the Midwest. Madison was recently ranked as the 7th most innovative city in the country by Forbes magazine – just above perennial powerhouse Boston, MA.

Several key organizations are driving the growing startup community. Capital Entrepreneurs is a group of over 56 companies that meet on a regular basis to help founders network and develop connections. MERLIN Mentors provides free mentoring services to new startups. Applicants are assigned a team of experienced entrepreneurs who help founders navigate many of the challenges facing a new company. These groups, along with the University of Wisconsin, are fostering a great culture for new startups.

Putting a price on Facebook Fan pages to monitor return on investments (ROIs) for campaigns takes more than reading a post or monitoring clicks. Networked Insights earlier this week released SocialSenseFB, an application that monitors the chatter from fans on a company’s page and how long they spend on the page.

Dan Neely, founder and chief executive officer at Networked Insights, a social media tech company, estimates about 7 million Fan pages on Facebook, from a variety of brands like Starbucks and Research In Motion (RIM). “You don’t need to read 100,000 posts weekly, but rather understand the trends and themes, so you know how to talk with your customers,” he says. “Understanding what’s valuable to them in Facebook, where they engage with you in real time, compared with blogs, where they talk about you, is very different.”

As might be expected for a series working toward its recent much-promoted finale, “Lost” below, generated the most engagement through social media of any show from February through April, according to Networked Insights, a social media analytics company.

The statistic is the modern equivalent of water cooler conversation, and is measured by the number of online interactions posted and read about a given show. “American Idol” ranked second, and there was a steep drop-off in the social media index after that. Moreover, other shows with substantial online buzz did not have commensurate Nielsen ratings. Only four of the 10 shows in the social media ranking were also in the top 10 for ratings. Many popular shows on the social media index, like “The Simpsons,” were not even in the top 40 in Nielsen ratings.

Networked Insights raised the money in a funding round led by Kegonsa Capital Partners, a Fitchburg investment fund. The company will use the money to continue listening in on 1.5 billion conversations that 300 million people are having each month on the Internet, the company said.

“This infusion of capital will propel us even further in that direction, tapping the power of the largest focus group in the world to improve any and all marketing activities that rely on understanding the customer,” Dan Neely, the company’s founder and chief executive officer, said in a statement.

Networked Insights was founded in 2006 and has offices in New York, Chicago and San Francisco. The company previously raised $4 million from Kegonsa and other investors. The new round brings the total amount of investments it has raised to $9 million, the release said.

Instead, Neely, 33, uses his math skills to devise computer programs. He heads Networked Insights, a company created in Madison in 2006. Networked Insights analyzes social media to find out what everyone is talking about.

What can it possibly matter what people are replying to blogs or what they are tweeting about on Twitter? All that information helps companies figure out how and where to market themselves, Neely says.

While digital channels and online interactions offer a plethora of data points, they don’t come with a set playbook for assigning value. Marketers have grown comfortable with formulas like gross ratings points and frequency, time-tested formulas for building brands in traditional media. Yet with social media, what’s a Facebook friend worth?

“The value of social media is it’s the richest data set that’s ever existed,” says Dan Neely, CEO of Networked Insights, a Wisconsin-based analytics company that uses social media to help clients make marketing decisions. “You can use this data for many things.”

The two sides of the social-media measurement debate are at the forefront as many marketers plan to ramp up their social-media budgets in 2010. According to an ExactTarget survey of 1,000 marketers, 70 percent said they plan to increase spending in social media, but less than 20 percent said they could effectively measure ROI.