Pulsar

Introducing Narratives AI - the first search engine for Public Opinion Detect, understand, and act on the beliefs shaping society and consumer behavior, with a simple search query and in seconds. Sign up below for a 30-day trial.

Trend forecasting is broken. Join us to learn how to fix it. For a decade, brands have chased the same lagging indicators, like sales data, search volumes, retail analytics, social virality — and ended up looking identical. Big data tells you what everyone else already knows. By definition, it’s a sameness engine. And the obvious AI shortcut makes it worse: large language models are trained on the rear-view mirror and statistically revert to the mean, which is the opposite of where real trends live. This session lays out a different approach, built on the scientific method: detect with big data, validate with thick data, test with synthetic data. This session lays out a different approach, built on the scientific method: detect with big data, validate with thick data, test with synthetic data. But these changes must be underpinned by a shift in wider mentality; one in which trends should be treated as hypotheses to test, not statistical events to report. Register here to join Francesco D'Orazio's (@abc3d) session: thesilab.com/resource/the-s…

What is WhimsyMaxxing? We helped @BritishVogue make sense of this new trend in menswear. Whimsymaxxing captures the addition of play, imagination, and joy to everyday life – through small expressive choices in clothing, spaces, music, and routine. It is often cast as a response to hustle culture and optimization pressure. When you see your favorite popstar decked out silk scarves, vivid trainers or ballets flats, that’s WhimsyMaxxing in action. Thank you to Peter Bevan, for featuring Pulsar insights in his exploration of the trend. vogue.co.uk/article/whimsy…

Stop guessing. Start knowing. Introducing the new multi-dimensional Crisis Oracle. Today, we’re excited to share Pulsar’s Upgraded Crisis Oracle, with sharper detection, threat staging and multi-dimensional risk scoring, informed by how teams have been using it. Detect, measure, and prioritize emerging threats with greater confidence. audiences.pulsarplatform.com/prod-ai-agent-…

CEO authenticity has become a hard-to-ignore driver of brand perception 🍔 What the @McDonalds CEO bit into his burger, he and the team couldn't have known how far the video would travel, the harmful narratives it would attract, or that the @BurgerKing CEO would soon be recording his own rejoinder. We used Narratives AI to track how the viral videos changed brand narratives, audience perception, and positivity over time. • How different narrative themes, around culture, marketing and beyond, can attach to a brand • The ways in which these can interweave and surface pre-existing negativity • Which communities are responsible for driving the conversation forward Full analysis here: pulsarplatform.com/blog/2026/mcdo…

When an international crisis breaks, the UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office doesn't wait for a morning briefing. With embassies in almost every country, they're tracking public sentiment in real time. Read our case study with the FCDO to understand how Pulsar helps one of the world's busiest foreign ministries stay ahead of the story. pulsarplatform.com/resources/fcdo…

By using Narratives AI and Pulsar TRAC to map the most common stories and perspectives around both McDonald's and Burger King, we can identify how public opinion has evolved, and how different communities help shape these.

Leadership and Ethics is where the gap is most visible: @BurgerKing rose modestly from 34.2 to 40.0, while @McDonalds fell to 12.9. While these narratives attained greater magnitude thanks to the viral video, part of the story here concerned existing negative narratives finding airtime, or interweaving with the dominant CEO narrative, to create a multi-faceted picture that impacted the McDonald’s brand in the short term.

A CEO took a bite out of a burger, and his brand ended up swallowing the negative consequences.

We've partnered with @TheSILab to launch a course that helps social intelligence professionals design automation & agentic workflows using the skills they already have. 3 modules, over May and June 2026. Apply here: thesilab.com/from-analyst-t…

Identifying influencers and key nodes in any conversation network is easier in 3D. Pulsar TRAC now offers a 3D Influencer Network Graph, allowing you to analyze your audiences and understand how influence really travels through a network. • Rotate, zoom, and explore influence as a living 3D system • See in detail how communities cluster and overlap • More easily identify bridge accounts between communities Your audiences aren’t two dimensional. Your audience maps shouldn’t be either.

🚨 Join us tomorrow 🚨 for a deep dive into how global organisations can move beyond simply reacting to fast moving online moments. In this rare behind the scenes session with David Hart, we will explore how the FCDO goes beyond surface level monitoring to build a more nuanced understanding of audiences across key topics. By layering real time social and news data with traditional research, they uncover not just who is talking, but what drives them and how to connect in more meaningful and impactful ways. Sign up now 👉audiences.pulsarplatform.com/pu-webinar-soc…

Public opinion tracking. Crisis monitoring. Travel & trade diplomacy. Across virtually all countries in the world. As Senior Comms Insight Manager at one of the world's busiest foreign ministries, David Hart supports teams around the globe across as many issues as there are news stories: from a solo comms officer in an embassy tracking local sentiment, to central teams in London briefing ministers during a crisis. Join us for a rare conversation to learn how to scale your social intelligence to almost every market and issue globally. Save your spot here: audiences.pulsarplatform.com/pu-webinar-soc…

For marketers in regulated and reputation-sensitive industries, the gap between creating a campaign and launching it can be filled with weeks of legal back-and-forth. And as AI accelerates and scales content production, ad compliance approvals have emerged as a critical bottleneck. Pulsar CLEAR is designed to address this. It analyses every claim, image and frame in an ad using a multi-agent AI architecture and a live regulatory knowledge graph, delivering transparent, auditable compliance assessments in minutes. It’s time to rethink compliance and turn it from bottleneck to strategic advantage. Learn more: audiences.pulsarplatform.com/prod-ai-agent-…

Audiences today are making purchase decisions based on UGC product reviews, especially highly engaging video ones. So what makes for an impactful review? One that travels and may shift perspectives on a brand or a product? Video intelligence allows us to crack open the ‘black box’ of social video, and answer these questions. In this report, you’ll learn: 🎥 Which brands are most mentioned in different types of product review video 🌟 How reviews resonate across the Beauty, Tech, and Food categories ❤️ Why audiences love opinionated content 🎯 The formats and language that work most effectively across different categories Read here: pulsarplatform.com/resources/vide…

How does one of the world's busiest foreign ministries embed audience intelligence across public opinion tracking, crisis monitoring and trade diplomacy? In a rare behind-the-scenes look, David Hart, Senior Comms Insight Manager at the UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office @FCDOGovUK, will share how he uses real-time social and audience insights from Pulsar to support the organization: from solo comms officers in embassies and consulates, to central teams in London briefing ministers. Reserve your spot here: audiences.pulsarplatform.com/pu-webinar-soc…

The difference becomes clearer at the audience level. Chipotle’s narrative is more concentrated within politically engaged communities, where attention tends to amplify conflict. Taco Bell’s audience is distributed across cultural communities such as music, gaming, sports, and other fandoms, where brand moments are more likely to be shared, remixed, and extended.

Unsurprisingly, Chipotle's stronger narratives are around fresh ingredients and sustainable practices, which is why it beats Taco Bell 75.1 to 39.2. However, the brand was exposed to a few controversies of late that ruptured the connection with some of its core audiences.

@Tacobell is outperforming @ChipotleTweets in terms of brand narrative. The reason has less to do with the food, and more with cultural resonance. Using Pulsar Narratives AI, we measured brand narrative positivity between November 2025 and February 2026, with Taco Bell scoring 52.6 compared to Chipotle’s 41.5.