The humanitarian health crisis in Venezuela is a widespread media topic. However, what is really going on in the country? Accounts of this drama are based on limited reports mainly from people leaving the country and international players, potentially holding their own political agenda. On the other hand, objective accounts are also challenged by the difficulties in getting true responses in a context of citizens fearful of sharing their opinions to an interviewer by using any traditional fielding approach. To overcome these limitations, three independent research agencies, Fine Research, Reckner Healthcare and Toluna, joined efforts by putting together their HCPs (Fine/Reckner) and general population (Toluna) panels in a pro bono initiative to provide Save The Children with unbiased information that will help them improve the delivery of their projects at the country's borders.
Venezuela is currently facing curtailed freedom of speech, human rights violations, shortages of essential goods, and ongoing public unrest is under debate, so independent and objective information is sought. Many believe that local media are under continued State harassment, making it a challenge for the remaining private media to creatively connect to a politically divided audience. Our purpose is to show how innovative audience measurement techniques helped Venezuela's second largest TV Channel to successfully navigate this environment, while maintaining audience engagement. Semantic analysis, gathered from viewers' opinions and social media content, combined with "hard" audience measurement analytics, delivered the "soft" insights for gauging engagement within a context of a turbulent society.