One company paid almost €400k for social media monitoring and focus groups in early stages of pandemic

The Department of Health said the research had been intended to understand the “extent to which the public understood and were empowered to comply with the public health advice to protect themselves and their loved ones from this novel disease”. Picture: Gareth Chaney/Collins

One company was paid almost €400,000 by the Department of Health for social media listening, focus groups and other market research about Covid-19.

Brand agency MCCP had been hired by the department before the pandemic to work on two projects relating to communications planning, and for “a radical listening exercise” on women’s health, which were expected to together cost around €140,000.

However, after the pandemic hit, the firm was hired to carry out four different projects, including social media monitoring, which cost a total of €397,854.

The firm was paid three times for what was described as “Covid-19 social listening” during the early stages of the pandemic to see what was being said on social media platforms about the disease and the government response.

A log of expenditure shows €9,157 was paid for social media monitoring in February 2020, a further €6,457 between March 6 and 13, and €9,225 more later that month.

The firm was also paid over €295,000 for working on Covid-19 focus groups with the general public.

This included one payment of €97,908 for research and focus groups, and further payments for analysis, research and planning as part of the original contract for the Department’s wider communication strategy.

The Department of Health said the research had been intended to understand the “extent to which the public understood and were empowered to comply with the public health advice to protect themselves and their loved ones from this novel disease”.

They said it had been necessary to continue the research work for much longer than had originally been anticipated.

The Department said the social media listening function had been taken in-house during the summer after the MCCP contract had ended.

It said listening to public views and concerns, including the conduct of surveys among the general public, were based on World Health Organization communication planning advice.

A spokeswoman said: “In the context of the unprecedented pandemic and the public health crisis that it caused in Ireland, there was an urgent requirement to secure a research agency to undertake research to understand the public perception of Ireland’s response.

“This was necessary to ensure the successful adherence to public health advice and to measure the response of the Irish public to the Department’s communications campaign.”