( CNN ) -- It 's no secret that corporate branding is big business . But in the age of social media , staying ahead of consumer conversations is an increasing challenge . Enter Randy Browning and his company , Blab . It works on predictive social intelligence -- identifying and predicting emerging topics and conversations before they trend on the internet . The company 's propriety technology , aptly named Blab Predicts , gathers 100 million conversations a day , across six social networks and 50,000 news sources in real time . Seattle , Washington-based Blab then classifies those conversations into topics . Companies pay for the predictive data related to each topic . CNN spoke with Browning to find out more about Blab and the merits of using predictive technology . CNN : Give us an example of Blab and how it works . Randy Browning : So let 's say you 're an airline and you 're going into spring break , and you 've got a lot of business riding on flights into Florida . All of a sudden , there 's a shark attack in Florida . And the news is something that 's going to move from the news world into the blog world and start resonating with your target audience . Blab is able to tell that airline this is just a news blip it 's going to last 12 hours and it 's going to not go further than that , or this is going to be a big issue and it 's going to be pervasive 72 hours out . So we are really truly a crystal ball , saying here 's how people are going to be dealing with this story that 's hitting the press right now . CNN : Why do companies need to predict conversations on social media ? RB : There 's been a fundamental shift in the way that marketers need to engage customers and it comes down to this : customers are happy operating in real time . I learn , I 'm engaged , I 'm excited about living my life in real time . But businesses are scared to death to operate in real time ! Because when you 're spending millions of dollars in media , you do n't want to be in a reactive state . You do n't want to say , `` Hey , I 'm caught off guard . '' What we do for them is we shift time . We say here 's what will be resonating with your target audience up to 72 hours in the future . CNN : You say that you 're the first company to do this kind of predictive social intelligence . What are the challenges of being an early adopter of new technology ? RB : Every start-up has issues it has to overcome . With Blab , it was my background in advertising . I had a vision but I was n't a technologist . So I could n't get in my garage and start building this . I did n't have venture capitalist connections . So it was n't about calling up a friend and saying , fund us without the proof . That was the barrier I had to solve in building Blab , bring the right founding technology team together , the right angel investors together who would believe in a vision . CNN : What advice do you have for others who are starting a business ? RB : My advice for entrepreneurs is if you 're driven by a passion and an industry understanding , do your research around financing and investing . That is key , that 's the success to getting a company off the ground . And keeping a company going .
Blab predicts topics before they start trending . It analyzes 100 million conversations a day , and 50,000 news sources . Comment: