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I spent a fascinating day yesterday pouring over research and analysis figures with a Sydney PR agency [nameless at the moment, for reasons that will become obvious].
They were looking at where the ‘influencers’ were for one of their clients’ products.
What blew us all away was the uncovering of the rapid growth of Social Networking sites like facebook, bebo and twitter in amongst the more regular and expected areas where influential thought leaders and potential product/brand evangelists were to be found.
Further analysis and data-mining could have been conducted — and will need to be — in order to move to the next stage of developing relationships wit the key influencers (the ’sneezers’ as Seth Godin calls them, because the more influential they are the wider the idea ‘virus’ can be ‘sneezed‘).
It was great to see the influence the Social Networking sites have, particularly for the client’s product, used or desired as it is by a large percentage of the female Australian/New Zealand population, across all adult demographics but particularly across 18-55.
We then went on to consider another of their clients, a company who are incredibly well known in the general marketplace — both here in Asia Pacific and throughout the world — and who’s products are highly respected.
Their potential customers span from 18 to 108 years of age, male and female. There is almost no barriers to purchase and I would be willing to bet that it would be only the lowest socio-economic groups that could not justify purchasing one or more of their products.
Because of this company’s positioning statement and product development ethos, you would expect them to be exploring the social networks to identify potential brand evangelists.
But no — they haven’t yet. Yet the Social Networks could be a natural ‘fit’ from them. Here’s why…
Decades of academic studies into ‘Innovation’ and the spread of new technologies amongst all manner of populations — rural, urban, impoverished, wealthy — confirms one thing: early adopters of new ideas, products and technologies are highly networked across multiple social groups and highly influential members of their core social groups. If they believe a product, service or idea would be of value to their social group they will sneeze. The greater the belief, the larger and more persistent the sneezing becomes.
At the same time, the second-tier early adopters — those, like me, who follow what the leading edge are doing — take up the cry and join in the chorus [to mix metaphors rather clumsily], often adding value by ‘translating it’ into another language (in my case, the language of business communication) so that the true importance and value of the innovation can be appreciated across broader sub-sections of the larger population.
A number of third-tier members of the population will then join in, influenced in part by the idea of the innovation itself, in part by mimicking what the second-tier influencers are doing/saying (”Hey, John’s using that new widget; he’s always finding cool stuff, we should use it too“), and in part by wanting to be ‘ahead of the pack’.
Once the third-tier are on-board, the rest of the population quickly follows. Some because they ‘get it’ and some because they see their friends, neighbours and work colleagues doing/using it and they don’t want to miss out or appear ‘old fashioned’.
This stage is currently and most popularly known as the ‘tipping point’ — where unless something completely outside the control of man happens, or unless someone stuffs up in a massively spectacular way, the product, service or idea will become the new ‘big thing’.
Yesterday’s innovation is tomorrow’s standard.
Let’s tie all this back in with the client and their great product(s)…
They have a reputation for innovation within their industry. They should be seeking out the sneezers and evangelists within the Social Networking space (and let us not forget that social networking sites are incredibly popular web destinations for all age brackets in Aus/NZ - see table below) and engaging in conversation with them. Today’s web travellers spend a lot less time soaking up one-way information from traditional media channels and a lot more time playing and interacting in genuine conversation with online peers.
As compete.com said six months ago:
“But as social elements become the driving force behind many of the web’s most popular sites, an increasing number of consumers young and old are finding casual online conversation crucial in maintaining and expanding business relationships”
To not do so is to miss a phenomenal first-mover opportunity that will go to one of their competitors if they are not careful.
Let’s hope they aren’t so wedded to in-house innovation that they fail to take advantage of the innovations of social media and social networking!
Hitwise Australia - Top 20 Websites - October, 2008 |
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