Outsource your decision making - influencers are ready and willing
marketing February 1st. 2008, 8:29am
Thousands of people are trying to control the thoughts and actions of billions each day. This isn’t a science fiction novel or a paranoid delusion: this is real life. These thousands of people are charged to influence the behavior of other people.
It’s nothing new, either: people have been trying to influence their fellow humans since the dawn of civilization and probably earlier than that. In a year that will be dominated by information designed to elect the next president of the United States of America, it’s important to think about the power of influence on all of our lives. The fact that people are working to create a social media index, a way to determine the relative influence of social media users, should serve to illustrate the intense interest in figuring out how efficiently and effective spread messages.
The blogosphere has been abuzz in January 2008 with discussion about a Fast Company magazine article that attempts to cast doubt on some of the current wisdom about trendsetting and the adoption of new ideas. The argument centers around the ability of some people “to be a compelling force on or produce effects on the actions, behaviour, opinions, etc., of others” (the quote comes from this white paper).
If you accept the argument that certain people, referred to as influencers in academia and business circles, can guide or shape the thoughts and actions of other people, the research of Duncan Watts may serve to cast some doubt on the power of the influencer. This seems, on the surface, to contradict a school of thought made popular by Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point.
For the purpose of this article, there are two principle schools of thought on how to have an impact on what people think and what they do without overtly coercing them:
(a) Broadcast messages through every feasible medium, using every feasible persuasive method, that you hope your target audience will hear, believe, and act upon - mass marketing
(b) Aim your messages at the influencers within your target market (the group of people whose behaviour you want to influence), convert them to your way of thinking, and have them exert their own ability to persuade and control their network of contacts
There are many opinions as to which methods are most effective at making people behave in the way that you want. Mass marketing may be more effective that influencer marketing in certain scenarios. Proponents of critical thought and free will may scoff at the power of influencers while savvy marketers may know otherwise.
I think that it’s increasingly important to be conscious of the fact that people are always trying to control us in some fashion, whether on a personal level or at a macro level. US citizens have been subjected to a mind-numbing barrage of political advertising and media programming during the past few years in the most extended prolog to a presidential election in history. In addition, business and academia continually fling messages at groups and individuals, trying to sell ideas, products, and services.
Despite the mutations of forms and methods, influencing is nothing new. We all attempt to wield influence at various times in order to meet our needs. Should we be concerned that many people are trying to get better at controlling our thoughts and behaviour?
- No, because ultimately we have free will and if we try hard enough, we can usually get to the truth.
- Yes, because many times we choose to forget that we have the ability to think critically and make decisions or we abdicate that ability during times of hardship, fatigue, fear, and laziness.
The choice is yours, but there are plenty of people out there who will make choices for you if you let them. Think about it.
Related links:
Links to posts about the Duncan Watts article in Fast Company
Political Ad Spending Set To Climb Sharply
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February 1st, 2008 at 11:01 am
You are right that influence is not new. What is new? We have new means by which ideas can propagate and new means by which influence is exerted. Hopefully social media enables people to be exposed to a greater variety of differing views which - perhaps - helps stimulate critical thinking rather than encouraging people to uncritically accept what they hear. Is social media helping to stimulate these critical thinking muscles or is it making them lazier? I like your last observation: many abdicate their ability (responsibility even?) to think critically out of fatigue, fear, laziness, etc - how true.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:16 am
@marcel - hi, thanks for your comment. I guess I am most concerned about how influencing is used in the realm of politics.
I’m keenly aware of how influence can work wonders in the realm of charity, public service, and exposing good new products and services. I also understand the desire to understand the mechanics of influence better as a means for a company to survive and thrive.
I just think that we all need to think a bit more critically, myself included, and realise that we aren’t always getting the right information or, in some cases, we get a partial message which can screw up our thinking. Trust, but verify, as he once said.
February 1st, 2008 at 1:06 pm
The article twists both Watts’ arguments and the stuff he criticizes. It’s interesting, but it’s largely besides the point and makes some mistakes, seemingly intentionally, to be provocative.
February 1st, 2008 at 4:40 pm
@On Motivation… yes, fair analysis of the Fast Company article. The main thing it did was to push out Watt’s name and ideas a bit further, which was a good thing, I think. Don’t know how much it’s going to do for the author, though.
February 2nd, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Just see, “We Know What You Want”… see it at Amazon.
February 2nd, 2008 at 6:42 pm
@sam freedom - good call, I’ll have to check that out
March 27th, 2008 at 7:26 am
[...] Brian’s post ties at least in part to the whole area of influence, which I wrote about a couple of months ago. [...]
April 3rd, 2008 at 1:14 am
I think the beauty of social media is that you can try to address influencers, you can micro-target your message to your core audience, or you can set your scope wider to address wider audiences with relative ease.
I think the hardest part is deciding on a tactics, once you’ve developed a strategy. There are so many options, but with a limited time span.
April 3rd, 2008 at 6:51 am
@Nathan - thanks for stopping by! Interesting point about tactics.
June 5th, 2008 at 2:32 am
[...] are experts, influencers, and [...]
June 6th, 2008 at 8:05 pm
[...] his mark as well. His recent post on How Early Adopters Pull The Web is an outstanding look at the influence of technology early [...]