Insights into marketing - Social influence marketing

Tom Lynch and Shiv Singh

August 1, 2008

I s there any doubt that social media exploded in 2007? The astounding growth of Facebook alone forced everyone - not just marketers, but corporations, investors, academia and media - to pay attention to social media as a serious business and cultural phenomenon.

A major shift is occurring; the rise of social media is creating a new form of marketing altogether, Social Influence Marketing (SIM). Here are 10 major social media developments you need to know now:

1. SIM becomes your third dimension of marketing. Brand marketing and direct response used to be what mattered. Today, SIM requires new strategies, rules and tactics along with a lot of experimentation.

2. Advertising on your consumer's terms. SIM is about the active advertiser attempting to engage with consumers on their terms - where they want to and in a language and format of their choosing. The most immediate impact? Slick, big-idea advertising will have less influence than marketing strategies that allow companies to participate in the online conversations.

3. Forget about the marketing funnel. Social media in all its forms is having a complex influence on the traditional marketing funnel and making it look more like a Kandinsky painting than a linear process. This transformation will occur as SIM impacts purchasing behavior and the traditional marketing funnel.


4. Social networks matter more than Web sites. Consumers are continuing to spend most of their time on social networks. Any company developing a new site, product or marketing campaign must think about how it integrates with key social networks. This can't be an afterthought anymore.

5. Engagement metrics come to the forefront. Much of the Web's success as a marketing platform is driven by its ability to capture strong metrics. New measurement models and corresponding tools will be needed to track whether SIM is having a stronger effect on the purchasing cycle than brand marketing or direct response.

6. The Internet blends in with everything else. Consumers don't see the Internet as something distinctly different from their offline worlds anymore and expect seamless combinations. Every key consumer activity has online and offline components that contribute to the total experience.

7. Media companies continue to be at the forefront. Whether it is in how companies approach social media and deliver video in new formats via the Web or how they seed media within the social networks, they're going to be in the lead again.

8. Companies realize that communities matter again. Social networks are just another incarnation of online communities (think America Online). Companies are going to invest to understand adoption, user behavior, trust and information flows in these communities. And as they attempt to influence behavior on these networks, they're going to think hard about their own tone and how they should participate.

9. SIM takes many different forms. Companies and individuals will need to think hard about what social influence marketing means for them and for their networks, organizations and industries.

10. And it broadens influence. SIM is not just about user-generated content or marketing on social networks. It is going to affect how organizations innovate, develop ideas, recruit, measure performance and interact with all their constituents - customers, employees, partners and shareholders. Only by changing their organizations from the inside out will companies be authentic when talking to the outside world.

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Tom Lynch is VP of strategy, planning and analytics for the central region with the  Atlanta office of Avenue A Razorfish.

Shiv Singh is national VP of social media and global strategic initiatives with Avenue A Razorfish.

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