Commentary
The Hidden Social Networks Are Most Influential
- by dave.b , Max Kalehoff , December 19, 2008
That's according to Daniel Romero, a scientist at the Center for Applied Mathematics at Cornell University, and HP Labs, who recently sent me his team's latest paper on the online social networks that "truly matter." According to the report, the volume of social network connections a person has is a weak indicator of how prolific a poster someone is. What really matters are actual friends. This was based on an analysis of 309,740 Twitter users, who, on average, published 255 posts, had 85 followers, and followed 80 other users.
The authors explain: "Even when using a very weak definition of 'friend,' we find that Twitter users have a very small number of friends compared to the number of followers and followees they declare. (A friend here is defined as anyone who a user has directed a post, or '@username,' to at least twice.) This implies the existence of two different networks: a very dense one made up of followers and followees, and a sparser and simpler network of actual friends. The latter proves to be a more influential network in driving Twitter usage since users with many actual friends tend to post more updates than users with few actual friends. On the other hand, users with many followers or followees post updates more infrequently than those with few followers or followees."
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The authors concluded: "[S]cholars, advertisers and political activists, see online social networks as an opportunity to study the propagation of ideas, the formation of social bonds and viral marketing, among others. This view should be tempered by our findings that a link between any two people does not necessarily imply an interaction between them. As we showed in the case of Twitter, most of the links declared within Twitter were meaningless from an interaction point of view. Thus the need to find the hidden social network; the one that matters when trying to rely on word-of-mouth to spread an idea, a belief, or a trend."
To me, a marketer observing all sorts of attempts to crack the code of influence and message dispersion, the gem in this report is the statement that "a link between any two people does not necessarily imply an interaction between them." This presents serious challenges to popular assumptions (and sometimes blind conviction) of influence and link authority. These assumptions have severely informed social-media marketing over the past five years.
To be sure, Twitter is not reflective of all social networks; each has its nuances. However, most are vulnerable to false assumptions that have haunted traditional media venues for years: mainly, that audience and engagement can be implied through opt-in or subscriber status. Think of the dozens of magazines and newspapers piling up on my living room coffee table. I suppose those print publications count me among its followers, and they tout that to advertisers and target me accordingly. But the fact is they have little meaning in my life because I barely pay attention to them; I don't recall even passively opting into most of them. (However, they do a good job of getting the fireplace roaring.)
And the same goes for Twitter. As of this writing, I have 955 followers, and I have little knowledge about who most are. Conversely, I'm following 584 people, and I pay meaningful attention to around 100. My social connections are not indicative of my merit or propensity to spread an idea. For me, core Twitter value comes mostly from the 50 or so friends with whom I regularly interact. Upwards of 3,000 posts, I write mostly for this group, and they're most likely to respond to me. That's the network that resonates -- the one that truly matters.
From a personal standpoint, what are your most meaningful social networks? If you're a marketer pioneering social media, how are you segmenting and valuing networks? What's working and what's not?
I represent a social media GEM www.sternfannetwork.com. The owner/moderator does reviews for products or services which are willing to pay a very nominal fee. We have covered everything from adult products, to book and DVD releases...as well as costume contests and club venue openings! His users comment profusely and really engage. I feel even though our numbers arent HUGE, we are extremely valuable for a marketer who gets that going this route is sooooooooo much more successful than just reach. The proof so far for my argument is sales. All of my marketers can brag sales were a direct result of their use of our social media platform to tell their story and get their message out.
Overt irrelevant pitches not welcome Heather...
I think this is an interesting assessment of influence on microblogs but it does leave out the network effect to some degree. If I pay attention to fifty 'friends' and they each pay attention to fifty friends an idea or meme can spread very widely very quickly. This just reinforces the study's conclusion that even an apparently low authority source should be taken seriously because of how fast an idea can spread with just a few connections.
This will be, IMHO, the basis of all marketing in the very near future.
Martin: Good point. Although, meme spreading is an anomaly, not a rule. Just like most viruses don't spread, a tiny fraction will. (I'm not a fan of the "viral" biological metaphor, but you get the point!)
Michael Durwin: Advertising may have no place, or very little place, participating DIRECTLY in social media. Advertising is paid media. Social media tends to be earned and tied to referral value.
Btw, never heard of "SoMe"! I must have been under a rock.
What you need to understand is that we are still deep in the first generation of Micro/Life Blogging and the tools are still extremely primitive. Remember when Instant Messaging first came out and the chat rooms were so crowded you couldn't have a meaningful conversation? That's where we are now, except that innovation is accelerating (the economy not withstanding) and tools like TweetDeck are quickly appearing that allow you to manage your followers.
I'll be covering much more on this topic shortly at my new Blog: "HyperTense" at: http://www.nealwiser.com.
Please leave comments.
so what do you thing Charley Brown should do about Lucy? Talk among yourselves.
At the end of the day, it's about being real. Case in point - I made a small shout out to kickapps on my twitter feed. Immediately I got a follow from kickapps, with a nice little thank you. Then I ran into a technical snag (Macromedia contribute compatibility issues), and I contacted my new friend at kickapps and their competitor to weigh the benefits of each widget builder. I got an immediate and great response from kickapps, and am in the process of converting all my Sproutbuilder widgets to Kickapps because they really stand behind their apps. So you can't just throw out messaging if A: you don't have a great product and B: don't support that product. Of course it takes more time to really respond to inquiries, but as Tony of Zappos says, each customer inquiry is a marketing and branding opportunity. So in the end I guess we still have to be humans (darn it).
And your REAL social network probably has a lot of key people that are not on Twitter, nor Facebook, nor Linked, etc. Many of my "key connections" are not retrievable from any on-line social graph... and I like that.
The people with the BEST networks are not on any of the social network sites -- they don't have to be. They keep their networks private ...and powerful.
Valdis Krebs: My most important social network is the combination of my Gmail and work email databases. Email is the ULTIMATE social network. Here's why: If I had to keep only one social-network database, it'd be email. It's that important. Even more telling is that email is the default communications and profiling schema of every so-called social network I've ever signed up for.
For as much time as I spend online, and as much value as I place in digital social media, I still value real social media the most.
You know real social media. It's what happens when you're shoveling snow and notice your neighbor—the one who puts Consumer Reports to shame in the way he researches and analyzes major purchases—making short work of his driveway thanks to a brand new snow-blower.
Of course there's a huge place for the digital variety of same. And I'll be the first to admit I'd be pretty much lost without Twitter, Ping, Facebook, LinkedIN, etc. But there are times when I wonder if we're all losing touch with the type of social media that, in the end, matters most; i.e. Face-to-face (or shovel to snow-blower), tangible, offline interactions in which people endorse/support/recommend stuff as they look you in the eye.
Because it's just too easy to fudge it online. Too common for important details to be left out. Too little back and forth and too much confusion from so many different inputs.
Full article at http://www.gabardinestudios.com/thread