About 80% of the user-generated content on the web, including comments and questions, is created by less than 10% of web users, a group we refer to as the most frequent contributors (MFCs). The rest of the web community sits back and watches the interactions as a mostly-passive audience that only occasionally injects a few comments"Influence is intrinsically linked to trust (see trust and youth marketing post earlier). Why is trust important to mobile and mobile behavior?
Carol Phillips (Millenial Marketing)
Well, start with the basics: what's good for the consumer is good for the company. Can you argue with that (see this article - source). Data from the Mobile Youth Report shows that 52% of youth trust their handset whereas only 27% trust their operator. Here are the video insights.
This begs the question, when Nokia and Vodafone both decide to launch new music services, which brand has the most persuasive power? Apple's influence relies of trusted - it is consistently ranked as one of the most trusted brands in Edelman PR's trust barometer surveys. No wonder then that they are able to launch new products to market with a degree of ease unseen in rival tech companies.
Similarly, platforms that aim to push brands through untrusted media necessarily face uphill challenges. Blyk is one that we blogged about earlier - if SMS is untrusted (as highlighted by marketingwatch) what influence can the platform have?
We can see evidence for trust representing the backbone of influence in the success of micro-engagement over macro; individuals trust individuals over corporations and the same applies to marketing messages.
That's why blogs are effective media in influencing purchasing decisions (also here & here) because done correctly, the marketing is a two dialogue between two individuals. Now unpack that logic with growing evidence that blogs are mainstream.
As the target group becomes more focused (eg ethnically aligned), consumers place a premium on trust. Defined beachheads offer greater marketing density and are therefore more conducive to word of mouth influence, such as with Ethnic groupings. Targeting market beachheads relies on building brand trustworthiness; in surveying Latinos in the US, just 2% of respondents said they preferred hard-sell "active interaction" with people representing the brand; most preferred a softer sell and a more passive message at an event, conveyed through signage or video presentations.
Getting it right comes back to the debate of Share of customer vs Market Share; Apple, Google, Nike, Facebook (originally), Myspace, Japanese auto brands (Honda for example) all benefit from adopting the "share of customer" approach and consequently, the trust dividend in influencing both product uptake and customer advocacy.
Similarly, influence and trust skew across lifestyle lines. Gamers, for example, overweight in influence amongst their peers. Research conducted for IGN Entertainment by Ipsos MediaCT, examined the audience for console games, handheld games and games for the PC or Mac. What they found was that gamers are likely to influence others when it comes to media and technology—beyond games.
Check out this post by John Bell on the subject:
One of my favorite strategies that the Obama campaign adopted was best articulated by ZeFrank. It's about micro-engagements or small things people can do amongst larger things that require more commitment. Think of it as a sliding scale of engagement from simple and quick to deep and rewarding. Whe ZeFrank was doing The Show, he was publishing the video above a comment string. He noticed that participants would leap into the string once a new video was posted and just type in "I'm first!", "I second", "I made it third..." and so on. That's all those users added to the conversation. Now, a more traditional content creator might get upset. ZeFrank saw the opportuntity - there were participants (can't just call them "viewers" as they play an active role) who just wanted a small form of interaction, a short and easy way to play a part. He created a series of simple clickable dingbats, easter-egg-y type interactions on teh main screen to give them a little more to interact with and keep them engaged at the level they clearly wanted to be.
Technorati Tags: youth marketing, influence, wom, trust, mobile youth, blyk, nokia, vodafone, apple
1 comments:
Great article. I am a manager within the camp industry, and I believe we have relied heavily, for years, on word of mouth advertising. It is that trust that we have with our campers/parents that enables us to get more campers in the door, and ultimately more opportunities to develop youth. As we look at new ways to reach our audience in the future, I am hoping that the industry looks heavily into the building the trust with our audience in social media outlets. To often we play catch up, when we could be poised to join the conversation now. Again, great article and I appreciate the work your organization is doing.
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