Chapter 7
TARGETING THE EASILY INFLUENCED NOT THE HIGHLY INFLUENTIAL
In Short
- How the traditional notion of “influencer” may not be as important as many believe.
- How to plan and manage more successful campaigns.
- How you can capture the easily influenced.
Overview
In this chapter Tim Hoang, Senior Digital Consultant at Cohn & Wolfe with clients like McDonalds, Nike and Ford, discusses how much of the talk in marketing and social media is based on the influentials theory, partially because it is easy to justify to ourselves and our clients, and everyone else seems to buy into it. However, there appears to be an ongoing argument as to the plausibility of these small groups of influential people – influentials – who are able to cause a revolution by having a vague combination of charisma, popularity and a penchant for helping others.
Why the Easily Influenced May Be More Important Than Influential
It’s ironic that while every social media and communications expert continues to argue about what the definition of an “influencer” actually is, many continue to sell campaigns to clients with the crux of activity focused on targeting this unidentified group of individuals.
There is also the issue of the plausibility of this small group of influentials being able to cause a revolution simply by having a hazy combination of charisma, popularity and an inclination for helping others.
However, by looking at how messages actually spread through different groups of people, we can see how ...
