YouthNation: Building Remarkable Brands in a Youth-Driven Culture

Chapter 7The Power of the Crowd

As we have witnessed with events like the Arab Spring and more recently the Ferguson unrest, YouthNation enriched communities possess the ability to rapidly and effectively bring people together with a common interest or cause. When they do so, their reach is so profound and their impact so powerful, they can literally topple regimes that have been in power for generations.

Similarly, interactive communities sharing a common thread also have the ability to bring about more scalable global change. As high speed Internet access is now commonplace in the home in developed markets around the world, the notion of community no longer knows geographic boundaries like it did in the days of the town village square or even ten years ago.

The Staying Power of the #Hashtag

A galvanizing force in the power of the crowd is the #Hashtag. When words or phrases in social media are preceded by a pound (#) sign, this means that they are being used to identify messages on a specific topic that will be easily sorted and searched on social media sites. The #Hashtag first came into mainstream popularity via Twitter but now has extended to almost all major social media platforms including Instagram and Facebook.

The #Hashtag has made it easy for users of social media platforms to follow commentary on an issue or trend of the moment, or contribute their thoughts in a forum dedicated exclusively to a particular topic or event. When an athlete like Peyton Manning makes ...