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Tag: influence

Internet is a mass media

Among the most fortunate mass communication theories, the Katz & Lazarsfeld’s “Two steps flow of communication” during the 40s described a model where a message  broadcasted by a source is captured by an opinion leader who, because his/her reputation among the society, is able to influence the audience’s behavior. Basing on this research, marketing and public relations payed a lot of attention to choose testimonial to be used in above or below the line campaigns. When in the early 2000s came out the “Web 2.0”, it seemed that model was intended to disappear. Observers and researchers welcomed with a great passion this collaborative circumstance, highlighting the direct access to information, the decentralization of content production, the disintermediation between producer and consumer, the possibility to directly engage with the source. All connected people would have been able to access the information, to elaborate them and share the results. The opinion leader’s role appeared to be definitely got discussed. From opinion leader to hub Actually some changes happened, but only on a exterior level. First of all new personalities came to light. They, missing the web, probably wouldn’t ever get visible. Second, we paid more and more attention to conversation generated on-line and contents themselves became often mainstream. The basic  communication flow, anyway, has been almost unchanged, but transforming the “two-step flow” into “multi-step flow”. A proof of that is the fast growing development of reputation and influence measurement tools such as Klout and Kred. Supposing that every internet user is potentially an hub of a subnet, composed by its contacts, the communication flows from a source is captured by the “hub” that broadcasts to the subnet. Message’s viral degree, that is the message’s ability to be propagated, depends on hub’s reputation and the ability to influence the subnet. From hub to influencer If initially it seems that the individual centrality in message propagation has been improved, recalling the Katz & Lazarsfeld theory, the only true difference relies more on the number of required steps to reach the influence, than on the social dynamics themselves. In the sociologists’ theory, indeed, an opinion leader’s main characteristics were the most access to media, a more literate understanding of media content, the ability to explain and diffuse the content to others. If the access to media problem appears to be solved,  the ability to understand and to broadcast media content is still today the common feature between mass and social media. Katz & Lazardfel, furthermore, concluded their researches highlighting that personal influence (set by interpersonal relationship) is more important than the mass media. Starting from these observations, also today, enterprises plan word-of-mouth marketing, viral marketing campaigns and PR Tatics. Features such as Retweets, Sharing, Comments (that is all the features releated to…

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Piccoli social crescono

Più piccoli sono, e più pensano a coinvolgere i propri clienti. E’ spesso un luogo comune, piuttosto errato, pensare che chi utilizza bene i social media siano solo le grandi imprese. E’ vero, sono quelle che dedicano maggiori investimenti in termini di tempo e denaro. Le piccole imprese, tuttavia, sembrano aver compreso meglio le potenzialità dei social media. Infatti, mentre le Medie imprese sembrano essere più concentrare a sviluppare una base di follower, le piccole – ed in particolare nel B2B – preferiscono puntare su una base piccola e creare una relazione forte. Queste alcune delle evidenze della ricerca “Path to Influence: An Industry Study of SMBs and Social Media” condotta da Vocus e Ductape che ho sintetizzato per SNID

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The Growing Social Media Influence in B2B buying process [SNID]

This post has been originally posted to SNID Blog The opportunities offered by social networks to B2B company has confirmed once more by the DemandGen Report “Breaking Out Of The Funnel –  A Look Inside the Mind of the New Generation BtoB Buyer”. The survey, that interested about 100 BtoB buyers who had purchased a business solution or system in the past 12 months, show a deep change in BtoB buying process and buyer’s behaviours. Buyers, as reported, are no more driven by the BANT process (Budget, Authority, Need and Timing).Project are no more decided on an annual plan but around a business challenge  and the budget is set according to information gathered by peers (79%). More and more (40%) are used to set and get the budget approved after a they determined “the potential impact through other adopters and built a business case for immediate adoption”. The information gathering is a crucial step., and rarely involves solution provider in the first steps. 78% start with informal information gathering; 59% engage with “peers who had addressed the challenge”;  48% follow industry conversation s on the topic and 44% conduct “anonymous research of a select group of vendors”.  Buyers usually requires solution providers to be quick in information providing. Furthermore, White papers/ebooks play a bigger role as a media channel for info gathering. Social media also play an important role in the funnel: More than 40% of social media users said they followed discussions/threads to learn more about the topic they were researching; 37% said they posted specific questions on social networking sites looking for feedback on how others solved the specific business challenge; 21% said they connected directly with potential solution providers via social networking channels. “The majority of social media users said Twitter and LinkedIn influenced their decisions during the “Solution Analysis” and “Problem Identification” phases. Nearly 90% indicated that blogs impacted their research during the “Solution Analysis” phase and 3 in 4 respondents said social bookmarking sites such as Digg and Delicious were utilized during the early Analysis phases.” [Demand Gen Report] Finally, buyers of unbudget project (53%) are also more open to share the experience through blogging, social networks (Linkedin, etc.), or beign a reference/case study for the solution provider. BtoB organization are required to: listen and respond to the conversations buyers are having in the social mediasphere. connect in social media sphere and  build relationship provide relevant contents for each stage of buying process monitor and track the buying process and connect with buyers having purchasing behavior The emerging evolution shows a more relevance of inbound marketing than the outbound and the relevance of building relationship. People are the main channel and organization have to be…

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