the impact and etiquette of social media

The Impact & the Etiquette of Social MediaDavid Cushman

Apr 12, 2023 2

Who am I?

20 years in media, advertising, marketing and organisational change

Author of The Power of the Network Blog ranked world No7 for publishing, UK’s

top 20 for marketing/advertising, Invited to speak on the impact of social

media from New York to San Francisco (the valley, too) Cannes to Cork

Helped Bauer/emap, Honda, Phillips, Sony-Ericsson, Gatwick Airport, Edge, UKBA, CWDC, DfT, Grey (London), MCBD, Digitas, RIOT/180, ThirdeyeT, Gambling Compliance, The Met Police, Coca Cola etc

Trustee of UK charity Citizens Online Ex-Director of Social Media at BrandoSocial Currently MD 90:10 Ltd (Ninety10group.com)

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Context

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What is social media?

Digitally enabled peer-to-peer networks

From email and sms to Facebook and Twitter

Distribution is by people to people

Content is by people to be shared with other people

POWER!

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Power?

Every hotel Every restaurant Every shop Everywhere…

Filled with published critics

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Peer-to-Peer?

The most powerful behaviour changer there is

We do what others like us do

Social media brings us together with people like us

Social media helps people like us act together

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Social media

Is not: A channel (it’s a network)

Is not: A place to broadcast (it’s for conversations)

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It’s all about the people, people

Where humans are talking to each other about things that bother/interest them – on a global scale

You are included. With or without your permission.

If you’re lucky/unlucky

If you contribute If you participate

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We’re all publishers now

300m blogs globally 73% of web users read blogs Facebook members 132.1

million unique users in June 2008 (now over 300m)

MySpace had 117.6 million users in June 08 (now declining).

Twitter has now exceeded 50m – up 49m in a year! (overtaken myspace in UK)

More video added to Youtube in last year than broadcast by TV EVER!

The revolution is speeding up...

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We’re all advertisers and marketers now

Friend-recommendation is responsible for 70%+ of all purchase decisions

34% write about products and brands on their blogs

20% of all tweets are brand related

23% of social network users have added applications

18% of bloggers install widgets

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Social media. Shared media.

Very different measures required. Not consuming; participating Co-creating the experience Communities not audiences To take part, you have to create part Think ears and mouths, rather than

eyeballs

Very different from the world of mass broadcast media

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How do we adapt?

The user is the destination now

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The long tail… and it’s getting longer

The idea that the majority is made up of people who don’t want the thing that the largest single group do.

Twitter Trends, the charts and often elections – surface the largest single group – not, by a long way, the majority

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Frightening Fragmentation

Q: How can we reach deep into and along the ever-elongating long tail?

A: Understand how messages/ideas and conversations evolve in the networked world

The internet is for people.

The internet is for people. For people to form groups

The internet is for people. For people to form groups

Groups with sharedpurposes

The internet is for people. For people to form groups

Groups with shared purposesGroups of people that can form at little or no cost

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That changes everything

http://flickr.com/photos/stuckincustoms/

Three key disruptions

Who gets to create content?

Who gets to distribute content?

Who controls the user experience?

Three key disruptions

Who gets to create content?Any and everyoneWho gets to distribute content?Any and everyoneWho controls the user experience?The user is the destination now, they control their own A-to-anywhere journey

You can’t target every community of purpose

They can

Here’s howhttp://flickr.com/photos/caribb/

You can’t target every community of purpose

They can

Here’s how

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THE STAGE

Scale = audience = where the eyeballs have gone

Message broadcast at audience

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THE STAGE

But in (social) networks the broadcast message doesn’t arrive

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They aren’t looking at The Stage.

They are looking at each other

Scale = lots of communities of purpose = where the eyeballs are focused

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•They share messages among their groups.•They adapt them to suit their groups •They make the message theirs

We share what we think is cool with people who (we think) will think its cool, too

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•The groups are not fixed (adhoc).•The message spreads when the groups reform around a new purpose

Users select what they think is cool (has utility) to take with them on their journey

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Participants adapt the message

to suit the group they wish to share it with

The people best-placed to adapt the message are in the group, not on the stage

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And so it continues; the message evolving to

survive. Or it dies out

We share what we think is cool. That which we co-create, we embrace

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They aren’t your groups they are theirs

They aren’t your messages they are theirs

Communication is not done to them, it is done by them

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In social media

WE are the (only) distribution, WE are the content, WE are the 'user journey', WE are how messages are

transmitted. WE are the medium and the

media carried by it WE are the connections.

and how the connections are made.

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Same as it ever was?

Key lessons for organisations

http://flickr.com/photos/cleversimon/

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Key lessons for organisations 2

Respond

http://flickr.com/photos/daveyp/

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Listen

The conversations are happening with or without your permission.

They are happening everywhere people talk

You can listen: twitter search; brandtags.net, Radian6, etc

Listen, enable, and serve.

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Business case for listening

70% of purchase decisions are friend-recommended.

How much of your current spend is focused on connecting to the conversations?

How much value do you currently place on these conversations?

If the answer isn’t 70%...

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2. Respond

Marketing isn’t done to them, it is done by them

Think less of where the eyeballs are and more about the mouths and ears

Place value on real-time, human interaction.

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Social media works best

When users can adapt the message to better suit those they would share with

Eg Youtube’s many incarnations of the Cadbury’s gorilla ad.

Where they lower the technical barriers

Eg Pampers easy-insert of your own kids’ pictures into a Christmas video message.

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Messy kitchens

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Interesting + together

Create interesting things for people to do together

Co-create with those you were going to do your content to/deliver a product or service to.

Now do it with them. They’ll find that more interesting.

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Connect communities of purpose

Make it easy for people who care to connect

People who care, act Action creates value (makes change) Their actions attract more people to the

purpose by amplifying and sustaining the conversation

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Success requires:

1. A willingness to relinquish control

2. Toolkits users can play with

3. Creative users

2&3 are in place.

Ready for No1?

http://flickr.com/photos/darwinbell/

Broken media

If you publish without allowing the reader to publish back, you state:

There, I'm done. That's all you need to know. All your questions have been

answered - because I say so. This is as good as it gets. Me producer, you consumer. Me expert, you little man/woman. Nothing to be challenged here. Move

along Your opinion counts for zip

Media that publishes without a comment box publishes broken

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What makes me angry?

1. Organisations insisting on massaging (messaging?) the humanity out of their best efforts to communicate with humans. There's a kind of insanity in that which is beyond grotesque.

2. Those who think they can 'use' us (that's me and you, kid) as a channel. 

3. Those who think the conversation is trivial. They belittle what it is to be human and the value we place on relationships. Their loss.

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Remember

It ain’t social media if it doesn’t change your business…

Social + Media

Social = Groups, people, us, what we choose to do together

Media = Content, distribution, them, what they would seek to do to us

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Together 90:10

“The people who can make the biggest difference to your college don't work for it.

“Adapting to the network means they can.”

Contact:

David Cushman

FasterFuture.blogspot.com

twitter.com/davidcushman

davidpcushman@gmail.com

david@ninety10group.com

Call or text +447736 353590

Or just Google me (no, really)

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