Learning by « hanging around » : how teens are talking about brands and

consumption on social network sites

Child and Teen Consumption 2010- Interdisciplinarity, theory and practice -

Campus Norrköping, June 21-23 2010

Alexandre COUTANT - Thomas STENGER

coutant.alexandre@gmail.com - stenger@iae.univ-poitiers.fr

University of Poitiers, France, CEREGE, CEPE

Diffusable sous licence Creative Commons – CC BY-SA 3.0http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Teens and consumption on SNS

• « Youth & SNS » Research Project – granted by the French National Postal Service

(2008-2009)– A multidisciplinary team of 7 researchers in

Marketing, Communication and Computer Sciences

• Three main issues :– Defining what are SNS within the « social medias »– Understanding what kind of activities are going on

these sites– Exploring brands visibility and what kind of

interactions are possible with young users

Methodology• 24 months of online participative observation on the

most popular SNS in France (Facebook, Skyrock, Myspace, Netlog, Lexode)

• Online questionnaire (n= 635)• In-depth interviews of 65 French teenagers and

young adults (13-27 years old)• Analysis of the platform design and systematic

profile analysis (n= 38)• Case study relying on a monitoring of brands

actions• Semantic analysis and network analysis of 7041

profiles on Facebook (Tetralogie)

SNS definition

• SNS are web-based services that allow individuals to :– (1) construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded

system,– (2) articulate a list of other users with whom they share a

connection, and– (3) view and traverse their list of connections and those

made by others within the system. The nature and nomenclature of these connections may vary from site to site (Boyd, Ellison, 2007)

– (4) base their interest mainly on these first three points and not on any particular activity (Stenger, Coutant, 2009a, 2010).

Friendship vs interest driven online activities

• “Interest-driven participation has to do with more of the geeks and creative types of practices, where youth will connect with others online around specializes interests, such as media fandom, gaming, or creative production”

• “Friendship-driven participation is what most youth are doing online, and involve the familiar practices of hanging out, flirting, and working out status issues on sites like MySpace and Facebook” (Ito & al., 2008) every day life conversations (Certeau, 1980 ; Proulx, 1994)) frivolity (Coutant, Stenger, 2010)

A place for brands ?• Interview results (Stenger, Coutant, 2009b) :

– Ads are identified and ignored– No one had already consumed on the platform. Neither do they perceive

these sites like commercial spaces– Brands devices are not recognized (pages, jeux, groups)– These devices are appropriated by teens, who twist them for peer

sociability uses (self presentation, flirting, joking « hanging out »)– Frivolity: how to data mine interactions not dealing with a particular point

and often switching from face value to private joke

• Radical opposition to promotional speeches held by web-marketers, SNS and sometimes research in marketing

• Qualitative results confirmed by Tetralogie quantitative analysis• BUT, observation as Tetralogie results highlight that even

if brands are not visible, a lot of interactions are dealing with consumption

Tag cloud made with the « activities » label

Tag cloud made with the « status » label

Tag cloud made with the comments

Generalized spaces of ordinary prescription

• Prescription: potential and more or less intense influence someone or something can have one one’s choice

• Broad theoretical framework (Hatchuel, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2008) used in ergonomy, management or sociology of labor

• Online studies : effects of “official” film critics prescription or of netusers recommendations and opinions (Stenger, 2004, 2006, 2008 ; Debenedetti, 2006 ; Dellarocas, 2003, 2006, 2007 ; Godes et Mayzlin, 2004 ; Larceneux, 2007 ; Belveaux et Marteaux, 2007). No studies on SNS

Define tools and individuals making and participating to ordinary prescription

ordinary prescription

Software encouragement :

Social encouragement :

• Several steps of willing and consciousness of the prescriptive activity :– A minima prescription– Public declaration– Intentional prescription

– Software prescription (Top News, friends and reconnections suggestions, newsfeed management, applications and mashups)

Les Rsn : un espace de prescription

ordinaire généralisée

A successful sociotechnical chain of prescription

• A pacified place to present oneself (Coutant, Stenger, 2010)

• Software encouragement taken over by users themselves

• Reactivity : – changes in status (to distinguish links, videos,

articles, etc)– Choice to publish or not every activity– Other sites activity import– Changes in pages and groups to include it in the

newsfeed, redirection ti the page when someone is joining it, justified suggestions of pages and groups

Thank you

Child and Teen Consumption 2010- Interdisciplinarity, theory and practice -

Campus Norrköping, June 21-23 2010

Alexandre COUTANT - Thomas STENGER

coutant.alexandre@gmail.com - stenger@iae.univ-poitiers.fr

University of Poitiers, France, CEREGE, CEPE