Influence and Authenticity

Influence and authenticity. These are the underpinning principles of social media marketing and of word of mouth.

People very seldom make decisions independently, what they like depends a lot on what they believe others like. If it wasn’t for this there would be no fashion trends, no music trends and no fads The Tipping Point ideas and trends take hold sometimes dramatically and sometimes not for intrinsic quality reasons, or else why would we have overnight sensations.

These trends can be ascribed to the existence of Mavens (people who attract and gather information) Connectors (people who link people together) and Salesmen (people who have the gift of the gab and can convince others)

Social media empowers these people, it empowers the connectors to connect, the mavens to gather information and the salesman to have an audience to convince.

The market is a conversation and with huge numbers of people connected its essential that the each participant is authentic. There are just too many people to be able to fool so you may as well not even attempt. The classic case of how spin fails in the new world is the Kryptonite bicycle lock company The Kryptonite Affair luckily this works both ways and the weight of evidence can often foil the attempts of people to try to break down a reputation.

Consider signing up for a tracking service such as Google alerts or Trackur to find out what people are saying about you and your brand and find triggers to engage.

You social media strategy will take this into account. What role do you play in the network and how to maximise that role and always a commitment to authenticity.