Big ups to Ross Dawson who organized the Future of Influence Summit last week in San Francisco and Sidney. It was quite an undertaking to have a conversation in two continents and an interesting one at that. I was honoured to be able to do the opening keynote, which I posted up later on Slideshare. But my presentation isn’t what I came away from the summit thinking about that day, although it’s tangentially related. What I came away thinking about is how unfortunately focused the idea of ‘Influencer Marketing’ is in the context of growing businesses.
I’ve written about this before when I talked about Whuffie Math in April. It all came about through a scuffle I had with my publisher on to whom should I send advanced readers copies of The Whuffie Factor. I thought I should send the copies to people who were clearly enthusiastic about the book’s impending arrival, despite their ‘reader numbers’. My publisher thought I should send the advanced copies to those who had a large readership, despite their enthusiasm for the book.
In the end, my publisher caved and sent out the books to the addresses I requested AND they handpicked their own influential group of bloggers/journalists. The result? I had 15 of the 25 people who requested books (my enthusiasts) write blog posts and, I believe, everyone tweeted about the book at some point. As for the influencers? I have yet to read a review.
Heck, I’m not against influencers. I think they are awesome and have worked hard to build an audience that trusts their word. But the point I was making to my publisher was that the same influencers they wanted to send books to have a steady stream of books being sent to them. I know. I’m on that list. I have probably 20+ books sitting waiting for me to read them. I feel awful that I got a free book and can’t reciprocate with at least an Amazon review…or even a tweet or two! So, I end up shelving many of these books at Citizen Space (my coworking space in San Francisco) for others to enjoy. There may be some posts and recommendations coming from people who pick these books up there, I’m not sure. But either way, I was sent a $20 book (average) plus shipping and I haven’t even had the decency to read it!
Now, the burning question at the Future of Influence Summit was, well, what is the future of influence? After listening to multiple panelists talk about how to find and reach out to influencers, I came to the conclusion that the future of influence isn’t about influencers themselves. It’s more about providing a great product (that helps people become more influential themselves quite often) and rewarding your customers that help you spread the word about it (helping them become even MORE influential). It’s about helping your customers become the influencers, not sucking up to the influencers.
I don’t really have a name for it and I don’t think coining anything new is particularly useful, but I would change the idea to Enthusiast Marketing instead of Influencer Marketing. It recognizes that, as Ross said, “Everyone is an influencer” and gives you the opportunity to thank your currently loyal and awesome customers and help them go further, thus increasing their own influence.
When I think of blogs like TechCrunch, I very much see their growth as being that of a symbiotic system where startups helped TechCrunch grow influential and TechCrunch helped startups grow influential. Michael Arrington was crazy about the growth of the startup world, so he created a blog that reflected that enthusiasm. At first, he sought out startups for interviews and reviews, but after a while these startups recognized that he was an ally and went to him. When I first approached him in regards to Riya (now Like.com), TechCrunch had about 10,000 readers. But I loved Michael’s enthusiasm and was happy to walk him through what we were doing. Essentially, as startups grew, so did TechCrunch. I imagine there are loads of stories like this where influencers grew out of being just bloggers or the like with small audiences who became influential through their enthusiasm for a topic and the support of the products they were excited about. Enthusiast marketing.
So…instead of just focusing on who is influential in your given industry, think about who is enthusiastic about what you are doing (or seems really into your industry). Create influencers out of your enthusiasts and I’ll bet you will see much better results than chasing after the same people as everyone else.
While I don’t know if this is The Future, I hope it is. I also think it’s the most sustainable model we have for start-ups. I’ve been struggling with exactly how to refer to this as well (having referred to it earlier as a ‘passionate users’ approach) — but one of the best examples I’ve seen is Gary Vaynerchuk. I keep hearing him described as the fun guy everyone wants at their dinner party, but if you look at the comments from his enthusiastic community, it’s clear he’s helping *them* become the people everyone wants at their dinner party. At the very least, he’s giving people more reasons to HAVE parties, with–or without–him.
In Gary’s case, he’s doing it with guilt-free education and inspiration — “learn about wine and have fun experimenting and experiencing it without all the bullshit that usually surrounds being a Wine Snob…” And his most passionate followers are taking what they’ve learned and using it. He may not be making people more “influential”, but he’s certainly making them more interesting and–judging by his zillion comments–more festive. And THAT inspires the hell out of me.
I’m hopeful for this future. Many people are doing what they can to help make this more likely. At the least, I hope more and more chunks of advertising are used not to further a meaningless message, but to give people something they can use.
Tara – great post. I think what we are seeing here is that even when marketers (and publishers) embrace social media, they still are not embracing the mindset that will make them successful in the space. The mass media mindset lives on.
The misconception is that influencers have a lot’s of time to review lot’s of products. While they drive lot’s of attention to them, they can’t cover it all. That’s why I hope the Enthusiast Marketing becomes the new rule, I see every day people talking about Posterous, Friend Feed, Google and many more products. People that don’t have huge ‘numbers’ but people that may have a greater impact on me trying or not a product.
Kathy, on the Gary Vaynerchuk’s case I think he sort of turns everyone in an influencer for his products or work. There are lot’s of people, myself included, that will love to promote his book for all the advice he offers in it and all the useful knowledge he puts out in every video and keynote he gives.An important part is that Gary feels like the buddy you have had for a long time, he answers e-mails, chats with you on AIM. So people feel compelled to help him. Not only because he is there, but because he puts out great content (which is his product)
A thing to add is that Tara herself is like that. I remember the first time I stumbled upon her work I e-mailed her and she got back to me with a very nice e-mail. She made an Influencer out of me because I loved what she writes (qualifies as a great product)and I really love to recommend her Book to everyone that says “and for marketing we will use facebook” so they can learn what it’s all about.
So those are some examples of how you can make or give the tools so everybody can be an influencer if they want to. I also hope that this will be the Future of Influence. I’m confident that it will be.
Tara:
Great post and thanks for writing it.
Could it be that the enthusaist is actually the same as the customer evangelist? Just saying…
@Jeff
Yes. Similar. Except I really don’t like the metaphor of evangelist.
Tara,
I have to say, I definitely agree. I’m also glad to start seeing you posting more around here again!
I didn’t know that this Influencer Summit even existed. My first thought was exactly what you had said. These influencers are inundated with products and they can’t possibly love everything they get.
I think that you should stick with the people that really care about your book because they will tirelessly promote it. The influencer will take 5 minutes, if they can, and give it one plug. It will probably be an overview and very bland.
I know, because I’m lucky to be getting on the phone with a huge author this week. He’s going to take 5 minutes out of his day to talk with me about his book. You can bet that I’m going to promote the crap out of his book. It was all because he asked me to consider buying his book.
Speaking of books, aren’t you going to be coming out with another one sometime? Let me know. I’d love to chat with you again!
take care
~Andy
@Andy,
Awesome story! And yes…I’m finally working on my next book.
You rawk.
@Kathy
Great story about Gary. You are right. He makes EVERYONE feel special, not just the fancy people and that is huge. So glad that @jorge popped in to tell his own story about Gary.
I’ve seen this topic tossed around in a couple different niches. It seems the same “influencers” get all the attention from the big companies and therefore the little companies but they are now so overloaded with free stuff that they aren’t covering even a small portion of what could actually be interesting and useful to their readership.
The concept of enthusiasts strikes a chord with me because they are seeking out what they love and sharing it. They naturally light a fire in their readers about particular ideas, products or services because they have that fire lit from within. Not because a company offers them free stuff.
I’m glad to see you handpicked people to share your book with and they answered the call so abundantly. This message needs to reach more marketers!
Great post and much resonance. I’ve just sat through a GfK US annual report and
alongside Gen X, Y and Boomers most surveys are calibrated against Influentials
- all the while I was thinking about your Enthusiasts.
Allow me to add this thought to the debate – that perhaps the better term is
‘Advocate’. I’m thinking about how so much of marketing and acquisition is based
on promise, that the value of (good) experience is much more than retention as
an advocate can acquire new customers for you, that peer to peer reviews are
often more trusted. Also, when you advocate a product or service you affirm
your own choice wich prdisposes you to buy again.
There was a bunch of interesting work done on Net Promter Scores (NPI) by Dr
Paul Marsden (among others) and HBR wrote a paper on the biz value entailed.
Great debate from your readers and just wanted to add advocacy into the mix as
a possible term and direction for marketing.
And finally, a thought to leave you with: given the power of social networks,
the 6 degrees of seperation, the snowball effect of micro aggreagation then the
advocate or enthusiast is going to be more important in ‘my world’ than the
superconnected influencer of ‘the world’.
cheers,
T
I’ve seen this topic tossed around in a couple different niches. It seems the same “influencers” get all the attention from the big companies and therefore the little companies but they are now so overloaded with free stuff that they aren’t covering even a small portion of what could actually be interesting and useful to their readership.
I am just always more blown away about internet marketing on account of understanding the way the the current generations communicate with the world through the internet. My 10 year old grandson just took me a website they had launched to manage popular topics for their peer group. They wanted to know a way to launch advertising on the website to generate income. I am so very happy.