International Journal of Market Research Vol.

51 Issue 4

The social media revolution

Tom Smith
DOI: 10.2501/S1470785309200773

Over the last few years the web has fundamentally shifted towards user-driven technologies such as blogs, social networks and video-sharing platforms. Collectively these social technologies have enabled a revolution in usergenerated content, global community and the publishing of consumer opinion, now uniformly tagged as social media. This movement is dominating the way we use the internet, and the leading social platforms like Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and now Twitter have moved into the mainstream. These sites are the tip of a redefinition of how the internet works, with every site now incorporating the features that allow users to publish opinions, connect, build community, or produce and share content. This growth of social access points means that usage has grown at staggering rates. The Universal McCann tracker study I ran up until the end of 2008, which measured the usage of mainstream social platforms across the world among 17,000 active web users, demonstrated this. The number of active users reading blogs grew from 54% to 77% globally in just two years, while the number who had written a blog grew from 28% to 45%. The other big change was the shift to consumer-driven multimedia platforms such as video sharing, with 83% watching video clips online, up from 32% in 2006, making it the quickestgrowing platform in history.

What is interesting is the way this changes our relationship to content and information. This was shown in the Global Web Index pilot study that my company, Trendstream, delivered in January, which demonstrated that the video-sharing market in the US is driven by consumer-focused content. Videos focused on users personal lives outpaced all professional content both in terms of passively viewing, where 41% had watched videos of user content in the last week, and also in the videos that were shared and uploaded. This focus on personal topics demonstrates how the future of content will be increasingly bottom up and consumer driven. This social revolution is being felt all around us, even if you are not actively involved in social media. Today if you search for product, the results are dominated by user content and opinion this shapes all online users opinions. Second, our networks of influence are growing and becoming more dominated by strangers as we increasingly socialise in digital spaces such as Facebook and Twitter, exposing us constantly to a huge volume of consumer influence. Third, the opinions we find in the online space influence our opinions offline as well, as they move into the traditional media. This was recently demonstrated by the Hudson River air crash in New York, which was reported first and most immediately via social channels such as Twitter, and then made its way into traditional media. Social media impact is being felt across the globe. Wherever people are online they are actively engaged with a wide variety of social media platforms, from blogs to social networking to

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Conference notes

video sharing if there is an internet connection, people are involved. However, Asian internet users lead the way and are the most active users of blogs, particularly in China and South Korea, where blogs are adopted as a form of social community. The next most active users are in Latin America, while the established web markets of the US and Europe demonstrate slightly lower levels of adoption, and a more passive approach to creating and sharing content. This is changing, however, and the active participation rates are increasing hugely.

and offline. This orientation away from talking though mass media to listening and conversing through social media shifts the whole focus of economy, making research more important.

What the listening economy means for research

This is a huge opportunity for research as the need for research outputs and knowledge drives the economy. Sharing opinions is normal: social media have inspired an environment where sharing opinions and content through the web is fun, meaningful and rewarding. This creates an environment where conducting research is more natural. Research sits at the top table: in an economy driven by consumer opinion, the need for research skills becomes paramount, both to understand the reasons behind trends in opinion and also to create truly great customer-centric products, which is an absolute must in the ultra-transparent world of consumer commentators. Research becomes marketing: it is now possible to build a brand through listening. The well-documented examples of MyStarbucksidea and Dellideastorm show the potential to drive brand advocacy on research. Listening and asking questions in a social media environment become a way to start listening and build relationships. Global focus: users are sharing content and building community across the world thanks to social platforms; consequently, brands are increasingly globally focused.

Listening economy
Social media is reorientating the economy. The previous world of mass communications was controlled by the professionals, and feedback and comment were virtually impossible to project to the world. Organisations in the public eye could operate with little concern for their interaction with consumers. Now that every consumer online is a commentator, reviewer and publisher, all organisations have to stop talking and start listening to how they are perceived. This makes the act of listening an essential part of every business model, feeding product development, customer relations and marketing communications. Companies that dont listen in this environment will increasingly get left behind. Of course, listening is just the start, it is about actively taking part and engaging consumers directly. You listen and then you talk. This engagement with consumers online will be a key way to build long-term advocates of the brand, who not only purchase their products but also recommend them on

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International Journal of Market Research Vol. 51 Issue 4

Social platforms become research platforms: social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn are increasingly focusing on the opportunities to provide research services. Massmarket communities have a huge potential to develop research services. This interest will only increase as their pressure to turn a profit increases in the current economic environment. The rise of real data: as we publish our opinions, we leave a trail of data. These data are worth money, and the rise of buzz tracking tools, which track consumer opinion on the web, and analytics to explain behaviour become big business. There will, however, be an increasing need to put research behind this data to understand why things happen.

Embracing the opportunities

Research and research companies can embrace these opportunities by evolving in the following ways. Build community: to stay relevant and drive engagement, research panels should evolve into communities by borrowing the best practices of social networks. Consumers want to share opinions, and research communities should tap into that. This means providing constant surveys, message boards, listening permanently rather than occasionally, and making the conversation two-way by sharing results back with them. Work with brands to build research communities: creating two-way research-led user portals will be

standard practice for all organisations in the public eye. Listening and being open will be an essential positioning in the future. Research agencies can help companies deliver this. Use external platforms to build community: talk to users and panellists via blogs and social network pages, and find them in the places where they spend time. Widgitise: widgets, or mini applications, allow you to place your site or content in an external web environment, such as a social network page, a personalised home page such as iGoogle or the desktop (e.g. Windows Vista Sidebar). These offer a new way of, first, building and maintaining research communities and, second, distributing surveys. Embrace social media platforms as research platforms: blogs, wikis, video sites and social networks all offer interesting platforms for collecting opinions, content and data. This requires a longer-term and a sometimes always on approach rather than short surveying windows. Research companies that evolve with the social media space and embrace it in all these ways will increasingly prosper. Remember, this is just the start as all content moves into the web then social media and consumer opinion will increasingly define the future of not just the web, but society as a whole. Tom Smith is Founder and Managing Director of Trendstream.

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