Groundswell and Social Networking Media

I was really excited about this topic because I have not been much of a social media user in the past, but recently I decided to embrace the age of online social networks (a few years late I know). Because of my new found desire to enter the world of social networking this topic is opportune as I am learning all about SNS through facebook. With this blog I get to do some research into how these powerful tools are used to disseminate opinion, facts and even propaganda to the masses.


To give you an idea of how much of a late adopter I am, up until about 3 days ago I had never updated my status on facebook and honestly was not even sure if I did it correctly when I did it. I only signed up for facebook because someone did it for me, and the only pictures on there are a few very old profile pictures and photos I have been tagged in by other people, but I don’t think these even count as my pictures. Needless to say I am not the typical twenty-something student who utilizes facebook, twitter, or any other online social networking media. Though I do not have much experience with social media since I have just never gotten it for some reason, I am finding myself discovering an entirely new world with endless possibilities if used correctly. Of course most people already know this, but being a SNS newbie it’s a revelation to me.

What I would like to discuss is the ways that companies can use social media to connect with their audience. Twitter, for example, is an extremely popular tool allowing anyone to update everyone about anything. Just today Twitter announced that it will begin incorporating focused advertising based on peoples’ tweets. Now when anyone decides to talk about something through twitter, companies have the opportunity to take advantage of the topic that is on the readers mind about it or its product and pull them in to getting more information. I think that just like any other form of online advertising, companies need to tread lightly when imposing themselves on peoples “private” space, but if they utilize this new tool appropriately it has the possibility to make a real impact on customers. Just like any other form of advertising which targets search topics or key words in e-mails, companies can get you to think more about them when someone else plants the seed of curiosity in your mind. When you are thinking about something and you get more data (ads) specific to that topic created by the company, it gives the company an opportunity to being creating, reinforcing or changing the experience associate with that company or its products. The key here is that it is so much more powerful when it is a trusted source that plants the seed rather than the company. The chapter talks a lot about how the prevalence of groundswell poses so many challenges and opportunities for companies and this is just one more tool at the disposal of the marketing machine. The more ways companies have to connect with you the better chance they have to not only get feedback about what is and is not working, but also to make a change to their message when necessary. This feedback is essential in developing and reinforcing the desired experience.

Opinions expressed in blogs, facebook pages, tweets, etc., now more than ever, are so much more powerful that an ad campaign due to the perceived neutrality and established trust associated with them. I say that, but it is important to remember that marketing campaigns are still extremely important in shaping, if nothing else, the initial perception put out there and can help shape the opinions of the people who initially comment on those topics. It is from comments that companies can learn so much. A great example of this is Tiger Woods’ recent comeback. Nike, put out an extremely controversial ad that, I believe, played only for a day and on very specific channels. Though this ad was not “widely” distributed in a traditional sense, it was all over SNS sites and the topic of many conversations, good and bad. People had opinions about the commercial which led to opinions about Nike and obviously Tiger. This in my opinion was masterful “jujitsu” on the part of Nike. The company knew that anything and everything associated with Tiger’s return to golf would be talked about everywhere, so they made sure to give the critics and fans something to talk about, and keep talking about.

Nike knew exactly what it was doing when releasing this controversial ad because they wanted to get people talking about it, keeping Nike on everyone’s mind. More importantly for the topic of our conversation Nike could access people’s true reactions, not by conducting large research topics, but simply by looking at what is being posted for everyone to see. This is another important benefit from the availability of information; people’s opinions are not swayed by the act of collecting data as they can be during a focus group or a questioner. SNS give you a huge sample population proving actual feeling about topics which makes it easier for companies to judge how to respond. Though, actually collecting this data and quantifying it can be challenging due to the freedom of responses. The ad was about his “mistakes” which led to the situation he is in now. It made him look vulnerable and more importantly sad and sorry. The ad campaign, I think, was designed to make Tiger look like a normal person who is fallible. This allows this superhuman figure to be just like the rest of us and makes his life relatable to the everyday guy, the guy that buys Nike products and is a Tiger fan. Nike is reaching out to customers showing them that Tiger is just like you and me, telling us to “come on back and buy our products, we stood by him and so should you”. I think this example relates more so to managing peoples’ perceptions and creating that experience, from a traditional media perspective than gaining insight. The other side of the campaign though, what I’ll call the “residual data” generated by peoples responses is invaluable to understanding what people really think about Nike and Tiger. I don’t think Nike intentionally created the ad in order to extract people’s responses, but it was absolutely a benefit. This data is just another avenue for Nike to gain true insight into their customers and critics thoughts.