1.What is Social Media, exactly?

Broadcast media functions by sending a message from one centralpoint to many destinations.Social media, as the name implies, takes a pluralist approach.Here messages are sent from many points to many points.Social Media is a catch-all term to describe all forms of digitallyenabled peer-to-peer environments. It includes all forms of many-to-many communications. These include:

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Text messaging; sms and mms

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Email; including webmail(gmail etc) and fixed (outlook)

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Instant Messaging: eg Windows Messenger; skype

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Forums; of the traditional message board variety.

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Social networks: such as Facebook, MySpace, Itsmy

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Blogging: Platforms such as Blogger, Wordpress

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Microblogging: eg Twitter, Plurk

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Video sharing sites: eg Youtube, Vimeo

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Image sharing sites: such as photobucket, flickr

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Conversation aggregators: such as Friendfeed, Disqus

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Human-powered search sites such as mahalo, ditto.net

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Human filtering sites such as digg, delicious, stumbleupon

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Comments on more traditional ‘broadcast-style’ sites – such asthe BBC, Guardian.co.uk

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Wikis: wikipedia

2. What goes on in these spaces?

First, it may be wise to consider what doesn’t go on in this space. The broadcasting of one-size-fits-all messaging tends to fail.Broadcast is effective when you have an audience ready to consumethe message.In social media there are no audiences – there are many, many,communities of people talking to each other about things they careabout. Sometimes, if you are lucky, they’ll talk about you.

They self-form into groups of shared interest/purpose – as evidencedby Facebook groups and the more adhoc interest groups which emergein Twitter. They are talking to each other not looking at the stage from whichadvertisers would like to attract their attention. They attract each other’s attention. They act as navigators and arbitersof choice. This is clear from the click-thru rates on ads in social networks. Theyare typically very low (0.01% on average).In context and related ads can increase this rate. But even when theCTR increases advertisers are faced with the fact that ads are onlytrusted by 5% of the UK population (Edelman trust report, 2009). Trust cannot be broadcast. It now resides in our relationships with ourpeers. More than 70% of all purchase decisions are made on therecommendation of peers (according to Forrester).So how can we reach into this ever-lengthening, ever fragmenting longtail of demand (people are still making decisions about buying things, just not in the traditional ways)?We can’t. They can.

The key distribution mechanic:

In social media, the key distribution mechanic is the peer-to-peer passon. This takes two main forms:

I pass on (or display) something I find useful/interesting tosomeone I believe will also find it useful/interesting2.I see something I think is useful or interesting displayed bysomeone I trust – and copy it.Creating something interesting for people to do together is the key tobeing welcomed in and shared in these peer-to-peer networks of trust. This is why the creative element, ideally working on the brief creationwith those you would target, is so important. The more time and effortspent getting this part right, the less time and effort is required inseeding strategies.

Widgets,

badges and applications: These are essentially pieces of code which create a piece of onlinefurniture for users to place on their profiles, forums, desktops etc. They can be grabbed and shared and easily installed on places such asfacebook profiles or users blogs.A youtube video is a widget. These are at their most effective when we allow users to addsomething of themselves – to create their own personal outcomethrough customisation and personalisation.If they are allowed to join in the creation they are more likely to valuethe result and want to pass it on to their friends.So we make our products and messaging adaptable in order for themto be adoptable, if we are to expect successful transmission in socialmedia.If I like something I may pass it on to peers by:

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texting them a url or invite to join in

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emailing them a link or invite to join in

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IM-ing a link

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Posting about it on a forum

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Posting a blog post

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Microblogging about it

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Creating a video about it and sharing that

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Taking pictures in relation to it – and sharing those

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Talking about it in all of the above and offline – recommending itto people who trust me

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Recommending and voting for the results in places such asdelicious, digg, stumbleupon, maholo etcBearing the above in mind helps guide which share-able functions it iswise to include in robust and effective widgets.