Social Media is nowhere near being used braodly for bigger social change in developed nations, like it is in Iran or Sudan or the Ukraine. Eventually it will be. We wanted to look at what were the hottest societal topics in Social Media channels.
But it seems that for Social Media to be the underlying technology that enables broader social change, as a society, we aren’t mad enough about a major topic; it’s just too fragmented. Yet. The undercurrents are there. Here’s a look at the largest social issues we see trending in Social Media channels (Sept. 2008 to March 2010);
1. Financial Crisis: It remains top of the list across the U.S., Canada and UK (where we conduct our research.) A number of sub-topics feature in here (i.e. lending practices, citizen and government debt.)
2. Corporate Greed: Ties into #1 but is more related to issues around corporate leaders, their bonuses and making too much money; perception or otherwise. The volume of discussion was high enough to warrant it’s own segment.
3. Aid Relief: Over the past two months this has mostly been focused on Haiti, but China’s recent earthquake trended upwards for a few days.
4. National Politics: It’s hot, but not that hot. In the U.S. it’s Tea Party related, in Canada it was Proroguing Parliament and ongoing scandals and in the UK it was MP expenditures followed by the election. Debt related we placed into the financial crisis.
5. Iraq & Afghanistan: Perhaps this can also be said of foreign policy of U.S., Canada and UK. But it mostly focuses on Iraq and Afghanistan – in a negative manner. Broad public support is not there.
6. Energy: This is trending upward. Discussions revolve around alternative energy sources such as solar power and are negative towards our reliance on fossil fuels.
7. Healthcare: While this ranked very high in the U.S., Canadian and UK discussion is there but brought the overall ranking down.
8. Food: We see a lot of discussion going on around food, namely the source of our food and then as it relates to our health. This is fairly equal across the U.S., Canada and UK.
9. Climate Change: Could be categorized with energy, but we see this as a separate issue since it covers energy, industrial pollution, foreign and domestic policy and the G8. While discussion goes on across Social Media channels, it is surprising to us it is not higher up the list.
10. Privacy: It’s out there, perhaps on the low side, but the launch of Google Buzz and other apps has kept it simmering in the background.
Methodology:
Using mediasphere360, we looked into the blogosphere, newsgroups, forums, microblogs, social networks (10) and 256 non-profit websites for traffic rankings. We used a set of common keywords around the issues above. Keywords were identified by using Google Insights. We then filtered out celebrity discussions and entertainment properties. The search methodology and analysis as it relates to our technology are proprietary to MediaBadger. Searches were refined to U.S., Canada and UK (colonies and territories excluded.)
Social relevance. Social Media is constantly evolving with meme’s, brand discussions, product rants and raves, funny concepts and ridiculous to the sublime for content. Generated by people as we know. Yet advertising has traditionally been a reflection of society.
Social Media, with so many channels (there’s over 60 different types of Social Networks) and so much happening so fast, it’s increasingly harder for an ad agency or market research agency to keep up. Funny and innovative content on the Web changes so quickly that by the time a creative director finds a clever way to tie in a product to a TV, radio, print or online ad, the concept is stale and the ad flops. No matter which medium it is carried in.
Then an ad appears or some form of campaign, it goes viral and reaches even beyond the original target audience that in effect it has no real effect on product sales as it was intended.
Print advertising as with radio, are still key elements for real marketing. Perhaps more so in one sense. Yet they are challenges for the ad agency who wants to find something of relevance across all mediums, in a timely manner.
Agencies will be under increasing pressure to generate creative concepts ahead of the consumer who is creating the content themselves.
What do you thunk?
(Author: Giles Crouch)
One of Canada’s top marketing minds, Mitch Joel, rightly asks that if the big companies and marketers have truly delved into the Social Media sphere, then is Social Media dead?
I wonder if perhaps the reverse is more true? Is marketing dying as a result of Social Media? Let’s face it, marketers walk an uneasy line of stretching the truth and so it’s no wonder that only 14% of people trust advertisements. As marketers, we’ve gone and shot ourselves in the foot.
Social Media is a ray of sunshine into media channels previously controlled by gatekeepers (editors, journalists, broadcast network owners)…and don’t they say sunshine is the ultimate disinfectant?
Each company that has waded into Social Media channels with a heavyweight or heavyhanded approach has suffered; Motrin, Nestle with Facebook (just this past week!), JetBlue, Rogers and so on.
It’s still far, far too early to make any concrete predictions when it comes to Social Media (no one is truly an expert yet in this space) and perhaps all we can say is that it will change. Quite significantly. People are only just finding their voices.
I suspect Social Media will thrive, while it is marketers (I’ve been one for nearly 20 years) will be the ones to suffer and businesses will adapt in whole new ways. Eventually. In the meantime, it’s going to be a rocky road…
What do you think?
(Author: Giles Crouch)
Research, Thunking•
on February 25th, 2010•
Why doesn’t government and politicians take activism on Social Media services seriously? To some degree they do. For elected members activity on blogs, comments on news sites, some Twitter commentary; can be an indicator of citizen sentiment on an issue. But what about petitions and gaining change within government?
My theory is that there’s a few issues at work here, legitimate ones for government. Issues that will need addressing in the future.
Content Quality: Let’s face it, often times the “comments” left in online news services and blogs are often crap. They are highly opinionated and often without the evidence needed to make the opinion based on some qualified research or data. Often they are rants and by people who likely can’t be persuaded to an alternate stance anyway; politicians and government understand this. It’s not worth the effort to address them.
Anonymity & Identification: This to me is a serious element. Most people post on blog comments or news media site comments under an assumed false name or “handle” like “opinionator123″ and don’t use a real name. One has no idea if that person is a smart 12 year old or a 40 year old, male or female or living within the jurisdiction of the story being addressed. This then goes to the issue of identification and validating the responses or discussion.
What Will Be Needed?
Today, there doesn’t exist a way to truly validate an individual (beyond online voting systems, which are not scaled to go beyond electoral requirements and time lines.) Outside of Cyburbia, we have established means of determining personal identity (drivers license, identity cards, passports etc.) which we do not have in Cyburbia. Hand written signatures on a petition are acceptable because there’s a proven means of validation, trusted and accepted. But there isn’t for our lives in Cyburbia.
So Where Does That Leave Us?
For now, I think that just leaves politicians and government bureaucrats with taking Social Media seriously – but only so far. More in terms of “general sentiment” or identification of potential issues to cross over into voter or constituent actions. But that’s it. Government has a responsibility to the public to make decisions based on quantifiable sources and via accepted means.
So until some form of personal validation system is developed and validated by governments, we can’t expect activism in Social Media services and channels to be taken overly seriously. Services like Move On are gaining momentum, but still remain on the fringes of acceptance. In India such activism is taking hold, but only hits the “elites” or those that can afford computers and Web access; still missing the majority of the population.
What do you think?
(Author: G. Crouch)
Because it’s boring. Email is boring.
But more people use email than Facebook or Twitter. Combined. Every day. Still.
Email spans a wider demographic range than any other social technology application. We’re already seeing (in our own research and others) that age groups are defining social technologies…more on that later.
Email is ridiculously simple and it’s boring. Across many age groups, we’ve mastered email, whether that’s via a Web interface like Gmail or Hotmail or if we have an email client like Mail or Entourage or Thunderbird. Most of us already have our various “groups” that we send stuff to. We don’t think about it, we just “forward”, “reply” or create new, copy/paste or drag/drop and hit “send.” And we’re done. Boring. That’s when social change comes about from a technology; when it becomes boring.
Jody Williams won a nobel peace prize for land mine activism – mostly using email and faxes. Two boring technologies.
The phone eventually enabled the ability to have 911 service, of which a TV show was created. Because it was boring and we all knew how to dial a phone. In the 1930’s phones were pretty much banned in offices.
Facebook is not an email “killer” because it’s still complicated and not boring yet. Same thing with Twitter.
A new social media technology that is now pretty much boring is SMS/txt messaging and perhaps the first instance of txt messaging benefiting society was Haiti – that most of the money raised in the US, Canada and UK was through SMS donations. In the 2005 Orange Revolution in the Ukraine, it was txt messaging that played the key role in gathering people to protest the election results and promoted democracy. It’s getting boring.
So, what do you think? Is email still the number one social technology?
Thunking•
on November 10th, 2009•
The industrial age heralded mass-manufacturing and the use of machinery to do so. The printing press revolutionized our thought processes and communications. With the rise of the industrial age the telephone and it’s widespread use, became possible.
At the opening of the industrial age, children were employed to fix machines. Many died. The work week was seven days, pay was horrid. A new social concept came into being – unions. The church also chimed in saying Sunday was a religious day of observance. The 5 day work week came into being, along with the concept of shift work. Huge social change occurred. As the telephone came into being, new social rules around its use evolved over time.
Enter the Digital Age, the advent of the fax machine, the Internet with email…snail mail use plummeted. It was easier and cheaper to use email. The cost of the transaction was put down to almost zero.
We are in a transition phase from the Industrial Age to the Digital Age. Watching this happen and with our ongoing analysis for clients across healthcare, manufacturing, shipping and more, we’ve noted some curious events happening. Here’s some of what we think will change;
Work Hours: The 8 hour white collar day will change, not so much the length of the work day, but the when. Shifts that enable connecting with other time zones (it’s already happening, has been for a while.) It will just become more common.
Work Location: Well, the concept of home office and remote office working is far from new. But it may become more realistic in the future.
Work Social Rules: Workplaces will first deny all access to social technologies. Then they’ll learn how to use those social technologies to their advantage (some already have) but limits will be put on “personal” social tools.
Etiquette: We predict a renaissance in social etiquette. Just as it’s not cool to wear your mobile on your hip, it will be uncool to check your mobile device at dinner functions and cocktail parties while talking to people.
Social rules are changing. A new age of transparency is upon us, but we are in the early stages of change. We’re just beginning to understand these social technologies and barely understanding their implications on our social behaviours. Paul Carr has some good insights.
Thunking•
on October 30th, 2009•
Social Media, more specifically how people are using it, is in the honeymoon phase we suggest. Business is eying it warily, a tiger circling its prey, nibbling here and there. Citizens are all playing with it delightedly, discovering their voice. Sharing ideas, trying out new online services and apps. Let’s face it, much of the content being produced is not of much societal value, but is valuable within the groups it is relevant to.
There’s been rumblings of “Online Social Activism” in the past. We’ve seen hints here and there; removing a Cardinal in Boston, outing bad marketing or poor service by companies (i.e. United Breaks Guitars and a number of others.) The failed attempt in Moldova using Twitter to drive a revolution and the successful use of Social Media tools to force BBC and CNN to cover the Iran elections in June of 2009.These are but early sputters of Social Media as a mechanism for significant social change right now.
One of the primary functions of our company is research into Social Media; who, how, why its being used and what tools, mostly for business clients. We’ve covered some very unique and seemingly obscure industries (i.e. model trains, knitting, HAM radios) and in each case we find people actively engaged in sharing, idea generation and discussion.
Having been at this for near two years now, our observation in a recent team discussion is that we’re in a honeymoon phase – the “early adopter” phase in marketing terms. One can’t predict when, but as sure as Luther figured out how to use a printing press to drive the Christian Reformation so will citizens figure out how to use one or several Social Media tools to cause another revolution. Obama made very effective political use of Social Media; it too was just a start and pale to what we predict will come.
Our forecast is that within 3 years we will see people figuring out how to become more organized, how to leverage these tools in ways we haven’t yet thought of. As rural communities and more countries turn on Internet access and the cost to access and use these tools continues to fall, more uses will be found. An article yesterday by Pete Cashmore of Mashable already hints at societal changes in terms of an individuals presence online and the change of privacy.
There is an interesting Chinese proverb/curse that says “may you live in interesting times.” I think we are in interesting times. I’m not sure its a curse though.
Do you agree? Are we in the honeymoon phase of Social Media? Is bigger change coming?
Media Measurement•
on July 7th, 2008•
Understatement of the month is that Traditional Media is changing. What’s interesting is how those changes are coming about; some subtle, some less so. Newspaper readership is declining constantly, and the ad dollars needed to keep it going as well. Yet there are more magazines and books than ever before being published. This is a bit of a dichotomy. Perhaps it’s good to look at “how” the Web has impacted changes in newspapers and magazines.
The newspaper as we’ve known it will never be the same. Nor will magazines. But they will likely survive for many years to come. What’s changing is the formatting of these traditional publications and how they are becoming more integrated with Social and New Media. Take for instance the NY Times. Last year they implemented summaries of the stories in the paper in the first couple of pages – so you don’t have to read the whole paper. Magazines have increased the number of sections with “shorts” – quick information perhaps with an associated picture – and less long articles. Some publications like Atlantic, Harpers or the Economist continue to have in-depth articles, but this is also relevant to the audience – and the story is always carried over onto the Web.
We do very little long reading while on the Web. In considering this blog post (an abstract of our soon to be released eBook, The Conversant Corporation) I’ve had to write in summary form. Web reading is a skimming behaviour, the shorter the content the better. Reading on the Web is typically a skimming style because we plant links in stories and a reader may quickly go off on a tangent, skimming yet other stories?
Author Nick Carr (The Big Switch) has pointed out in his article Is Google Making Us Stoopid that our reading style on the Web is changing how we read books as well. Our attention span is shortening and we want things in clips – the deeper material and answers are always available on Google or Yahoo! at the tip of our fingers. This is a hallmark of the 90-Second-Economy.
Many newspapers have websites, and with them is the ability for the public to blog and comment on articles. The stories are extended on the Web. Even traditional television news extends the stories on the Website. Watch a TV documentary and a website address will be displayed for more information on the story.
This anecdotal evidence shows us that the Web is having an enormous impact on Traditional Media. They are re-formatting their content to reflect the reading style of the Web. This concious shift is subtle, yet remarkable…what does this mean for how magazines and newspapers will be read in the future?
