“Social Influence Marketing: New Way to Win Customers”

By Dave Friedman
Avenue A / Razorfish
From: ChiefMarketer.com

Dave’s Comments (Digital Marketing Tutorial Blog): Maybe I’m slow, but this article is the first time I’ve ever seen the term “social influence marketing” and I LOVE it! We Internet Marketers finally have a way of looking at and characterizing ALL of the new Web 2.0 applications from a Marketing perspective. This article by Dave Friedman (and Shiv Singh) of Avenue A / Razorfish is a gem – I highly recommend reading the entire article, especially if this term is new to you and you’re involved with Internet Marketing.

“Don’t get us wrong, we’re not saying that consumers can’t think for themselves. But they do influence each other when they decide what to buy.

What’s changed is that digital behavior has caught up with offline behavior. Consumers now seek advice through social networks, prediction markets, micro-blogging, location-based, networked mobile phone applications and even virtual worlds.

The question is what marketers can do to tap into this phenomenon.

To shed some light on this, I spoke with Shiv Singh, our vice president of social media and global strategic initiatives. Singh has discovered a major shift—that the rise of social media is creating a new discipline called Social Influence Marketing.

To shed some light on this, I spoke with Shiv Singh, our vice president of social media and global strategic initiatives. Singh has discovered a major shift—that the rise of social media is creating a new discipline called Social Influence Marketing.

What is it? It’s the art of employing social media as part of the entire lifecycle of a marketing campaign—and beyond. Singh is also a respected blogger on the subject.”

Read the entire article on ChiefMarketer.com.