The Value of Rubbing Up
This week Brad Berens generously visited University of Notre Dame to deliver the keynote speech at the MBA-student sponsored event, the Social Media Symposium. I’ve ‘known’ Brad via email and Twitter for nearly 4 years, but this was our first corporeal experience. (Thanks, Brad. for enlightening me on how the word corporeal is actually pronounced!)
Brad Berens has what many Millennials aspire to – that is a ‘slash career’. He simultaneously wears many hats including blogger/ imediaconnection editor-at-large/Senior Research Fellow at USC Annenberg School for the Digital Future/event producer for DMG World Media. In his position as Chief Content officer, Digital Marketing Officer, his main focus is producing 18 marketing events each year, including AdTech, the CMO Executive Summit and iMedia Summits. In other words, he is well plugged in to what is happening in digital marketing and media.
Berens’ keynote, titled “Media Friction and Fragmentation”, was crowded with insights and ideas, but two ideas in particular stand out: “All Media is Social Media” and “Consumers Want to Increase Their ‘Social Friction'”. Together they provide a useful prism for evaluating the torrent of new digital marketing ideas.
All Media Is Social Media
Think about it: everything we do on the Internet is inherently social, or at least has the potential to be social. To the extent that media is rapidly becoming digitized, it follows that all media is inherently social. Most Internet sites and video games have a ‘share this’ option. Sharing can be asynchronous (i.e., an email forward or tweet) or simultaneous (Chatroulette, Call of Duty). Sharing is caring. The construct of the lonely person at their typewriter or the isolated computer geek has completely given way to the virtual social world of the connected consumer.
Consumers Want To Increase Their ‘Social Friction’
In business friction is a bad thing. We want efficiency, not friction. But in our social lives, friction means we’re getting closer to others and that is a good thing. Visiting Disneyland is a high friction experience – you don’t go alone (or how sad for you if you do). Watching a movie or bowling can be either a low friction experience or a high friction experience depending on whether you have an opportunity to interact with others during the experience. Likewise with the Internet. It can be high friction or low friction. To the extent that we can make the Internet more like Disneyland and less like watching TV or bowling alone, it will be more compelling to users.
By combining these two insights, the logical conclusion is that the most useful and compelling social media platforms will be those that are high in ‘social friction’.
Social media is not just a way to communicate — communication is only the beginning. Social media is a form of entertainment that offers consumers new ways to literally be together online and even to enhance their analog experiences. Looking at some of the hottest trends in online media through this prism provides insights as to why these are gaining traction: they each embody the idea of high tech meeting high friction.
1. Location-based Platforms
Foursquare is one of the hottest platforms in what is known as location-based marketing. It allows you to notify your friends who use the platform where you are by ‘checking in’ to different locations. There is a game-like quality to the applications by providing rewards for frequent check ins, but over time it is thought that the real power and appeal will be allowing you to know whether you know anyone in your immediate vicinity. You can also change your plans to be more likely to be where your friends are. No more accidental encounters. Twitter and Facebook have also recently incorporated location elements to their platforms. The iPad provides location-specific advertising and marketing opportunities for social connection. (For more on how marketers are leveraging location-based platforms, see Mashable’s “Five Things You Need to Know About Location-based Marketing”)
2. Social Gaming Platforms
In the old days we had solitaire and Bejeweled. Then there were games you played online or within Facebook like Farmville or Scrabulous. Now console and online games like World of Warcraft and Call of Duty are almost entirely seen as a way to interact with friends. According to a recent TIME magazine article, the next generation of games will take the idea of social friction to the next level. The next generation of online games — like the popular Bejeweled Blitz — will offer richer, more direct competition and game play between users. New platforms from iPhone and Facebook will allow players to share scores, statistics and and even add a personalized gaming highlight reel to their profile directly from Xbox 360 or Playstation.
3. Social Shopping Platforms
For Millennials, especially, shopping is ‘social glue’, whether it is done online or in-store. Millennials are more likely to shop with someone else, and they are ready to spread the word if they see a particularly good deal. According to Mintel, sixty percent of 18-34 year olds “read consumer feedback online about products or services before making a purchase”. Sixty-five percent of teens say when their favorite brand or store has a sale, they want to share the information with their best friend or sister. There is a huge opportunity to combine the fun of a game with shopping. Deal sharing sites such as Groupon.com and LivingSocial.com reward you for signing up new users if they subsequently buy a deal. Groupon only makes a deal official if a certain number of people purchase it.
4. Social Viewing Platforms (The Back Channel)
The Academy Awards and Super Bowl viewing experiences were transformed this year by consumers connecting via Twitter on the ‘back channel’ as they watched the ‘front channel’ on TV.
The next generation of Web-connected TVs and software will include ways for people to monitor and interact with the conversation happening around an event, filtering live streams in real-time to display the most relevant discussions. According to TIME , an interview with Twitter founder Evan Williams at South By Southwest was wrecked by criticism on Twitter (more than a little irony there!). “Festival goers were unimpressed with the questions posed to Williams by moderator Umair Haque of the Harvard Business Review and tweeted their displeasure before leaving the interview en masse. In a blog post later, Haque said he wished he had been monitoring the Twitter conversation from on stage.” The ability to have a discussion during a shared viewing event enhances the viewing, for better and for worse…
5. Social Action Platforms
There are many sites offering advice to non-profits on how to leverage social media to connect with their users, but I found very little about how to connect users to each other. The site, Act.ly, is a Twitter-based platform that allows users to start petitions and recruit like-minded individuals to support them. Twestivals are another way Twitter is being leveraged to bring people together in the offline world. The site allows you to attend events in your city by donating to worthy causes selected by the organizer. A key feature is begin able to see who is planning on attending. Look for more sites that connect people around causes to energize them to get off their computers and into their communities – together.
‘Social friction’ is a useful concept for marketers who want to engage Millennials.
Marketers wishing to engage Millennials would be wise to leverage these social media platforms to help Gen Y’ers do more of what they want to do – spend more time with their friends and to make that time as rewarding and fun as possible. Why? Young adults and teens are adamant that their digital world is no substitute for real interpersonal relationships and interaction. Millennial, Angela Stefano, describes her wish for less digital, more analog life succinctly in The Next Great Generation blog:
“I, for one, would much rather be at a party with my friends than at home reading tweets and text messages about what a great time they’re having. … If anything, our analog lives are made more complex by our digital ones. …Not to mention, your digital world wouldn’t be very exciting if your analog one wasn’t filled with people and activities. Without those first connections…well, you’re kind of just a creeper looking for friends in a chatroom. When it comes down to it, our digital lives complement our analog ones. And it should never be the other way around.” — Angela Stefano
