Six degrees of separation…. Its not just a party game – research has shown that we’re all connected to each other by no more than six other individuals. Analysis of these connections, in the form of social networks analysis, lets us understand how people in a community (online or offline networks) are connected.
And what emerges from this process of analysis is that not all members of a network are connected equally. In fact, just a small handful of people connect the majority of people in a community.
So, what does this have to do with tourism?
It is rare that a tourism destination or organisation has the budget for indiscriminate mass marketing. Even online, the challenge of reaching your target market through a scatter-shot approach is precarious and costly.
So, as you can’t realistically market to everyone in your target market, is there a way to identify the most promising prospects with a broad range of communities? Is it possible to identify the small handful of people within a given network who are connected to everyone else, so you focus efforts initially on them?
Yes it is – particularly when looking at the connections within groups, networks and communities online.
For example, at a simplistic level, there are tools that let you visualize the interconnections between friends in an online social network like Facebook:
These visualisations of a social network (my Facebook friends as it happens!) hint at the fact that there are multiple levels of connections between different subgroups of people, with some people densely connected, and others sitting in potentially influential positions between several different networks.
But it is not always the people with the most connections that are the most influential. Within a social network, there are specific people who form and influence opinion and people effective at communicating those opinions or messages to many others. There are the connectors, the endorsed, the influencers and also the critics – and you may be interested in identifying one or all of these types.
The online environment means that with careful data collection and measurement, there are ways to measure the six degrees of separation in order reduce the number of prospects you are targeting from the very many “unknowns”, to the few “knowns” with extensive connections.
Digging deeper to find the best prospects for communication
Identifying the best prospects for spreading your message requires some deep digging into the data and there is not one process that suits all contexts.
However extensive your database, it is likely that often you just see the consequences of the influencer or connector at work. So when conducting social network analysis, we look at the wider online environment (eg blogs, webmasters, interconnected websites, social media communities and niche portals) to complete the dataset.
In the context of tourism social network analysis, we have found it useful to examine inbound and outbound links between online groups and networks. We also tie the data back to a range of other factors, such as the likelihood of the wider network to actually engage in our target goals (eg travel to a specific destination) and the likely extent of their interest in our marketing messages.
We run social network analysis software (for example UCINET, with origins in offline social research) across the online data to highlight those highly connected, or highly influential individuals that marketers can then begin a relationship with.
Using online social network analysis to target influencers, connectors and critics
Once the influencers or connectors have been found, you (or your marketers, if you have them) can focus efforts upon engaging with them. For example, it is now common practice within the movie and tech industries for key influencers such as bloggers or web forum managers to get the same levels of access and attention that were once reserved for the mainstream press. Travel and tourism seems a prime sector to follow this lead.
The key to making this process of engagement useful and effective for both parties is in understanding and matching interests a within a social network, as permission, authenticity and trust is key. (There are critics in these groups, and they are significant as they keep balance and keep the influencers and connectors on their toes!)
When you find an influencer or connector, you need to ensure your goals can be very closely aligned to theirs. They must see value for their network, beyond your self-interest, as they risk the disapproval of their peers if they try to blatantly sell on your behalf or feed inappropriate information to their community.
The process of social network analysis, which began decades ago in anthropological and social research, is incredibly appropriate to the new communities of the Internet. It offers tourism destinations and organisations the opportunity to have a new style of marketing relationship.
By identifying, then engaging with a small number of connected individuals online and supporting them in their interactions with their wider network, tourism organisations can use the concept of six degrees of separation to extend their marketing reach. It offers the potential to reach your target market across the world, without having to spend the earth.
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This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 24th, 2007 at 11:44 am and is filed under Destination research, Research tools, Social media measurement, Tourism market research, Web analytics and web measurement. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.