Consumer Behavior: Building Marketing Strategy 13th Edition by Delbert Hawkins, David Mothersbaugh

Exercise 44

Groups, Social Networks, and Seeding
You would probably not be surprised to learn that things like fashion and music spread through social networks. 4 But what about things like obesity, happiness, altruism, or smoking Research suggests these too are influenced via social networks. Take weight. Research shows that people with similar body mass indices are friends. There are a number of reasonable explanations. One is similarity-people choose others who are like them (be it weight, height, etc.). Another is that social networks establish norms of behavior. The evidence supports norms as a primary explanation for why people of similar weight are friends (part of the same social network or group). Slowly over time, what is considered normal weight within a group or network increases, establishing a "new normal."
Seeding can be an effective way of marketing using the influence of group and opinion leaders within groups. For example, Rick Warren's The Purpose Driven Life is the best-selling hardcover book in U.S. history that has been translated into 85 languages. It is a book with Christian topics, relevant to individuals of that faith, but not so much for others who don't share that faith. It is a niche book that spread rapidly and in record numbers to evangelicals for whom the book was relevant, but remained relatively unknown to people outside of this social network. The Purpose Driven Life was launched using "seeding," whereby free samples are given away to influential members of existing social networks. Rick Warren nurtured a group of some 1,200 pastors, provided them a free copy of the book, and encouraged them to lead their congregations through the 40-day program.
The phenomenal ability of Beats headphones to grow fivefold and reach $1 billion between 2010 to 2012, despite negative press reviews that suggested Beats headphones were overpriced and underperforming, can in part be explained by seeding Beats headphones to celebrity influential-locker room photos of Beats around the neck of NBA player LeBron James, Beats popping up in Lady Gaga's video "Poker Face," and rapper Lil Wayne wearing $1 million diamond-studded Beats headphones at an NBA game.
The spread of contagion through social networks is difficult to track and measure in the physical world, but data mining of consumer activity on the Internet provides estimations of the spread and impact of contagion. The firm Lotame, for example, can identify influencers in social networks possessing the desired demographics (e.g., women 25-30 years of age) and behavior (e.g., uploaded a video of their child(ren) in the last four hours), send them the contagion (e.g., a movie trailer), and count and track the behaviors and demographics of the people connected to the influencer (e.g., people who viewed the trailer partially or in its entirety).
The downside to contagion, particularly in today's open social media environment, is that it can be difficult to control what is "put out there" and linked to a specific brand and company. Employees who engage in such negative behaviors (e.g., prank and negatively toned videos involving a restaurant's products and\or facilities) can be dismissed, but correcting the damage done can be much more difficult and time-consuming.
Use group structure to explain why The Purpose Driven Life had little awareness outside a specific social network.