On the diversity of influencers

At Influencer50 we bang on about different kinds on influencers and why the world has moved away from focusing on journalists and analysts. And we don’t just mean bloggers and other social media users, which represent only a small proportion of influencers (especially in B2B markets). We’ve identified over 20 different types of influencer and probably are still missing some.

But why does this matter? Clearly, it matters if there are influencers out there that you’re not in conversation with. But why do influencers come from numerous sources? Why is there no small group of “super-influencers” that dominate a sector?

The reason is that diversity within an influencer community improves the overall functioning of the wider market. Having diverse backgrounds and agendas (and opinions, more than likely) means that a cross-section of influencers’ perspectives is maintained, which is good for broad-based discussion. It also means that the influence of a few personalities can be kept in check, lest bias be introduced. This is particularly important in decision making.

It turns out that a market, or a decision-making unit, will seek out a diverse array of opinions because it’s the wise and safe thing to do. It shouldn’t be a surprise, therefore, that influencer communities are not dominated by journalists or analysts, or any other type of influencer.

What’s difficult is identifying the less-than-obvious influencers. Identifying analysts and journalists is too simplistic and misses the bigger picture.

There are a couple of reference works in this area: The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki is very accessible, and the recent article in HBR on The Wisdom of (Expert) Crowds by Robert S. Duboff is interesting too.

A long tail of authority?

James at Redmonk posts on Andrew Keen’s book The Cult of the Amateur. Keen’s point is, in a nutshell, that user-generated content is inferior to that of professionals. So we take risks by using social media sources as reference points – Wikipedia and its (allegedly) dodgy content is the oft-cited example.

James contrasts Keen’s theory with Chris Anderson’s Long Tail and suggests that a “long tail of authority” will emerge as the credibility of professional authorities diminishes.

Hmmm. A “long tail of authority” sounds like an oxymoron to me. We use third parties to replace experience we ourselves don’t have. For trivial needs (which toothpaste to buy) we defer to just about anyone (spouse, sales assistant, person also browsing for toothpaste, etc). But for more important decisions we tend to use more verifiable sources. It’s not just authority that’s important – accountability is also vital is such decisions. Which is why we pay professionals, and why professional need indemnity cover.

By definition (I think), authority in any market is concentrated in the “short head.” It’s a scarce resource. Social media helps to distribute authority but doesn’t help create it.

As always, the truth is in the middle somewhere. There’s no doubt that social media has enabled some new authorities to emerge (James is a good example, top rated analyst blog). But there’s also a huge amount of dross being generated. Telling the two apart can be difficult for the uninitiated.

(As an aside, the analyst industry is professional nowadays but wasn’t always so. In my early years at Ovum (mid 90s) we often referred to ourselves as enthusiastic amateurs writing on subjects we (at first) knew little about. Specialisation and professionalism have changed this – I wonder if we’re heading towards full circle…)