Ego Trap: Influencer Lists

I've been thinking about how ego traps operate in social media - which could also be called hero marketing (credit Seth Godin for suggesting the term).  Social media focuses on individuals.  Self-promotion lies at the root of ego traps, usually inclusive of helping and promoting others.

I don't think ego traps are inherently "bad."  However, I believe that individuals should be fully aware of the implications when participating in a hero marketing scheme - particularly what they're trying to accomplish and why.  Honesty with one's own ego is the key.

There's some chatter going on about "50 of the most powerful and influential women in social media."

Influencer lists are ego traps in action.  Why?

• The list host seeks credibility as an authority, in order to win more business.
• Those included on the list legitimize the host by linking back to the list.
• Those left off the list (and/or their friends) legitimize the list by linking to it.

(To Ron Hudson's credit, he comments on the digg story, "...digg this story so that they are discovered by more people. Keep in mind, you will also be contributing to my own popularity as well. With that in mind, digg or digg not.")  Other influencer lists include people on Twitter, marketing bloggers, or the Silicon Alley 100.

Influencer lists are great for discovering new voices and recognizing well-done work.  Let's just be aware of and honest about what everyone seeks in the process.

Previously - Ego Trap: Industry Awards

Comments

[Peter Kim]

Marc - to your point about referring back to my own posts, what's so wrong about that? I know you say you're kidding, but coincidentally Scott Monty posted about the same issue today ( http://www.scottmonty.com/2008/10/taking-me-out-of-social-media.html ). This blog is where I post thoughts, which naturally build on one another...so why would linking to myself in order to give a reader background be egotistic? I think it's more arrogant to assume that a reader has been a subscriber here and already knows why I'm saying what I am. Thoughts? Maybe something for a separate post.

Agreed, transparent methodology is key for a list, especially one that ranks, and Hudson's didn't have this published.

And honesty is certainly key. With oneself, first and foremost.

[Marc Meyer]

Peter, as usual a very timely post. Ironically I notice that you have 5 hyperlinks pointing back to your posts so obviously there is a bit of self promotion occurring there-just kiddin..not that there's nothing wrong with that...

But more to your point which is dead on. I suppose what it comes down to is the end game or the end game result, and what we are all in it for. Certain elements of social media at it's core, are yes, about connecting, conversations and communities; but underneath it all for some, is the belief and knowledge that it is an extremely good tool for self promotion. Just not sure Ron did his homework like he should have.

What people are starting to realize, is that one of the best ways to drive traffic to your (a) blog is to mention others (your influencers) in a positive light or create a huge list that links to others, stroking as many egos as possible along the way.

The link juice coming back is what it's all about. Most influencers should know what's going on here, and yet, you're right, they fall into the ego trap. They bite. Because of the ego. and the need to feed it or to validate it.

It's really up to the influencer to decide whether they should fall into the trap. But let's be honest, some of those influencer lists are genuine, while others are complete crap. I am totally onboard with what you say, but we just need to ask ourselves everytime we write a blog post, what is our end game?

I've written posts about the 10 or 20 people I trust in social media. Or lists of thought leaders in the social media space. Or just lists in general. It wasn't for link juice, it was for those out there who didn't know who they should be listening to or trusting. I got responses from 60-70% of the people I mentioned. I can assume that the others might have thought that I was using them as link bait, or they merely had no time nor felt they had to respond. Either way, my goal was earnest in trying to get some information out that I thought might help others. Again- what was my end game goal here? That's the question. "Why are you Mr. or Ms. Blogger, creating your influencer list?" That requires a level of honesty that I think some bloggers are not capable of achieving or something they're not willing to admit.

[Peter Kim]

Hi Duncan - not sure what you mean by "sucked in" and I assume your concern is sarcastic. But we do seem to be in agreement. I'm familiar with the WOMMA influencer handbook - for anyone reading who's not, you can read and comment on it at http://www.womma.org/influencerhandbook/ .

[Duncan Brown]

Oh dear. I’m afraid, Peter, that you’ve been sucked in by these usually pointless lists by the ‘Influencer’ tag. They are, as many of the previous commenters have mentioned, not lists of influencers at all, but lists of people that have some degree of overt profile. CEOs, high-frequency bloggers, etc.

A couple of pointers in regarding such lists:

- ask “Influential on whom?” Influence is context-sensitive, so it’s insufficient to claim influence on “Twitter”, for example. Twitter is a platform, upon which numerous discussions occur. Some of these may indeed be influential. Most are (I suggest) not.
- Anyone promoting their inclusion on a list is probably not an influencer but, as you say, a self-promoter. Many influencers operate under the radar of social media and PR. They influence real decisions, not conversations.
- What’s the point of the list anyway? Is it just interesting background information? Or are we being encouraged to call these people – and if so what would we say? Engaging with influencers is a skilled discipline, incorporating high risk because if it goes wrong the influencers will influence against you.
- What criteria are being used to create the list? Popularity is the worst criteria to measure, because it’s the easiest to fake. 500 connections on LinkedIn doesn’t make you influential – it means you’re a connection gatherer.

There is an increasing interest in true influencers, from the likes of SAP. Check out WOMMA’s recently published handbook on Influencers. It’ll give a much more rounded view of what influence is really about rather than pointless lists of well-known people.

Regards,

Duncan Brown
MD Influencer50 Europe

[Urs E. Gattiker]

Peter, very nice post, we have tried to build on your work here: http://howto.commetrics.com/?page_id=14

[Adam Singer]

Peter,

Those lists of hundreds of people are completely useless and nothing more than linkbait. That is why I started a series on social media influencers and doing only a few people in each series.

How useless is a list of 200 people? Why bother, no one can read all of that. I'm documenting influencers slower and in more details, so we can actually learn from them and get value from them.

[robin seidner]

Couldn't agree more. I was really irritated by the Top 50 Tweeples silliness the other day and wrote about the same thing here: http://snurl.com/4e1jm .

What's important to remember is that just because a blogger or Tweeter is popular, doesn't necessarily mean they will be the right target for influencer marketing. As social media becomes more popular outside the Echo Chamber, influencer marketing will, I believe, become more difficult and diluted unless there are better categorization agents created.

I agree with Graham that good content is coming from more places that influencers. Its one of the key reasons I don't have a blogroll on my blog. Or maybe its because I rebel against the concept of popularity.

[Graham Hill]

Hi Barbara

Great point. Popular people are not necessarily good influencers. And influencers are not necessarily popular. There is much more to it than that.

I believe that many marketers have become fixated on influencer-driven marketing as their saviour in a world where marketing has become devalued, if not downright disreputable. But as Duncan Watts has shown, being an influencer is no guarantee that the market conditions are right for an influencer to be, well, influential. And as Kumar and others have shown, being influenced by an influencer is no guarantee that you will go out and buy, or that you will be a profitable customer.

Watts, Kumar and others are some of the first to study how influencers work and under what circumstances they work best. I feel that we are still a long from understanding either sufficiently well to be able to spend marketing budgets wisely. Sadly, that won't stop marketers from spending their budgets anyway which they please.

Graham Hill
Independent CRM Consultant
Interim CRM Manager

Further Reading:

Duncan Watts, 'Viral Marketing for the Real World'
http://cdg.columbia.edu/uploads/papers/watts2007_viralMarketing.pdf

Kumar et al, 'How Valuable is Word of Mouth?'
http://www.womanz.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/hbr-oct-2007-value-of-wom.pdf

[Barbara French]

Great, candid post Peter. I always enjoy reading your thoughts on the ego-side of social media. Too few top influencers are willing to take it on as you do.

To Graham's point, I too see many influencers who are doing nothing in particular to raise their online popularity. They seem to be more than content to influence a smaller sphere, people they know offline as well as online. This includes a number of industry analysts and consultants.

We are nowhere near the point of accepting that online popularity does not necessarily equate to meaningful influence.

[kate]

and let's just be aware of what criteria are used to create said "influencer lists." Often the motivation lies in the definition and formula itself. Having studied these lists and attempting to create an algorithm for influence myself, I noticed some were more transparently self-promoting than others. There's no gold standard of influence, and it's a multidimensional construct, so variation is acceptable, but mindlessly adding variables that measure the same 'aspect' of influence several times over also makes for an easily discernible ego trap.
PS- turning the M20 into a wiki was a commendable effort to open up the methodology. Did any interesting changes occur?

[David Mattia]

"Self-promotion lies at the root of ego traps, usually inclusive of helping and promoting others."...

If a long term trend is often fueled in the short term by specific kinds of ego centric motivation, then when the socially supportive ego energy is withdrawn, what will be left is the higher purpose evident in the evolution of that trend. In media's case it is Sharing Knowledge. Beyond the ego is a collective mindset that always exists in markets and can easily be ignored or denied with simple temptations. Without this higher order of organization markets would be very different or not exist at all. This is what makes the long view always valuable. Sooner or later every gas tank of ego runs dry, and when fads end, only the real trend is left. The dot com boom spent most of the IPO money on ego traps but look at its legacy. The blogosphere is also full of ego right now but its legacy will be the underlying trend allowing for social media and one aspect of the evolution of media in general...building more effective groups and environments that support those groups.

Behind every fad is a trend. It's just not always easy to monetize.

[Graham Hill]

Hi Peter

Good post.

I think we should all treat these lists with a big pinch of salt, especially the longer lists. Having appeared on a Top 20 list myself, I made an effort to look at all the other bloggers listed and was somewhat disappointed by what I found. There was much too repetitive posting and far too little original thinking.

I generally find great undiscovered blogging talent through adhoc recommendations on other people's posts. I would say that 75% of the 90 or so blogs I follow daily came this way. Yours did. I rarely find new talent by looking at lists or even at blogroles. There is just too much 'me-too' linking to be useful.

Hopefully, the days when it is cool to link to the great and the good (and often the mediocre) will soon be over.

Graham Hill
Independent CRM Consultant
Interim CRM Manager

[Peter Kim]

Oops Gavin - I totally forgot. It was in my head when I was writing the "other influencers" sentence and I was debating whether including a link would be disclosure or ego boosting...will add it in now.

( For anyone unfamiliar with the M20 reference, visit http://marketer20.com/ )

[Gavin Heaton]

Did anyone say M20? ;)

Of course it can be an echo chamber ... but I still think there is enormous value in some of these lists - especially for new players.