Defining social media ‘marketing multipliers’

Abstract

Using results from a comprehensive US online media usage questionnaire database of over 24,000 social media users, plus longitudinal analysis of five additional years of similar data (over 200,000 respondents), this paper develops a new social media planning model based on whether or not respondents give or seek purchasing advice from others. Those who do give/seek advice, the marketing multipliers, are critical to the marketer’s success. While they account for only 11.6 per cent of all respondents, members of this group have higher digital device ownership; spend more time with all forms of media, both traditional and interactive; and report being more influenced by media than other marketing methods. As active social media participants, they are the key elements in social media marketing success. By contrast, the 18.9 per cent who never give/seek advice, termed the nevers, have similar demographic profiles but are less actively engaged in giving or seeking advice using social media. This paper calculates influence lift among 31 media forms for the multipliers and the nevers in addition to average category growth. A new media allocation model is developed based on media consumption and advice giving/seeking. Suggestions for a new media planning model are also provided.