Opinion Leaders in the Digital Community

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As I mentioned in my previous post, opinion leaders, also known as social influencers, are beneficial to utilize when trying to capture the Millennial and post-Millennial generations. By using opinion leaders on emerging media platforms, such as social media and blogs, a company can reach a larger audience and influence more people to invest in their product or service.

In order to effectively utilize opinion leaders on digital platforms, we need to analyze what an opinion leader is, why their opinions matter, and who are the opinion leaders that matter to your company.

According to Business Dictionary, opinion leaders are “influential members of a community, group, or society who others turn to for advice, opinions, and views.” These people are not necessarily famous or wealthy, but they are influential in their communities and have a large follower base.

Opinion leaders can also be defined in relation to the DIffusions of Innovations theory developed by Everett Rogers. This theory states that 2.5% of society are innovators, meaning that these people are always the first to try out or buy the newest products; they stay on top of the trends and are willing to take risks to be first. The next 13.5% of people are early adopters. These people will also be among the first to try new products and tell others about them. In a marketing sense, these two groups of people would most likely be where a business would find opinion leaders. These two groups will try a product first and tell others about it. This is necessary to reach the other 84% of an audience, which includes the early majority, late majority, and laggards. These people want to see other people try a product before they are willing to. They usually need to be convinced by someone credible on why they should invest in the product. This is where the opinion leaders would be an asset.

So, why do the opinions of opinion leaders matter so much to your audience? Why are opinion leaders able to influence others in society? The answer lies in the rule of social proof. This concept, developed by Turkish social psychologist Muzafer Sherif, states that people determine what is correct based on what others think is correct. This theory is most effective when the proof is provided by many others or by a few others who have a lot of credibility and influence. People are more willing to invest in something after an opinion leader has tried it and approved it. People trust messages from opinion leaders more than messages directly from a company because they can relate to that opinion leader. The audience is influenced by opinion leaders because they are confident that the opinion leader they follow has a similar set of beliefs and values to correlate with their own.

While we can see that utilizing opinion leaders can be very beneficial and critical in reaching the masses, a company should be cognizant of which social influencers they choose to represent their company. Choosing the wrong opinion leader to represent a company could be detrimental, such as in the case where a person is widely known in the community for negative reasons, or in the case that a person is an opinion leader but does not share the same values and beliefs that the company upholds.

In order to choose the right opinion leader, a company should first know what characteristics embody an opinion leader. According to Cleverism.com, opinion leaders share eight main characteristics:
  1. They are respected in the community (both the physical and online community)
  2. Their view/opinion carries weight and has significance in their community
  3. They are passionate about whatever issue they are advocating for
  4. They are quick to shape public opinion on any subject matter
  5. They are subject matter experts in their field of knowledge
  6. They are able to voice their opinion in an effective manner
  7. They actively share information to the public in person and/or on social media
  8. They are able to effectively consume and interpret media content
A person with these eight characteristics can be categorized as an opinion leader.

In addition to knowing the characteristics of an opinion leader, a company must choose the opinion leader that is most suitable for their company. The opinion leader should know and agree with the reasoning behind the creation of a product/service, not just the product or service itself. The values and beliefs of the opinion leader should align with the values and beliefs that the company has publicized. The opinion leader should have a strong following that consists of the company’s target audience members. Finally, the opinion leader should have a strong knowledge of the field in which the company is in. For example, it would not make sense for a technology company to have an influential food blogger as an opinion leader to advocate for that company.

A company must also be strategic about the dissemination of information through opinion leaders on digital platforms. Digital platforms allow companies and opinion leaders to reach a massive amount of people, both locally and internationally, in a small amount of time. With so many digital platforms available as communication channels, such as social media, apps, and blogs, a company should be aware of where their target audience is, and what platforms their opinion leaders are strongest in. Messages are translated differently through long-form communication platforms, short-form communication platforms, and video-based platforms. A company must work with its opinion leaders to be versatile and disseminate the message in the most effective way for each digital platform. The same exact message said the same exact way will not be effective across different digital platforms. For a message to be most effective, both the company and the opinion leader(s) must tailor the message to fit the digital platform being used as well as the audience on that platform.

With the right opinion leaders, the right strategic message, and the right platform, a company is guaranteed to push past the early adopters and innovators and reach the remaining majority of the audience they wish to influence.
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