This study by Jacob Goldenberg and Moshe Levy looks at the effect of the digital revolution on the geographical distribution of our social networks.
They studied 100,000 Facebook and email users and mapped the volume of communication against geographic distance. It turns out that we predominantly use these digital tools to talk to our geographically close friends.
With email, 41% of communication was with people within the same city. (Email data does not provide as granular a geographic distinction as is available in Facebook). While we know that digital communication breaks down borders, the study shows we mimic our natural, physical, social networks when creating digital networks. These are true for Facebook and may not be true for groupings based around an external subject and not focusing on friendship as the primary social object.
They carried out a second study looking at how baby’s names spread over time. Since the digital communication revolution, their study found that :
“the baby-name data suggest that the IT revolution was accompanied by a significant increase in the importance of geographical proximity for social interaction.”
It strikes me that this may have a direct impact on how marketing should position products. We know that friends tend to have similar interests, likes etc. When marketing to an individual where we want to leverage their social graph, we should take into account the local nature of the graph and communication behavior. If there is a local element, or one can be defined, then there is benefit in promoting the nearest geographical location where the product can be found or experienced. The local nature of communication means that influencers within social graphs are likely to live near and communicate with one and other.
The report also re-enforces the arguments in favor of location based marketing.
As the report says, the potential for global communication does exist and is used but:
“…that while the IT revolution has clearly increased the overall volume
of communications, it has increased local communications to a greater degree than
long-distance communications.”
I found your blog on Google. I’ve bookmarked it and will watch out for your next blog post.
[...] lite medel kommunicera och hålla kontakten även om man är långt ifrån varandra. Via bloggen Connections hittade jag en studie av Jacob Goldenberg och Moshe Levy som analyserar och studera den geografiska [...]
Howdy there,Fantastic blog dude! i’m Tired of using RSS feeds and do you use twitter?so i can follow you there:D.
PS:Do you thought about putting video to your blog to keep the people more enjoyed?I think it works.Kind regards, Madlyn Mcilvain
Why didn?t I find this post earlier? Keep up the good work!