If you are involved in social media or viral marketing, most likely you have wondered how to increase the passing-along of your viral content. My co-author Michelle Rogerson and I have been wondering about the same question too in our research project on the spreading of user-generated content online. As the starting point, we conducted an exploratory survey to find out people’s general tendency to share information online and what makes them more or less likely to share information with others. Using snowballing technique, we were able to gather responses from 156 Internet users.  These users’ ages ranged from 18 to 62 with a median age of 30.  46% of these users were males and 54% were females. Here I share with you some key findings from the survey.

“If my friend shares something with me, I will view it. But don’t really expect me to pass it on.”

We asked our respondents how likely they are to view information shared by someone they know, and over 60% of them agreed that it is quite likely (7 or higher on a 10-point scale).  This is good news because in the case of viral campaigns, encouraging people to share information with their friends is likely to increase the reach of the campaign. The bad news we found, however, is that way fewer of them would further pass on the information to their respective friends.  Less than 20% of them said they are likely to pass on information shared with them by their friends.  Interestingly, when asked the same question about information consumers found online themselves rather than shared by their friends, those who selected likely to pass on information increased to about 30%.  The lesson here is that first-order word-of-mouth (consumers passing on information they found themselves) is more likely to happen than second-order word-of-mouth (consumers passing on information that are found by their friends). Therefore, companies engaging in word-of-mouth campaigns should still try to spread the word to as many “seeds” as possible rather than counting on a few starting points.

“Make me believe that the information is relevant to my friends and I will pass it on.”

The survey contained an open-ended question asking the respondents to list the factors that would make them more likely to share information online.  The dominant reason listed (by 35% of the sample) was relevance to the friends that they are passing the information on to.  This is perhaps not surprising considering that few of us want to jam our friends’ inbox with junk information.  For companies, this means an opportunity to encourage passing-along by demonstrating the content’s relevance to a consumer’s social circle.  Financial incentives offered to friends by some referral programs is an example of this approach. The second most widely listed reason was something funny.  Apparently, we as human beings like to share laughter with others.  Below are the top five reasons the respondents cited ranked by frequency:

1. Relevance to those sharing information with
2. Humor
3. Relevance to oneself
4. Importance/worthiness of information
5. Unusual/unique information


Opinion leaders share more information but are also more likely to seek advice.Studying information sharing is not complete without considering opinion leaders, those individuals that are on the cutting edge and are likely to influence other people’s opinions.  We found that being an opinion leader increases the likelihood to share information with others by 38%, perhaps partially explaining why these people are opinion leaders in the first place.  While this finding seems rather obvious, what is not so obvious is the finding that opinion leaders are also more likely to seek advice from others such as family, friends, and neighbors. Compared with regular individuals, opinion leaders are 25% more likely to seek advice from others. This finding is important because we have often seen the argument that the right way to treat social media is to be social (in other words, interacting with others).  Our study finds concrete support for that.  A true opinion leader does not just broadcast information to others but also listens closely and actively seeks out others’ feedback.

As we move forward to the next stage of the research project, we would love to hear your thoughts.  What makes you more likely to share stuff with other people?  As a company, how do you manage your viral campaign content and seeding process so that it can create the maximum ripple effect?

Retailers put a lot of thought into designing their store layout and ambiance. In the online world, websites also spend a great deal of effort designing their logos and images.  Even Twitter allows you to customize your own profile background. But do you know that other than fulfilling aesthetic and branding purposes, your graphics and other contextual cues can have much subtler (but still powerful) effects on how consumers think and what consumers do?

In recent years, consumer psychologists have made significant progress on alternative influences of consumer decision making.  Instead of treating consumers as cold, rational decision-makers, this research stream reveals that consumers are often driven by automatic processes that they are often not consciously aware of.

Example 1: Which sofa consumers buy depends on your website’s background image

Naomi Mandel and Eric Johnson published a study in Journal of Consumer Research, in which they exposed consumers to the same online furniture store with only one subtle difference: one version had fluffy clouds and blue sky as the background, and the other had coin images on green-colored background.  They found that those who saw the fluffy cloud background were more likely to buy the more comfortable but pricier sofa, whereas those who saw the coin background were more inclined to choose the cheaper but less comfortable sofa. The reason behind such differences is that the different images primed different attributes (comfort vs. money) in the consumers’ mind, therefore increasing the weight of the corresponding attribute in consumers’ choices.

Example 2: Drive by Walmart on the way to shopping to avoid overspending

A more recent study by Tanya Chartrand and her colleagues published in the same journal looked at the subconscious activation of goals through contextual cues. In one of their experiments, individuals were asked to focus on the center of the computer screen to complete a task. In the meantime, the brands of prestige (e.g., Nordstrom) vs. thrift (e.g., Walmart) retailers were flashed randomly on the edges of the computer screen for 60 milliseconds, outside of the individuals’ focal attention area. In a subsequent choice between two brands of socks and between two microwaves, individuals who were flashed the prestige brands chose the more expensive brand than the cheaper brand in each task, and the reverse was true for those who were flashed the thrift brands. Interestingly, the researchers also found that once a specific goal (achieving prestige vs. saving money) is activated subconsciously, it grows stronger until the goal has been satisfied in a subsequent real choice. All of this happens without the consumers’ conscious awareness of what is affecting them.

Lessons Learned:

• There are many more factors that affect consumer decision making than what companies normally pay attention to.
• The graphics, banner ads, and other contextual cues on your website or in your store can significantly alter consumers’ decision related to your product. If your product excels on a specific attribute, you may want to play up graphics and contextual cues related to the attribute to make it more important.
• The fact that these “innocent” contextual cues can affect consumers without their awareness brings interesting legal and ethical questions, similar to the long-debate surrounding subliminal advertising. For example, how far can marketers go in affecting consumers’ mind this way? What if such tactics are used on younger consumers who are less knowledgeable and therefore may be more subject to such influences?

What is your take on this?  Has your company ever tried such tactics? Or as a consumer, would you be offended if you know a marketer tries to influence you in this way?

Further Reading:

Mandel, Naomi and Eric J. Johnson (2002), “When Web Pages Influence Choice: Effects of Visual Primes on Experts and Novices,” Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 29 (September), p.235-245.

Chartrand, Tanya L. et al. (2008), “Nonconscious Goals and Consumer Choice,” Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 35 (August), p.189-201.

I left China to go to graduate school in the US when I was 22, right at the time when I should have become a mainstream Chinese consumer.  Instead, I became re-socialized (or “acculturated” in academic terminology) into an American consumer.  Recently I was able to make a nearly month-long trip to China.  With some distance now established from my home culture, I was able to observe with a fresh pair of eyes the unique characteristics of Chinese consumers and to reacquaint myself with values and behaviors that I had taken for granted before I left China 11 years ago.  In this blog, I discuss three things that I observed about Chinese consumer behavior during my trip.

1. Chinese consumers are highly brand conscious.  The shopping malls I visited in China were dominated by boutique stores from famous (a.k.a. expensive) designer labels such as Burberry, Salvatore Ferragamo, and Chanel.  Perhaps more surprisingly, these stores were brimming with shoppers who were actually buying.  Yes, having such a high concentration of luxury stores is a ready manifestation of the higher income level in a more developed China.  But with most consumers’ monthly income still only enough to buy, say, two $200 Burberry shirts, the popularity of these luxury brands reveals the brand-consciousness among Chinese consumers.  Even for less expensive purchases such as milk, snacks, and liquor, well-known brand names disproportionately dominate the market.  Why are Chinese consumers so brand conscious? I infer that it has to do with the inconsistent quality of products sold in China.  As a newly developed market economy, China has not yet established a sound market self-regulation mechanism.  Consequently, consumers do not yet trust vendors in the marketplace.  The mistrust goes the other way too, as most stores carry a no-return policy, increasing the risks associated with each purchase.  The outcome?  Chinese consumers flock to established brand names to reduce risk and protect their own welfare.

2. Consumer trends travel fast in China.  Being in a collectivistic culture, Chinese consumers tend to have closer interactions with each other than people from a more individualistic culture such as America.  People talk to each other more often and are more likely to have closer or even overlapping personal spaces.  Adding the lack of confidence in vendors, word of mouth becomes extremely powerful in consumers’ purchase decisions.  Once a new trend is initiated, it tends to travel very fast across the population.  You may find, for example, many households to become equipped with soy milk machines over the course of a short period of time.  Another helping factor is the unique media landscape.  Although TV channels have proliferated in China in the last twenty years, the CCTV channels are still the dominant provider of national and international news.  With their high viewership, these channels are able to exert an unduly influence on consumer opinions and offer advertisers a way to reach a big mass of consumers (imagine Superbowl every day).

3. Consumption in China is public.  It is well-known that Asian cultures put more emphasis on education.  But I experienced a more “public” version of this value.  In a discussion among friends about sending their toddlers to kindergartens and schools, I overheard parents reluctantly acknowledge a pressure to send their kids to the best of schools, even if these schools come with an astronomical price tag that they can barely afford.  Their arguments were that they want to give their kids the best start, but even more importantly, not to look like they are being cheap on their kids in front of their colleagues and friends.  This “publicity of consumption” is further fueled by the collectivistic culture, through a higher level of willingness to meddle in someone else’s business (i.e., people will talk, even in front of you) and through a higher pressure to conform to the norm.

I should conclude this blog with a footnote that these are only my short-term observations and undoubtedly carry with them my own individual bias and the special environment of the two metropolitan cities that I visited (Hong Kong and Shenzhen).  So they are only intended to stimulate the thinking of those who might be interested in marketing to Chinese consumers rather than function as golden rules of Chinese consumer behavior.