The American Stages of Thought Leadership

Seth Godin is a ridiculously smart and talented fellow. In my research on social media, he has been a wonderful resource on the impact and forces affecting social media. In particular, I have been grooving on this particular TED Talk of his, from which I am gleaning these particular insights: http://www.ted.com/talks/seth_godin_on_the_tribes_we_lead.html

While there are countless insights crammed into this 17 minute video, I want to focus on the points he makes at the 4 minute mark, which revolve around the evolution of leadership in America.

He begins with the factory cycle, in which leadership centered around increasing efficiency of labor and machinery in order to "change the fabric of an entire country". The problem, as Godin points out, is that we are running out of both cheaper labor and faster machines--foreign nations are out-competing us in both regards.

The introduction of television changed this. Instead of leveraging cheaper labor and faster machines, we leveraged giant amounts of money in order to push our ideas onto the world. Volume ruled; as Seth notes, the marketer acts as a sort of king, deciding what ideas go out to the peons below him. One's level of influence is only limited by the amount of money he or she is willing to spend on advertising.

The advent of social media has completely changed this dynamic. No longer are consumers limited to the messages that marketers push on them; they are empowered with the ability to join in the conversation and connect with their peers in order to develop a message themselves. One needs only to look as far as the BP disaster this summer to see this effect at work. No matter how many ad spots BP bought pushing their message of apology and renewed environmental responsibility, they were not able to swing the dynamics of the conversation away from a witty guy (or gal) with a Twitter account named BPGlobalPR.

And thus, we are introduced to the newest stage of marketing and thought leadership, one that Seth Godin calls that of Tribes. Humans have always gravitated towards those with similar interests as them, be it through churches, political parties, book clubs, or bowling leagues. What the Internet has done is make it ridiculously easy to find those similar to us, no matter how niche or unusual our interest, or assort ourselves into Tribes, if you will.

In this stage of leadership, we gain traction not by pushing a message out onto the masses, but by stepping up and volunteering to take ownership over a preexisting tribe. Godin points to the Beatles and Bob Marley as two Tribe Leaders; they did not invent their respective followers, they merely volunteered to become a figurehead for similar ways of thinking.

Think about nearly every social media campaign you have ever seen. What was its purpose? Most likely, its aim was simply to be an extension of a TV advertisement, pushing out a brand message onto Twitter followers or Facebook friends. The companies that truly connect with their followers inspire tribe-like fellowships. See: Apple, Zappos, Toms, et al.

The next time you see a social media marketing campaign, look at it critically. Does it inspire conversation? Divergent thinking? A cause higher than selling something?

--Taylor

is my life about to change? who knows? who cares?