1. Social Network Service
Prepared by Wesley Shu
Ph.D. University of Arizona
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2. Table of Content
Importance of SNS (Social Network Service)
Ties
Swarm Intelligence
Facebook
SNS for Business – Groundswell
iPod
Web2
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3. IMPORTANCE OF SNS
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4. Importance of SNS
Problem of Marketing
Gatekeeper
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5. Importance of Social Networking
Microsoft invests $240 million in Facebook
The software maker wins in bidding war with
Google, buys 1.6 percent share
Company value $15 Billion!
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6. Marketing
John Wanamaker, father of modern advertising,
“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted;
the trouble is I don't know which half.”
Over-delivery, no distinct audience
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7. Marketing Problems in China
King of the Bidders at CCTV (央視標王):
2010 Chinese New Year Eve: Mengniu,
RMB340M (US$50M) (2009.11.19)
CCTV income in a day: RMB10.9B
(US$2.8B), Last year, RMB9.2B
(US$1.35B)
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8. Marketing Problems in China
To cover first-tier cities, advertisement
expense > US$6M
To cover second-tier cities, another US$3M
To cover 30 cities, at least US$12M
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9. Marketing Problems in China
Marketing companies may not be
professional enough
Public data are not reliable.
亂槍打鳥，浪擲千金
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10. Marketing
Viral marketing
“Facebook” Marketing
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11. Gatekeeper
See Gatekeeper file – Small World
Its operation relies on Six Degree of
Separation
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12. Six Degree of Separation
Experiment by Microsoft
By studying billions of electronic messages, they
worked out that any two strangers are, on
average, distanced by precisely 6.6 degrees of
separation.
Researchers at Microsoft studied records of 30
billion electronic conversations among 180 million
people in various countries, according to the
Washington Post.
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13. Six Degree of Separation
Experiment by Microsoft
The database covered all the Microsoft Messenger
instant-messaging network in June 2006,
equivalent to roughly half the world's instant-
messaging traffic at that time.
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14. Six Degree of Separation
Experiment by Microsoft
Eric Horvitz and fellow researcher Jure Leskovec
considered two people to be acquaintances if they
had sent one another a message.
They looked at the minimum chain lengths it
would take to connect 180 million different pairs
of users in the database.
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15. Six Degree of Separation
Experiment by Microsoft
They found that the average length was 6.6 hops.
That may reduce to degree of one: Barack Obama
already has well over a million Facebook friends.
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16. Six Degree of Separation
Return
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17. The strength of a tie is a
combination of the amount of
TIES time, the emotional intensity, the
intimacy (mutual confiding), and
the reciprocal services which
characterize the tie.
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18. Strong Tie and Weak Tie
SNS: Integrate and
connect PEOPLE.
But Facebook and
MySpace or
LinkedIn are
different.
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19. Strong Tie and Weak Tie
People‟s relationships are ripple-style – from
strong ties to absent ties.
Strong tie – the circle where people and I
have regular and essential exchange of
information, ideas, thoughts, personal items,
etc., usually once a week.
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20. Strong Tie and Weak Tie
Problem of Strong Ties
Redundant information
Overlapping relationships
Homogeneity
No “Neurite,” no gatekeeper
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21. Strong Tie and Weak Tie
Weak Ties are the circles where people and I are
related but do not have deep relationships.
Quantitatively speaking, people in a weak tie with
me contact me at most once every other week, but
at least once a year.
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22. Strong Tie and Weak Tie
Potential Ties are the circles where people and I
are barely related.
Quantitatively speaking, people in a potential tie
with me contact me at most once a year.
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23. 23

24. Ties as Bridges
or potential ties
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25. Ties as Bridges
or potential ties
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26. Ties as Bridges
A D
C
B
?
Without the weak tie, AB and CD are disconnected
With the weak tie BC, AB, AC, AC, and BD are all
connected
AB and CD are two heterogonous groups! If B and C
has strong tie, they all are in a homogeneous group.
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27. Strong Tie and Weak Tie
In 1973, Granovetter from Johns Hopkins found:
Among those who found a new job through
contacts, 16.7% reported that they saw their
contact often at the time, 55.6% said occasionally,
and 27.8% rarely (N = 54).
Mark S. Granovetter, “The Strength of Weak Ties,” American Journal of Sociology, Volume
78, Issue 6 (May, 1973), 1360-1380.
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28. Strong Tie and Weak Tie
“Often when I asked respondents whether a friend
had told them about their current job, they said,
„Not a friend, an acquaintance.‟”
The effectiveness of viral marketing relies on
„weak ties.‟
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29. Wikitude World Browser
Local File
Return
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30. SWARM INTELLIGENCE
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31. Swarm Intelligence
Why ants can always
find the shortest
routes to find food?
Eric Bonabeau and Christopher Meyer,
“Swarm Intelligence,” Harvard Business
Review, May 2001.
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32. Swarm Intelligence
Pheromone – repeat more on a shorter route
More pheromone attracts more ants; and
more pheromone
When food is consumed up, fewer ants
returned, and pheromone evaporates faster,
so fewer ants take that route.
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33. Swarm Intelligence
In the ubiquitous Internet, such self-
adaptability and self-organization should be
the market feature:
Invisible hand
Ambient awareness (周覺) in this complex
system (e.g., News Feed)
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34. Return
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35. FACEBOOK MARKETING
PRINCIPLES
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36. Marketing in Strong And Weak Ties
The effect of a marketing campaign on a
strong tie cannot spur.
The effect of a marketing campaign without
considering „ties‟ can be wasteful.
Marketing with ties! – more aggressive than
affiliate marketing
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38. Marketing in Strong And Weak Ties
Affiliate marketing
either is not
contextual (targeted)
marketing, or is seller-
based contextual.
Facebook marketing
is customer-based
contextual.
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39. Marketing in Strong And Weak Ties
Affiliate marketing
does not construct a
network
Facebook marketing
couples with social
networks from strong
ties to absent ties.
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40. Marketing in Strong And Weak Ties
Affiliate marketing
does not create or
collect information
Facebook marketing
creates your own
information systems,
databases, and
networks.
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41. Marketing in Strong And Weak Ties
Information from Facebook
The strength of ties between two people.
The category, attributes, interests… of a
person
Vast database
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42. Marketing in Strong And Weak Ties
Information from Facebook
In the Facebook era, you are the
center of the (your) world.
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43. People help you collect data
There is a limit to our life, but to knowledge there is
no limit. With what is limited to pursue after what
is unlimited is a perilous thing.
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44. Marketing in Strong And Weak Ties
Orderlessly orderly –
survival kit in a jungle
Architecture of
participation
What‟s more –
Platform as a Service!
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45. Facebook As “Gatekeeper”
Facebook can be an organization‟s
gatekeeper.
Through Facebook, you are forming
gatekeepers, not „guanxi.‟
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46. Gatekeeping and Guanxi
Gatekeeping Guanxi
Open business Closed circle
Spur innovation Innovation makes guanxi
Transparent less useful
Better hide everything from
outsiders
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47. Facebook As Weak Tie
Facebook build better weak tie
Weak tie is the missing piece of marketing
Most advertisements either focused on strong
ties or potential ties
Multi-level marketing on weak tie
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48. Facebook Company Case
Serena Software
Serena Software uses Facebook as their Intranet
and allows employees to use Facebook freely on
Friday afternoon.
Saving money, since the vast majority of its 800
employees work outside of its headquarters.
Serving as neurites/gatekeepers – one-to-one
marketing
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49. Facebook Company Case
I will NOT be participating in any Recession
Affinity Group
MIT Initiative on Technology and Self
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52. HOMEWORK
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53. Homework
Tim Brown’s Speech
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