¶ … Leaders are becoming an increasingly important target for marketers. These opinion leaders allow marketers to focus in on the coveted personal, word-of-mouth advertising market, thus personalizing and legitimizing a product. Targeting opinion leaders can be highly effective after a product has penetrated the market, but new products often benefit little from targeting opinion leaders.
Opinion leaders are becoming important in marketing campaigns because they allow marketers to tap into the sometimes difficult to reach world of word-of-mouth advertising. Opinion leaders provide marketers with an opportunity to reach influential community leaders who will hopefully provide others with an influential 'recommendation' for a product, based on the marketer's campaign (Frost).
Marketers believe that buying behavior can be influenced by opinion leaders. Opinion leaders influence other consumers through direct, word of mouth insights and opinions. Marketers believe...
They act as a "leading indicator of popular trends," thus providing marketers with a way to target consumers who are at the forefront of new trends. The trends that they 'forecast' range from new product adoption, to social attitudes, and public issues. Opinion leaders come from a wide range of economic and social backgrounds (Frost).
To reach opinion leaders, marketers must focus on a number of factors. Marketers must learn specific techniques about running a word-of-mouth marketing campaign. Unlike traditional marketing campaigns, campaigns that target opinion leaders do not rely on information about products doe not move through the media and highly visible spokespeople (Frost).
Instead, marketing…
