Opinion leaders in social influence and communication

¶ … 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 that the word-of-mouth recommendations of opinion leaders carry more weight with other consumers than do other forms of advertising like television or newspaper advertisements (Frost).

Opinion leaders make up about one in ten American consumers. 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 to opinion leaders must take into consideration complex social networks. As such, targeting these individuals can be difficult for two main reasons. First, opinion leaders are specific, as one leader may not be a leader for other individuals. Second, some opinion leaders are difficult to influence (Frost).

Targeting opinion leaders can only occur under specific conditions. There must be sufficient penetration of the market for opinion leaders to be able to identify. At this point, marketers must try to sell the product using interpersonal, and emotive advertising in order to distinguish the product. To reach opinion leaders, the marketer must first discern who they are, their characteristics, interests and mindset. (Frost).

The ability of opinion leaders to influence others varies largely on the type of product. Products that opinion leaders are the most influential in marketing include vacation destinations, computer software, magazines, cars, movies, restaurants, television shows, investments, retail stores and websites.