In 2007, Forrester Research analysts Josh Bernoff and Charlene Li developed the Social Technographics Ladder.  This tool classifies people according to how they behave and participate in Social Media.  While it’s not the only model out there, the Social Technographics Ladder has become very influential as a way to describe the various groups of people that form the Social Media ecosystem.   At Empower MediaMarketing, we use this tool to help us understand the audience and develop Social Media strategies for our clients.

“Old” Social Technographics Ladder

Enter the Conversationalists
In mid-January 2010, Forrester added a rung to the ladder called “Conversationalists”.  These are the people who tweet or update their Social Networking status at least once a week.  They represent 33 percent of the online population and just over half (56 percent) are female.  While just over one-third (36 percent) of Conversationalists are age 18-29, this group tends to be older.  70 percent are 30+ years old, of which 37 percent are 30-43, 14 percent are 44-53, 9 percent are 54-64 and 4 percent are 65+.

New Social Technographics Ladder

Growth Chart
Here is a table showing how various levels of participation have risen, fallen, or remained constant:

Key Takeaways
After reviewing this data, a few thoughts immediately come to mind:

• Age is less of an issue with Conversationalists (two-thirds are over 30 years old).  Some of this is due to how easy it has become to Tweet or update your status.  Not only is the barrier to entry very low, but people love to talk.

 

• The Ladder has positioned Conversationalists between Creators and Critics.  Behaviorally, this makes sense because not everyone has the time or skills to be a blogger, create videos or publish a forum—these activities can be a bit intimidating to the uninitiated.  But people still want to talk, so they do it in the easiest and quickest manner possible: via Tweet or status update.

 

• While it’s not the only form of Social Media, Twitter and Social Networks (especially Facebook) have become cultural obsessions in the past few years.  It’s easy to dismiss Twitter as “mindless babble” when you first hear about it, but after you’ve read about it for the twentieth time, curiosity becomes too powerful to dismiss.

 

• Spectators are still participants in Social Media, even if they are just watching and reading instead of posting and creating.  As marketers, we need to make sure we’re speaking to this silent majority just as much as we are to the loudest and most engaged.

 

• The number of people who don’t participate at all in Social Media (“Inactives”) is rapidly declining – from 44 percent in 2007 to only 17 percent at the current time.

By:  Michael E. Rubin, Social Marketing Manager

Image and data sources: Forrester Research, Inc.