If you click on the ‘like’ button on the Hello Kitty fan page, then you’re emotionally unstable. Or, if you ‘like’ the Harley-Davidson page, then you’re probably of the “lower intelligence” ilk.
Seemingly innocent Facebook ‘likes,’ according to a study conducted by a team of researchers in Cambridge University, have the potential to reveal much about a person. The study infers that flippant usage of this social media platform is not what it seems; it’s just the tip of the iceberg. That is to say, Facebook can be used to see right through you and peer into your soul.
This is idea is further explored by Eva Buechel (Research and Teaching Assistant, University of Basel, Carnegie Mellon University, and University of Miami) and Jonah Berger (James G. Campbell Assistant Professor of Marketing at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania) in their in-depth look at social media.
Their paper, “Facebook Therapy: Why People Share Self-Relevant Content Online,” begins with the premise that people use microblogging as an emotion-regulation tool which may contribute to the welfare of its users. Of course, there are also studies that state otherwise, pegging Facebook as a destructive social-media platform due to triggering envy, anxiety, and other negative emotions among its users.
Whatever these studies say, there’s one main thing that must not be overlooked – Facebook is very clever in developing its design, to put it mildly, because it leverages user information to harness a more directional kind of marketing. Over the recent years, the social media marketing industry has boomed and is showing no signs of slowing down.
The most recent social media industry report (2012) in Forbes Magazine by Jessica Bosari states that 58% of businesses who has used social media for three years and up experienced an increase in sales. This is indicative of how this means of marketing and advertising is now usurping traditional modes because it is more cost-effective and convenient. After all, social media platforms are excellent marketplaces, since individuals ages 20-29 – those with evident spending power – stay on these sites for more than 10 hours a week.
Social media, particularly Facebook, is now a goldmine for researchers, psychologists, cultural anthropologists, and non-traditional marketers simply because of the way it is structured. While individuals make use of Facebook for a variety of reasons, user preferences are stored and filtered to match marketers and companies. Check out the ads on the left side of the Facebook page. Those ads are no longer random; they are targeted through the user’s preference. Marketers see the value of this and it is for this reason social media has become a viable tool for reaching out to consumers.
Obviously, was (once upon a time) not the main reason why Facebook was created. Starting out as a venue for people to connect, it has taken a life of its own, as it now arouses the curiosity of many scholarly disciplines. The researchers in Cambridge University states that while the tool they used may be flawed, it does shed some insight on Facebook users. There are no definitive studies about human behavior and social media, but the increase in acknowledging it as a source of information in multiple disciplines is undeniable. As users of this platform, we can only proceed with some caution by being responsible with consumption and usage, and by taking everything in social media with a grain of salt.
So, what do you ‘Like?’
(Photocredits| Wired.com)
