Feb 08
26
On Quantum Theory and Social Media
Richard Feynman, a famous physicist and notable expert on quantum theory, once said “Nobody understands quantum theory”.
I spend a lot of time thinking in metaphors when I am trying to understand something and lately I have been thinking about quantum mechanics and how some of the concepts cross over to social media.
Now I am no expert in physics, but the basic parallel here is this: The smaller the scale, the less certain you can be about anything.
We all learned in school that atoms move around fast and they are filled with mostly empty space, so when something feels solid there is actually more nothing than something in it. Because of our large size (and the electrical bonds of the atom) we don’t sink through the floor with every step. This makes our everyday world fairly predictable and is described by classical or Newtonian physics. For centuries it has been the dominant mode of thinking and allowed us to predict the motions of planets and trajectories of cannonballs with very precise accuracy.
When you get down below the atomic level things get a lot weirder, where notions like particles and waves, matter and energy, here and there become indistinguishable. Stuff can exist in many places at once (Superposition), the act of measuring changes what it is you are measuring (Uncertainty Principle) and what appears to be static and solid is actually writhing and chaotic (Quantum Foam).
So here is the point:
Mass advertising is like Classical Physics; large-scale, mostly intuitive and somewhat predictable.
Direct Marketing is like Atomic Physics; small/medium-scale, mostly logical, but the segmentation aspects start to show some bumps and troughs on what appeared to be smooth and simple.
Social Media is more like Quantum Physics; small-scale, counter-intuitive and usually unpredictable.
Mass advertising operates in the realm of large groups of people and these target markets are big clumps and follow a somewhat consistent pattern when you look at them all at once. Traditional marketers deal with everyones opinions in big bins like sales figures, national focus groups, opinion polls, etc. These roll-ups average out the inconsistencies of individuals and blur together to form tendencies, trends and preferences. The actions taken in mass marketing can expect a relatively consistent result (i.e. send out a coupon and you can expect a certain level of redemption and sales revenue to come from it and the larger the audience, the more likely it is to average out at a predictable result). This is the world that marketers are familiar with and all-in-all it makes sense if you know the system.
Social Media on the other hand acts on the niche and individual level where things are a lot less certain. The complex nature of blog posts is hard to parse out into definitive numbers and trends. One blogger’s opinion might be indicative of thousands of others or no one. If you have ever been in a relationship or had siblings you know that individuals are complicated, can hold multiple contradictory opinions at once and often don’t do what they say they will. The lack of large numbers makes the reaction and result of social media efforts difficult to determine and measure. It is much more difficult to roll up all of these disparate opinions into a meaningful decision than to look at an opinion pie-chart.
As the potential influence of the individual grows these “quantum behaviours” which always existed in people become more obvious (if not more predictable) and we can start to track, trend and examine them. So in essence, social media tools have given marketers a microscope powerful enough to see what is going on at smaller scales. And just like the traditional physicists who opposed quantum theory (like Einstein for example) many marketers in the classical camp are not very happy with what they see, because it doesn’t confirm what they thought they knew. Decisions which appear obvious when looking at large sample sizes becomes more nuanced and contracdictory when you see everyone as an individual.
After having spoken about the implications of Social Media with loads of traditional marketers and seen presentations by those with a lot vested in the current “classical marketing” model, I can understand the hesitancy. Accepting Quantum Physics like accepting social media force the traditionalists to admit some things that are uncomfortable, like:
- The world doesn’t always make sense
- There are no guarantees
- Some people may need to question basic assumptions or even re-learn everything they thought they knew (for many traditonal marketers, the notion of going back to first principles is a tough one)
The final point is that those who were most familiar with developing new concepts were also confused by what they discovered. Here (and another at the beginning) is a famous quote from physicist Niles Bohr who once said “Anyone who is not shocked by quantum theory does not understand it.”
If the parallel holds between Quantum Physics and Social Media, what does that say about all of us who think we “get” social media?
[tags] quantum, uncertainty, marketing, theory, socialmedia, physics [/tags]
