mobilizing epic social movement: an interview with andy smith

8/8/2019 Mobilizing Epic Social Movement: An Interview with Andy Smith

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Page 1 December 15, 2010

MOBILIZING EPIC SOCIAL MOVEMENT: AN INTERVIEW WITH ANDYSMITHPosted by Christina Lee on December 15, 2010

Andy Smith is the co-author of The Dragonfly Effect an inspirational and yet practical handbook on howto use social media to drive seismic social change. In this interview, Andy talks about what the DragonflyEffect is and the secret to building customer loyalty with social media.

1. LETS START WITH THE OBVIOUS QUESTION. WHATS THE DRAGONFLY EFFECT?

The Dragonfly Effect, is an idea from chaos theory describing how a small act can cause big downstreameffects. We extend it to encompass the power an individual can have to set positive change in motion.This is done through the careful and coordinated execution of four distinct processes:

y Focus Establishing a clear, simple, measurable goal that the mere thought of achieving makes youhappy

y Grab Attention Making people look and pay attention to what you have to say in a way thats true toyour effort

y Engage Making people care through telling a true story that inspires people to acty Take Action where you put the tools from Grab Attention and Engage into your audiences hands and

make it easy and fun for them to take on your effort as their own

The dragonfly symbology fits because the creature is a symbol of change, transformation and rebirth. Andthe dragonfly is unique in that it is the only insect that can fly in any direction and even hover when itsfour wings are moving in concert.


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2. MANY BOOKS HAVE BEEN WRITTEN ON HOW TO CREATE SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGIES FOR THE EVER-INCREASING NUMBER OF TOOLS. YOU HAVE A RATHER DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE SOCIAL MEDIA IS A MEANSTO AN END AND THAT THE REVOLUTIONARY POWER OF SOCIAL MEDIA IS TRULY ELICITED WHEN ITSCONNECTED TO A SPECIFIC GOAL THAT DEEPLY MATTERS TO AN INDIVIDUAL. TELL US MORE ABOUT THAT.

When you start with deep empathy (human-centered design), you move to the forefront both for your ownreasons for doing something as well as why an audience will care. The forwards, re-postings and actionsthen become much more predictable and replicable. When you design programs that connect with whatbrings meaning to people and offer them a way to achieve it, success becomes much more likely.

3. THE NUMBER ONE CHALLENGE THAT MANY ORGANIZATIONS AND BRANDS FACE IN USING SOCIALCHANNELS TO GETTING THE WORD OUT IS NOISE. THERE IS JUST A TON GOING ON ENDLESS FEEDS YOUGET FROM PEOPLE YOU FOLLOW, UPDATES FROM FRIENDS, AND ADVERTISING. SOCIAL MEDIA TOOLS HAVEBECOME OUR BEST FRIENDS AND ENEMIES. HOW COULD ONE BREAK THROUGH TO MAKE AN IMPACT?

Once youve established and vetted your goal, breaking through the clutter is your next task. We call itgrabbing attention. This process is deeply informed by the very best marketing and advertising programs.

The key is to stand out and there are four design principles we identify to achieve this:

y Personal Create an appeal with a personal hook in mindy Unexpected People like consuming then sharing new information. Draw them in by piquing their

curiosity. Seek to reframe the familiar

y Visual Show, dont tell. Photos and videos speak millions of wordsy Visceral Design campaigns that trigger the senses through sight, sound, hearing, or taste. Music can be

especially helpful to tap into deep, underlying emotions

4. CAN YOU SHARE SOME TIPS WITH OUR NEW NING CREATORS WHORE TRYING TO BUILD A FOLLOWING?

I cant over-emphasize the importance of having single, clear goal. This will remind people why they areat your site and want to belong to your community. Having and telling your story well is another often-

missed piece of socially-minded efforts. Facts and figures, no matter how shocking, dont motivate peopleto act. Stories do. Whats the story behind your site? Why are you creating it? Who is the protagonist?What is their struggle? Stories are easy for people to share because they remember them and becausestories are interesting. Clearly tapping into the power of storytelling will pay huge dividends as youapproach all the other aspects of your effort.

5. ONE THING WE CONSTANTLY HEARD FROM OUR NING CREATORS (MANY OF WHOM ARE MARKETERS ANDNON-PROFIT ORGANIZERS) IS THAT YOU NEED TO WORK HARD TO ENGAGE AND GROW YOUR MEMBERS.UTILIZING SOCIAL CHANNELS DOESNT MEAN A COMMUNITY IS FORMED ORGANICALLY. WHATS YOURPERSPECTIVE?

We know there are no perpetual motion machines. Particularly at the early stages, membership growthwill take a lot of effort. Also, no matter how decentralized you make your effort, there is still a crucial

role for those at the center, particularly in the dragonfly wing. Focus keeping the effort clear andsingular in its goal and Take Action ensuring that the tools, and tips are constantly evolving and make itfun and easy to help you with the heavy lifting.

The community certainly contributes to the effort and may yield some extremely motivated people whowant to take on larger roles and you should let them [see the write-up on the Obama campaign in thebook for the gold standard in doing this].


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As Ning Creators, you recognize that the same tools that make it easy for you to establish your causeonline also make it harder to stand out. You can avoid this by being vigilant seeing tools as means to anend not as differentiators and, staying close to your effort and to the deep-seated motivators of thepeople in it.

6. I KNOW YOUVE DONE A LOT OF RESEARCH ON THIS TOPIC. WHAT ARE THE COMMON CHARACTERISTICSOF THE THRIVING COMMUNITIES YOUVE SEEN?

We profiled two thriving communities in our book: Charity: Water and Alexs Lemonade Stand Foundation(ALSF). Both of them use the power of story extremely well a disillusioned club promoter seekingdeeper meaning, and a little girl struck with cancer who decided to sell lemonade one cup at a time tofund childhood cancer research. They both deeply understand the power of giving people something theycan do with their time not just their money.

Charity: Water encourages people to forgo birthday presents and instead ask their friends to donate theamount they would have spent on a present to fund a well for a village in the developing world. ALSFprovides you with all the materials, guidance and even the PR you need to hold your own lemonade stand

to raise money to fight cancer. Another key element thats evident in the above is that online activity isnot an end in itself but is always directed to offline action (cancer research, well digging). Offline actionnot only provides the community with a physical social outlet which strengthens bonds but also ensures aconnection with purpose and goal achievement.

Plenty of criticism has been leveled at social media for its potential to enable slactivism, the appearanceof activity where there is none. In many cases, such criticism is unfair, but it is up to the organizer of anyeffort to ensure that the energy they concentrate is directed to real-world action; both Charity: Waterand Alexs Lemonade Stand Foundation ace this test.

7. TO MANY PEOPLE, NING IS THE PLATFORM THAT WEAVES SOCIAL CONVERSATIONS INTO CONTENT TOINSPIRE ACTIONS. THE KEY TO SUCCESS IS ABOUT FINDING A WAY TO MOTIVATE YOUR EVANGELISTS TOSPREAD THE WORD. DO YOU THINK ONE CAN ENGINEER VIRALITY? IF YES, HOW?

Both individuals and brands have spent a lot of time and energy chasing success in social media,particularly trying to make something go viral the holy grail of the space. The trouble is that althoughplenty of videos do get a million views on YouTube, you cant Frankenstein your way to viral success,dissecting then reassembling appeals based on what seems to have worked for someone else. We knowthat humor, pain, embarrassment and inexplicably cats often play a role in viral hits, but in many casesthe magic, irresistible element of the piece was unintentional making it extremely hard to replicate.

We think time is better spent deeply understanding the viewers than poring over previously successfulviral content. Social media effectiveness is the product of exposure times and desired action. In the socialspace the people ARE the media buy. Their forwards, ratings and re-postings are the means by which yourmessage is exposed to a broader audience. Having a clear call to action in the item is the other half,because awareness itself does not solve any problem. The one-two-three punch is to first connect the

piece to deep meaning, then present a clear and appropriate call to action, and finally make it insanelyeasy to spread the word.

8. WHILE SOCIAL MEDIA HAS GONE MAINSTREAM, ITS STILL IN A NASCENT STAGE WITH LIMITLESSPOSSIBILITIES. WHAT DO YOU THINK IS THE NEXT BIG THEME IN THIS SPACE?

I think the next theme will be refinement. We will see more subtle variations than entirely new themesthemselves. I think we will see the line get blurrier between social media and what we think of today astraditional media, as well as between media and commerce. As an example, when you last made an


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Amazon purchase, did you pay attention to the consumer reviews of the product? I bet you did. It turnsout that presence of customer reviews (even bad ones) can increase sales of a product.

Another encouraging theme is the increasing emphasis that people, particularly those entering the

workforce now, are placing on working at a place that shares their values. This trend will lead to betterbusiness where the good is baked in to the business model. They will do this because doing good as partof doing well will lead to higher employee satisfaction and lower turmoil, greater customer loyalty (Willyou buy your morning coffee from the cafe that only buys Fair Trade grown beans, or the other one thatdoesnt?) and a clearer business direction. I see social media playing a key role in these transformationsand in the process, it too will be transformed.

ABOUT NINGNing is the leading online platform for the worlds organizers, activists and influencers to create their ownsocial network. Design a custom social experience in under 60 seconds giving you the power to mobilize,organize and inspire. Based in Palo Alto, California, Ning makes it easy for brands of all shapes and sizes tobuild custom and powerful social websites. For more information, visit www.ning.com.

mobilizing epic social movement: an interview with andy smith

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