A growing number of marketing efforts are focusing on tapping Influentials: identifying, recruiting, informing, and winning the loyalty of highly connected individuals in the hopes that they will in turn use their powers of persuasion on their broader social networks. However, a debate is brewing about how this influence process really works – and what types of individuals can truly impact the behavior of others. Current communications theories suggest that levels of relationship, or closeness (as opposed to simply the attributes of the individual influencer), may play a more important role in the process of personal influence than previously thought.

This study explores the act of personal influence through data retrieved from 10 private customer communities, facilitated by Communispace Corporation. Private, long-term communities are a unique environment for studying the behavior of personal influence: members get to know one another, often reveal candid information about themselves, and freely seek and offer advice. This creates an intimate environment where members often form close online relationships.

Throughout the history of the study of influence most researchers have relied on self-reported methods of data gathering (the source perspective – “I influenced X number of people today”). This study uses this method as well, but also incorporates a somewhat new approach – the perspective of the person being influenced (the recipient perspective – “I was influenced by this person”). Through the recipient perspective, we found that influence within customer communities is primarily based on relationships and identification with other members and, even more importantly, with the group as a whole. Generally, the study revealed that influence within customer communities is relationship-based. Specifically we found that: (1) Private online community members appear more influenced by members who they can relate to rather than by members who present themselves as experts; (2) They are more influenced by their experience with the group as a whole than by specific, influential individuals; (3) Of those members who feel they influence others in their community, the majority self-report that they communicate their ideas effectively, feel strong emotions, and say what they feel.