Network Analysis is an innovative methodology, used already by Sociologists, Economists and social scientists, which can be tailored for either qualitative or quantitative analyses, in order to understand and influence consumer behavior. Like the name suggests, the main tenet of
Network Analysis is an innovative methodology, used already by Sociologists, Economists and social scientists, which can be tailored for either qualitative or quantitative analyses, in order to understand and influence consumer behavior. Like the name suggests, the main tenet of Network Analysis is that relationships at large tend be organized in the form of a Network.
Some basic characteristics of Networks are:
- They are structures made up of elements called actors; and a person, a technology and a company would all be actors under this perspective.
- They are organizational models (of people, objects and technologies) that are not hierarchical, which means that flows of information are horizontal or can include bottom-down or down-upwards strategies.
- They are based on the quality or intensity of relationships: they explain why relationships exist and how they exist, rather than presupposing that they already follow a certain logic or purpose.
- They allow you to capture, from a strategic perspective, the role that different players have within particular networks: this means, for instance, being able to distinguish between the behavior of users that engage your social media against those who do not or between regular customers’ behavior and the behavior of occasional ones.
- They are dynamic and not static: unlike static structures, networks allow for the strategist to understand the dynamics behind role changes within any particular network: actors change roles through time, occupying different positions within the same network. This is central to analyze things like market trends and dominance, as well as, consumer experience of products with improved features.
- They are embedded structures: this means that a network can in principle couple with other networks and can itself be made out of other networks. There is no hierarchy that would presume that human actors are the center of networks, but they allow marketing strategies to build networks that place ideal customers, for instance, at the center of a network of consumer experience.
What are the advantage