The era of self defining content by Antonio Petra, Head of Strategy and Insight at NATIVE VML 

What drives people to share content in social media?

It is true that a part of people sharing a piece of content through social
media is based on an altruistic need to share information that the user
believes is valuable to the greater community. For the most part though,
some recent research that we completed at NATIVE VML clearly demonstrated
that many people share content as a way of defining their own sense of self.


In the same way many people choose brands because of what it says about
them, a large proportion of people who spend time on social media are
choosing to share content because of what it says about their own style,
taste, beliefs, intelligence, or values. It is essentially a way of curating
the perception of self, just as much as the way you choose your clothes in
the morning.

Ultimately though this need to self-define through content is part of the
reason that there is a desire for a continual stream of new content. We know
that in the digital age people are starved for content, and that the
accelerated production of content has meant that we have now moved from a
24-hour news cycle to a nano-second news cycle. In truth this content is not
necessarily more insightful, it is simply broken up into digestible and
shareable sound bites.

In the age of social media, content has become a currency that people are
using to define their own self-image online. The difference between social
as a currency and any normal currency, is that social currency has to be
unique in order to have real value, like an up to the minute news tweet, or
the content needs to have an overriding self-defining message which is
stronger than its uniqueness, like supporting an anti-poaching message. The
commonality between these two pieces of content is that they clearly define
the sharer as a type of person or at least an aspect of the sharers
personality when the content is shared.

Many brands wonder why there is not more engagement with their content, and
it is simply because it holds none of these elements, it does not say
anything about the people you want to engage with. There is no reason to
share it because repeating it says nothing about the sharer. So when you
create content that you want people to share consider carefully the selfish
aspect. How will the sharer see this content as complimenting their online
personality when they share it?


COMPILED ON BEHALF OF NATIVE VML BY CATHY FINDLEY PUBLIC RELATIONS
MEDIA QUERIES CONTACT NICOLLE KAIRUZ ON 0114636372 OR
NICOLLE@FINDLEYPR.CO.ZA.

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