"Friend"casting: Why it works

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So what exactly is “Friendcasting”? Is this something I just made up? Well, no, not really! I first heard about friendcasting during a webinar featuring Jason Deitch of Fanpagegenerator and thought to myself-“Yes! this is exactly how and why brands need to be present on sites like Facebook”.

I’ll explain with an example.

The other day I logged onto my Facebook and something in my Newsfeed caught my attention. One of my friends had become a fan of Gurbaksh Chahal, now for those of you that don’t know he is one of the youngest millionaires in the US, and I remember hearing about him being on Oprah and thinking that at some point I wanted to read his book. I forgot about it but seeing it in my Newsfeed courtesy of my friend triggered the memory and I subsequently ‘liked’ him as well. I started reading his wall posts and was enticed to go and buy his book.

So what happened next? You guessed it! I found myself at the nearest bookstore and purchased his book (I wanted it then and there and didn’t want to wait to order it lest I forget again!)

The information came to me through a friend, someone in my trusted circle. Rather than have a brand broadcast the information (and potentially get lost in the noise), it got ‘friend’casted and came to me.

The lesson here? You need to be present. But presence alone doesn’t guarantee success. Nothing trumps good content. Good content results in actions and gets shared.

Thoughts?