Throughout your experiences creating and managing Joomla websites, you may have encountered the term "Social Proof".

Much buzzed about in marketing circles and quickly making it's way into the web design sphere, social proof is the careful art of guiding people to take actions by providing evidence of other people doing the same.

Let's take a look at an example of social proof at work, and discuss how you can incorporate it into your website and Inbound strategy.

Before I go too far, let me pause and clarify that the bandwagon image to the above is meant to be ironic. Although social proof does harness the power of human nature to "jump on" and follow others, that's not really what Inbound social proof should be about.

Think of social proof as a means to fine-tune your communication to the appropriate audience, and demonstrate the value of that message based on it's resonance with many others just like them.

Alright, are we on the same page? Great, now let's move on to the next.

The Psychology of Persuasion

I first encountered social proof when I read about it in Dr. Robert Cialdini's Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. The book explores six methods of persuasion, which are: Reciprocity, Commitment, Authority, Liking, Scarcity, and - you guessed it - social proof.

Dr. Cialdini explains that, thanks to our caveman ancestors, humans are hardwired to gravitate toward groups. Just like cavemen took cues from each other's behavior, we model our lives based on the "status quo" around us and thus develop and dictate what feel like innate social norms.

We're not so different from those woolly mammoth tamers of yesteryear after all! (just kidding)

When you find yourself making decisions based on the choices of people around you, that is your caveman (or human) nature at play. Just as we like to dwell, eat, and work in groups, we like to make decisions based on the behaviors of the group around us. For example, if you were to walk past two people on the street, and they both had their heads angled up at the sky, what would you do?

Don't fight it, you know you'd look up! On the surface, you'd be curious as to what might be flying by. Below, your instincts would be telling you to do as others do. And that, my caveman friend, is why leveraging social proof is so powerful.

To take it a step further, our likeliness to take action increases exponentially when we perceive the others partaking are similar to, or authoritative over us. 

To explore what social proof looks like from the outside, I did a little browsing around and checking out eBook downloads. I found the example below on Marketo's website:

Can you identify the social proof at play? Here's a run down:

Title

1. By labeling this eBook "The CMO Guide to Inbound Marketing", Marketo is identifying this download as authoritative and suitable for high level marketing executives. This characterization is no mistake, the inclusion of "CMO" is meant to grab the attention of executives who identify (or aspire to identify) with the title.
2. By perceiving this eBook as directed at and relevant to professionals in their role, marketers reading this landing page and pulled through the tunnel of internet noise into a message that's exclusively for them - and other people "like" them.
3. I might even go so far as to say the eBook graphic choice also builds the executive authority, since the silhouettes are wearing business attire and appear to be professional and informed. Again, to the executive marketer, these cues signify the download is made for "people like me".

Social Buttons

Visible social sharing is a blessing and a curse for marketers: when it takes off, it is the essence of effective social proof. When it doesn't, it has the opposite of the desired effect.

According to the psychology of social proof, the more we see other people doing something, the more likely we are to take that action. So, when we see an article has been Tweeted 4,500 times, we don't struggle so much with the questions of "should I or shouldn't I" share - since others are doing it, it feels natural for us to Tweet it, too.

In the example above, Marketo's social buttons are not working wonders for their social proof. At just 4 Tweets and 11 LinkedIn shares, the numbers aren't exactly staggering and certainly don't persuade a reader to spread the word on account of other people's viral sharing.

A quick fix for this would be to include social buttons, but not counters for each network. The eBook would still be sharable, but low numbers wouldn't tarnish any potential CMO visitor's perceptions.

Admittedly, this would diminish the social proof of including social sharing in the first place; unless a user directly saw a Tweet from someone they followed, they wouldn't be exposed to any social proof surrounding the sharing of the download.

Views

Notice that sly inclusion of "9k views" in the blue box on the left side of the landing page? That, my friends, is perhaps the most crystal clear example of social proof we'll find all day. 

Unlike the paltry social sharing numbers, 9,000 views is nothing to scoff at. I'm not even a CMO, but seeing that almost 10k people have read this eBook makes me think I probably should, too. 

This is group psychology in it's simplest form, minus the Kool Aid and weird chanting.

Us humans love to fall in line and model our behavior off others, which sometimes results in otherwise inexplicable behavior like horrible fashion trends (looking at you, bell-bottoms) and sometimes results in the spreading of important ideas and skills (like Inbound Marketing).

Marketo could strengthen their messaging here even further by making a qualified claim like "Read and Trusted by over 7,000 CMOs!". Although 9,000 is a bigger number, 7,000 could potentially be stronger if it were hyper relevant.

You'll notice that social proof is somewhat of a chameleon; it can show itself in proof by numbers, in written testimonials, in authoritative titles, and an abundance of other formats.

The instances listed above are just a starting point to get you thinking about social proof, but here are some essential places on your website to be incorporating it:

• Calls-to-action: Use numbers, teasers of testimonials, and other abbreviated bits of proof to incentivize users to click through
• Landing pages: Leverage different social proof tactics to drive conversions. You could even test a few different kinds on the same landing page, and see which performs highest!
• Blog: Where appropriate, include social sharing counters to demonstrate how other readers are sharing your content
• Sales pages: Worried about sticker shock or convincing visitors your solution is the best choice for them? Use testimonials to tell success stories with former and current clients

Let me know how your social experiments go!