a drop in the bucket – went to the clever scientists at the University of Massachusetts Medical School who made the discovery. There are few things more bracing than a bucket of ice dumped over one’s head. A bigger shock, perhaps, is an unplanned campaign that traded fun, peer pressure and a dash of online narcissism for a scientific breakthrough, and all of it down to the intersection between small town familiarity and social media fame. Where do the insights come from? First, from understanding that social is something that has to be seen across the whole customer journey. Taking a category at random – say, telephone providers in the UK – we can see that not one company is getting the basics of social presence right across an even abbreviated journey from awareness to loyalty. COMPARISON OF UK TELEPHONE PROVIDERS ACROSS THE CUSTOMER JOURNEY When it comes to social engagement, telephone providers in the UK have relative strengths. O2 is at least getting some things right, achieving broad awareness among UK social media users and converting reasonably well to consideration. But none get even the basics right across the whole customer journey. Second, from understanding that while “conversation” is an easy word to use, it’s a complex thing to understand. A conversation dissected and mapped will tell you what the key content interests, influential platforms and social behaviour of your fellow conversationalists are (see chart). Third, from understanding that some social conversationalists are more important