The death of the individual

One of the biggest social trends of recent years is over. The search for individuality, which has driven much of our marketing, is last year’s trend. Now it’s all about belonging.

The big unmet need is friendships, particularly close friendships. In the U.S. the number of close friends each person has dropped dramatically in recent years, from 2.94 in 1985 to 2.08 in 2004 (Note 1).

Many reasons have been advanced (e.g. Note 2)
- Time crunch
- Mobility as people move for employment
- Homophobia as it becomes unacceptable to show intimacy with other males if you are straight
- The growth of social networking which encourages casual friendships but inhibits intimacy

But the fact is that people care less about defining who they are and more about finding people to share who they are with. And with the current economic crisis it is more important than ever to have someone to share your worries with and someone to drown them with.

To me this accounts for the amazing growth of social networks. Yes there is a narcissistic element to them; who really cares what you are doing or thinking right now. But the real appeal is that it is easy to find friends. Facebook’s friend finder will help you if you’re having trouble and will even suggest some potential friends to you. Classmates or Friends Reunited will find your old friends again for you, though in most cases you will quickly remember why you lost contact.

People are almost desperate to expand their network of friends. The average person has 150 friends on their social network, including an increasing number of trophy friends. And yet only 5 of these are “close friends”. (Note 3)

So stop selling products on individuality and self discovery and start selling them on belonging. I really don’t want to see any more of “Where do you want to go today?”, “You’re worth it”, “Be all you can be”, “Have it your way” and their ilk.

1. http://www.asanet.org/galleries/default-file/June06ASRFeature.pdf
2. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/25/AR2006062500566.html
3. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/3306173/Facebook-study-reveals-users-trophy-friends.html