The power of influence. The power of persistence.

Shel Israel recently blogged about the power of Twitter and why companies should be listening.

The post covered how one tweet by David Alston (Radian6) highlighting bad service from UHaul exploded into a movement.

This post really resonated with me as I recently had a similar experience with My Land Rover Battle. Although my experience and David's had similarities, there were also some distinct differences.

David's review of UHaul had alot of legs and spread throughout the twittersphere fairly quickly. It spread much further than mine. Why? Well, bluntly put, David Alston has more influence than me. He's extremely well known in the social media community. I am not. He has far more Twitter followers and subsequently more reach than I do. His one tweet rallied a movement and most likely cost UHaul future business. That is the power of influence.

My campaign had a favorable outcome for me. David's tweet didn't really make a difference to him personally. Why? For one, David posted one tweet and left it at that. My Land Rover Battle was a campaign which, included a call to action for people to phone Land Rover on my behalf. I estimate that about 10-15 calls were made. This, in my opinion, is was what made the difference. That is the power of persistence.