Twenty years ago, many companies fell behind, or even hurt their own brand, while adjusting to the introduction of online marketing. Are companies destined for a similar fate with the rise of social media marketing?

Subodha Kumar argues that companies relying only on popular metrics, such as number of followers, to make their influencer decisions are not set up to compete with companies making more strategic decisions.  

Kumar creates a model that helps firms select the optimal influencers. The model asks companies to consider a larger recipe of factors, such as the characteristics of the product, the brand image, the target audience and the marketing goals.