What the theory says
Two-step flow argues that mass media rarely persuades people directly. Messages first pass through opinion leaders—people who are more active with media and more trusted inside a community. These leaders translate (frame, simplify, endorse, or resist) before ideas travel onward through everyday conversations. The classic account comes from Lazarsfeld and colleagues’ election studies and Katz’s later synthesis: we make sense of media socially, not in isolation.
A contemporary case: BookTok as a living two-step network
Walk into many bookshops and you’ll meet “As seen on TikTok” displays. That shelf is the second step made visible. Here’s the path: publishers and retailers push titles into the stream; then a small cadre of BookTok creators—niche reviewers with consistent taste—turn a cover and a blurb into an emotional promise: who it’s for, what you’ll feel, which trope it scratches. Their short videos spark stitches, reading vlogs, group-chat debates, and bookstore tables; the narrative frame travels faster than any ad. UK reporting links this creator-led wave to a sharp rise in SFF/“romantasy” sales across 2024–2025, with Rebecca Yarros and others topping charts—evidence that curation plus conversation can move entire categories, not just individual titles.
Why it works—and where it bends the field
Translation beats transmission. Ads and blurbs are thin signals; opinion leaders supply context (why this matters), credibility (why trust me), and community (where to talk about it). Algorithms amplify the middle layer. Platforms are unusually good at surfacing curators, which supercharges the “leader” role rather than replacing it. Frictionless action closes the loop: from a 30-second clip to “save,” “share,” “preorder,” or “library hold” in two taps. But concentrated influence can warp discovery. A few voices set taste, sidelining quieter authors and genres; micro-leaders sometimes propagate partial information (e.g., simplified views of publishing economics). For researchers and marketers, the metric isn’t just top-line sales; it’s downstream chatter—duets, annotations, staff-pick tables—because those artifacts show where the second step is genuinely happening. In other words, treat diffusion as a network problem, not a billboard problem.
Reference list
References
- Encyclopædia Britannica. “Two-step flow model of communication.” (overview and origins).
- Encyclopædia Britannica. “The People’s Choice” / “Personal Influence.” (foundational studies).
- The Guardian. “Romantasy and BookTok driving a huge rise in science fiction and fantasy sales.” (UK market context, Feb 3, 2025).
- The Guardian (Editorial). “Dragons storm the bookshops.” (commentary on sales surges and records, Feb 7, 2025).
- The Sunday Times via Nielsen BookScan. “Bestsellers of 2025 so far.” (romantasy dominance, Aug 2025).
- PBS NewsHour. “How #BookTok is giving authors and booksellers a much-needed boost.” (video explainer, Mar 19, 2023).
- Wikimedia Commons. “BookTokBooks.jpg.” (image, CC BY-SA 4.0; attribution as above).
