A tiny amount of advertising erases people's network influence

"There's a reasonably big body of literature that says you should find someone who appears to be structurally important to the network you're trying to connect with," he said. "We're arguing that, if advertising exists, you can just pick somebody at random in the network and you'll get just as good results as if you found the absolutely ideal person to start with."

This is even when advertising is 0.25% as strong as word of mouth.