discovering groups of key potential customersin social network A Multi-Objective Optimization Model

Social network analysis, Nowadays, the popularity of social networks as a marketing tool has brought a deal of attention to social networks analysis (SNA). One of the common problems in this field is influence maximization problem which is related to flow of information within networks. Although the problem has been considered by many researchers, the concept behind has been used less in a business context. In this paper, by using a cost-benefits analysis, we propose a multi-objective optimization model which helps to identify the location of the key nodes,that are symbols of potential influential customers in real social networks. The main novelty of this model is that it determines the best nodes by combining two essential and realistic elements simultaneously: diffusion speed and dispersion cost. Also, the performance of the proposed model is validated by detecting key nodes on a real social network.