Impact of Opinion Leaders in Information Dissemination in Rural Development: The Case of Okada Town Nigeria

Opinions is a key in any given system or society. It determines how great or small a concept, event, enterprise or invention can be. It is held by all feely, given freely or paid for as a professional fee or service. It is the building block of any society or organization. It is an integral part to the process of policy formulation or strategy development. Information dissemination and management are critical aspects of what makes any society function effectively and a lot of times, people depend on the judgement of certain members of the society to take decisions on what concerns the society or government policies, while others require explanation or approval from key members of the society to determine what would be the right action to take. This study adopts two theoretical basis and that is the two-step flow and the diffusion of innovation theory. This work adopted the survey research. In conclusion to think of opinion leaders as people who are more interested and informed, who acquire and maintain credibility and trust over time in a stable circle of relatives and acquaintances, is clearly too restrictive and unrealistic. In order to understand and classify new opinion leaders, the first step is to broaden the notion of opinion leadership to accommodate all such new developments. This means that, although empirical analyses in the field should be promoted and intensified, the first step of a research agenda should be to elaborate a conceptual mapping of the relevant characteristics of an opinion leader.