@ pam
2025-02-05 06:07:11
Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell has been around for a long time. I first read this book maybe about 10 years ago, but this time around I read it from the perspective of marketing, and PR.
Gladwell is a highly controversial and thought-provoking author - and while I often both agree and disagree, I'm impressed by how he links and simplifies his ideas to real-world examples from sports, fashion, social attributes, genes, religion, kids, politics, history and more. If you have similar or opposing views on Gladwell’s takes; I’d love to hear it
This book talks about how niche or idiosyncratic trends become mainstream.
If I were to re-read books related to these topics again, to understand the concepts better, I would read all 4 books in the following sequence :
1. Crossing the Chasm; Marketing and selling disruptive products to mainstream customers by Geoffrey A.Moore
2. Tipping Point; How little things can make a big difference by Malcolm Gladwell
3. Made to Stick; Why some ideas survive and others die by Chip and Dan Heath
4. Contagious; Why Things Catch On by Jonah Berger
(I've shared No 1 a long time ago, and No 4 recently. This is No 2)
Now, onto Gladwell's take - 3 factors can make an idea spread like wildfire or become contagious like an epidemic :
1. Law of The Few - influence of a few individuals
2. Stickiness Factor - how messages stick in people’s minds
3. The Power of Context - how environment and circumstances affect outcome
The overarching concept is how small actions can lead to significant and unexpected outcomes very quickly
1. Law of the Few - talks about connectors, mavens and salespeople.
These are people who are your links to groups, and communities and make the messages spread.
Some examples shared -
Paul Revere as the connector - he is famously known for his midnight ride, went town to town, knocked on each door, spread the right message and everyone was ready for the British invaders by morning leading to the American Revolution. William Dawes took on the same mission in the West of Boston but did not have the same impact - which concludes that connectors have a special gift of spreading messages
Another example is six degrees of separation - and eventually, the points of contact will be connectors
More people find jobs through connections
Needle exchange programme - discovered that the “insiders” collect all the used needles, exchange them for fresh ones and sell them for a dollar each to drug addicts. While this wasn't the original plan for needle exchange, it was effective as the insiders knew where the junkies were, when they were used etc and effectively got them fresh needles.
Connectors are people who know a lot of people, and also, the kind of people that they know. They bring people together, there’s no snobbery. They may not be the first to discover it, but they are the people who can broadcast it. Mavens are people who are experts in certain areas and accumulate knowledge. Salespeople are persuaders. Sometimes you can find all 3 in one, sometimes they are different individuals
2. The second factor is the stickiness factor and understanding what keeps people glued. Examples include :
Tetanus shot - In an experiment, half of the students received a "high fear" booklet on tetanus and the other half a regular one. The high fear group was more convinced but only 3% got the shot. The second time, a booklet with schedules and shot locations improved adoption, showing persuasion alone was not enough - the right information sealed the deal.
Sesame Street - getting children to stay focused on a TV programme. The observation is that children would only like straightforward information and can get distracted from time to time - hence every few minutes, there is a “distractor” on the show that switches the kids' focus and back.
The concept of a "distractor" refers to something attention-grabbing or visually stimulating that can potentially divert a child's focus from the educational content being presented such as colourful puppets, catchy songs, and entertaining characters like Elmo. These distractors are strategically woven into the show to maintain children's interest and keep them engaged in the main educational program
Blue Clues took it a step further and made it engaging for the kids to participate by answering questions and repeating many times
The factors that make a message stick are: Repetition, Distractor (something unexpected or unusual that captures people's attention), Unexpectedness ( things that are out of the ordinary), Concreteness, Emotion, Simplicity, Credibility, Storytelling
3. The Power of Context was quite interesting - It says that human beings are a lot more sensitive to their environment than they may seem. It retells the idea of PR and the importance of it.
An example is the Broken Window Theory, which highlights how people's behaviour can change based on their environment. For instance, in a poorer community, you're more likely to observe higher social issues, whereas in an improved community in terms of proper infrastructure, and visually appealing, the same individuals tend to exhibit and experience fewer problems. The example referred to the NY subway problems in the 80s and how it was reduced drastically.
Another well-known experiment is the Stanford Prison Experiment. In this study, individuals were assigned the roles of either prisoners or guards. The environment was transformed to resemble a grim prison, leading the guards to exhibit cruelty while the prisoners lost their sense of self, referring to themselves by numbers. The experiment was called off after just six days.
The power of context talks about the importance of Nature over Nurture and the influence of Peers that impacts how you react and make decisions.
Other examples were the teen smoking epidemic, and the suicide epidemic (these two were on how to contain it)
4. Some other examples that are related to community building
If you want to bring about a fundamental change in people’s beliefs and behaviour, a change that would persist and serve as an example to others, you need to create a community around them, where those new beliefs could be practised and expressed and nurtured.
Examples - the Methodist group spread - John Wesley who went from town to town, met with the locals, set up communities and connected it.
Another example is the Ya-Ya sisterhood book - this did not spread early on, but it did when the author when town to town over a year and reached out to the book clubs
Both the above two examples talked about a continuous time frame of say 1 year of going from location to location (both within a country) to spread the message.
150 seems like a good number within a small community to have effective engagement. Anything more leads to a new community, to build up the next 150. Gladwell gave many examples from tribes (Hutterites) to the corporate environment that uses this concept. To serve as incubators for contagious messages, the group has to be kept below the 150 Tipping Point.
One last example - there was a campaign to spread awareness of diabetes - and this was done in churches for its large group of people - but it did not catch on because people were tired, hungry, and wanted to go home. So the campaign shifted location to saloons and that picked up because people were relaxed and spent hours there.
In comparison to the diffusion model - connectors to me are not the early adopters, but rather the key spokesperson in the early minorities. Connectors also translate the message of the innovators into something the rest of us can understand.
In summary - The tipping point talks about the possibility of doing a lot with a little - by concentrating on a few key areas - to make something spread.
The "Law of the Few" emphasizes that Connectors, Mavens, and Salesmen drive word-of-mouth epidemics, so concentrate resources on them if you want to start one.
Stickiness - the key is to package information irresistibly - you just need to discover how.
The "Power of Context" reveals our profound sensitivity to environmental changes. Our inner states reflect our outer circumstances.