The Tipping Point — Book Summary

By Malcolm Gladwell

Why do some ideas or initiatives go viral while others don’t? Is it the value or importance of the idea, who’s presenting it, or is it a combination of the earlier plus more? In what ways can ideas, inventions, products, services, or even brand awareness “Tip” from being mediocre to trading & spreading like the pleasure? Is there a certain threshold whereby if crossed, things will go viral?

The “Tipping Point” of almost anything can be broken down Into 3 “Rules of Epidemics” that determine whether something tips & spreads like wildfire or fizzles into obscurity if not applicable.

Whether you are a marketer, engineer, doctor, educator, or someone looking to make an impact, these 3 rules will determine how far your campaign succeeds (or fails) would transpire…

1. The Law of the Few (People)

A small percentage of people are accountable for building huge initial momentum that would create the momentum required for things to snowball “Tip”. These people are not necessarily in managerial positions or in a position of authority because of their special social gifts, and are single-handedly responsible for many trends around us today.

These agents of change embody certain characteristics, which includes:

• Mavens (the Data Banks) always have the inside scoop, and can’t help themselves from accumualting and sharing knowledge. Mavens are the ones who seem to know everything and always want to help! They simply love what they do, eager to teach others, and help you make informed decisions.

• Connectors (the Social Glue) are naturally connect people across different worlds and communities. They are these people who seem to know everybody, where they have more social connections than most & are great at making friends.

• Salesmen (the Persuaders) are charismatic, persuasive, and effortly influence others’ buying decisions. They can sell almost anything (ideas, products, way of thinking, etc…), where their persuasive abilities go beyond convincing. They understand body language, tone, and they let their actions do the talking.

If you are starting a new campaign, don’t waste your resources, rather, focus your resources on finding or identifying these 3 groups of people!

2. The Stickiness Factor (Infectious Agents)

As a child, I was hooked on Sesame Street & The Electric Conpany, which is where I’ve learned how to speak English quite fluently! Ever had a jingle that that you couldn’t stop humming (Netflix opening jingle or McDonald’s “Para Pap Paa Paa, I’m lovin’ it”)? These messages are powerful because they are “Sticky”, where you just can’t get them out of your head. Stickiness isn’t random! There are many techniques to make something stick, including the use of stories, unexpectedness (breaking the script), and concreteness. Success often hinges on small details rather than major changes. The tough part is to find the right stickiness factor for your specific target audience. If you are not achieving the desired effects in your campaign, take a step back and ask yourself: Is my message irresistible, memorable, and what would make it stick? To learn more about how things stick, please checkout my other book summary “Made to Stick” by Chip & Dan Heath (https://link.medium.com/onpkjvAH3cb).

3. The Power of Context (Environment)

Our characters & convictions are less important in determining our actual behaviours, compared with the influence of our immediate environment or “Context”. That’s because our environments and social norms define what constitutes “Acceptable Behavior”. What might work in the US, might not work in Saudi Arabia! These considerations consequently shape our actual behaviours.

According to the “Broken Window Theory” broken windows in a neighborhood will lead to higher violent crime rates. Based on the Power of Context, to reduce the crime rate, we should fix the windows rather than arrest people for crime! When one sees broken windows, graphite on the walls, and litter everywhere; one might not give it much thought to litter themselves & would careless about their social conformity; at least in that environment because they might think that it wouldn’t matter that much because it’s a hot mess anyways! In the same vein, to shape people’s behaviours, one can change the context & manage their social groups in an effort to create critical mass (through small groups of less than 150 people to effectively leverage on social bonds).

Diffusion of Innovation

Diffusion of innovations is a theory that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technologies spread like wildfire.

There are 5 established adopter categories, and when promoting an innovation, there are different strategies used to appeal to the different adopter categories:

1. Innovators: These are people who want to be the first to try the innovation. These people are very willing to take risks & are often the first to develop new ideas.
2. Early Adopters: These are people who represent opinion leaders, who enjoy leadership roles & embrace change opportunities. They are already aware of the need to change and so are very comfortable adopting new ideas.
3. Early Majority: These people are rarely leaders, but they do adopt new ideas before the average person. They typically need to see evidence that the innovation works before they are willing to adopt it.
4. Late Majority: These people are skeptical of change, who are willing to adopt an innovation only after it has been tried by the majority.
5. Laggards: These people are bound by tradition & very conservative. They are very skeptical of change and are the hardest group to bring on board.

There are 5 main factors that influence adoption of an innovation:

1. Relative Advantage: The degree to which an innovation is seen as better than the idea, program, or product it replaces.
2. Compatibility: How consistent the innovation is with the values, experiences, and needs of the potential adopters.
3. Complexity: How difficult the innovation is to understand and/or use.
4. Testability: The extent to which the innovation can be tested or experimented with before a commitment to adopt is made.
5. Observability: The extent to which the innovation provides tangible results.

Diffusion of Innovation is widely used to accelerate the adoption of important programs that typically aim to change the behavior of a social system.

How a Tipping Point “Tips”

When it comes to innovations or any new idea, product, system, or process for that matter, one would need to understand the law of diffusion & how to penetrate the market. Here is how to “Tip” the scale in your favor:

1. Innovators & Early Adopters rely heavily on their intuition & gut feeling when deciding to adapt a new idea or invention.
2. The Early & Late Majority are more practical minded, where rational factors mean more than intuition.
3. The further right one goes in the bell-shaped adoption curve, the more likely one would encounter customers who may need what’s been offered, but are unwilling to adopt unless other groups adopt & approve first.
4. The ability to get the system to tip is the point where the growth of the business starts spreading like wildfire.
5. The importance of knowing the Laggers is for one to avoid doing business with them.

The most successful adoption of any program, system, or idea results from understanding the target population and the factors influencing their rate of adoption.

Takeaways

1. Once an idea reaches the tipping point, it spreads like fire.
2. There are 3 kinds of people characteristics that are responsible for getting ideas to tip (Mavens, Connectors, and Salesmen)
3. Without stickiness, no idea will reach the threshold & tip.
4. The tipping point is that magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire.
5. If you want to bring a fundamental change in people’s belief and behavior, you need to create a community around them, where those new beliefs can be practiced, expressed, and nurtured.
6. There are exceptional people out there who are capable of starting epidemics, and all you have to do is find them.
7. The paradox of epidemics is that in order to create one contagious movement, you need to create many small movements first.
8. 8. Emotions are contagious & you can leverage them to create critical mall for things to “Tip”.
9. People are heavily influenced by their surroundings, context, and the personalities of those around them.
10. The world around you may seem like an immovable place, it’s not! With the slightest push in just the right place & direction, it can be tipped.
11. Tinkering with the presentation of information can significantly improve its stickiness & remarkableness.
12. The most successful adoption of a program or a system results from understanding the target population & the factors influencing their rate of adoption.

In what ways would you diffuse your idea or what you’re work on so that it would “Tip” the scales in your favor?

The Maverick

www.DarTec.com.sa

Hashim@dartec.com.sa