Malcolm Gladwell is one of my favourite writers, and I have great respect for the manner in which he can popularize important research findings in a way that respects the original research and still manages to be accessible to non-specialists. I read The Tipping Point when it came out first in 2000 and reread it recently. The subtitle of the book says it well: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference.
In Gladwell’s view, there are three type of people who are responsible for producing epidemics, trends, thought viruses, fashion, or whatever you may wish to term the popularization of a phenomenon. The connector brings people together. The maven is highly knowledgeable about the phenomenon, and the salesman is able to convince people of its merits. Sometimes one person can combine more than one of these roles, and sometimes they are different people, but in general a phenomenon (product, idea …) needs someone to create a group, someone to have expert knowledge, and someone to market the phenomenon.
Gladwell gives some excellent examples including the long life of Sesame Street, the fall in crime in New York, and the high rate of suicide in some areas. This is a valuable book for people interested in spreading ideas or raising the profile of products. In his conclusion, Gladwell notes that a big budget is not always necessary to get the word out, and that conventional advertising can be a huge waste of money sometimes. Instead, producing a message that is congruent with its context, finding an appropriate messenger, and setting up a network is the key. I talked to a publisher recently who had just spent $5,000 dollars on newspaper advertising that had yielded a single phone call which led to nothing.
People are innundated by advertising and while nobody would say that it is meaningless, people are powerfully influenced by their surroundings, their immediate contexts, and most importantly the personalities of those around them. Finding the special people to spread the message can make the difference that turns a product or an idea into a runaway success.