1. The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell Julius Calderon Entrepreneurship

2. Topics THE THREE RULES OF EPIDEMICS The Law of The Few Connectors Mavens Salesmen The Stickiness Factor Sesame Street Blue’s Clues The Power of Context

3. IDEA as an EPIDEMIC “The best way to understand... mysterious changes is to think of them as epidemics”

4. IDEA as an EPIDEMIC CONTAGIOUSNESS SMALL THINGS HAVE BIG EFFECTS “A waterfall only begins with one drop of water.” HAPPEN INA HURRY

6. THE STICKINESS FACTOR

8. CONNECTORS People who bring the world together Can spread a word-of-mouth epidemic (piece of news travels a great distance in a short period of time) 6 Degrees of Separation Not all degrees are equal We are linked to the rest of the world through a special few

9. CONNECTORS Know a lot of people Phonebook Test Some people just have a knack for making friends and acquaintances Not self-serving They manage to occupy many different worlds and niches They bring these different worlds together

10. MAVENS Information specialists or brokers connect people to information Experts in the marketplace Yiddish word meaning “one who accumulates knowledge” They know things that others don’t What sets them apart is that they are socially motivated Motivated to educate and to help Their advice is always followed by those with whom they shared the information

11. SALESMEN Skilled at persuading people Also just want to help people Tom Gau The Power of Persuasion Newscaster’s bias Jennings’ facial expressions influenced the viewers Headset test Nodding affected their opinion about tuition fees

12. SALESMEN WHY SALESMEN ARE EFFECTIVE Little things make a big difference Non-verbal cues are more powerful than verbal cues Physical movements affect how we feel and think Persuasion is subtle Cultural Microrhythm A bond is formed between people who are conversing You can draw others into our own rhythms and be synchronized with them Salesmen cannot be resisted

13. Summary: The success of any kinds of epidemic relies on the involvement of particular people with a rare set of social gifts. MAVENS – They provide the message CONNECTORS – They spread the message SALESMEN – They persuade people to change

14. THE STICKINESS FACTOR

15. The Stickiness Factor Define as a unique quality that compels the phenomenon to “stick” in the minds of the public and influence their future behavior. It is the quality that compels people to pay close, sustained attention to a product, concept, or idea. The messages must have a certain character which causes them to remain active in the recipients' minds. The stickiness of a message can often only be determined by testing and experimentation. (Sesame Street) The message must be repacked and tweaked several times before tiny changes cause the message to become sticky. (Blue’s Clue) Gladwell purports that there are "relatively simple changes in the presentation and structuring" of an idea that can make it more sticky (Fear Campaign/The Gold Box)

16. Sesame Street Sesame Street was an example of how an agent of infection (television) was able to infect a positive virus (literacy). The ability to combine long-established assumptions about children’s cognitive abilities and television-watching behaviors on their heads. People vs Muppets; Reality vs Fantasy The success of Sesame Street and its groundbreaking format was not achieved by accident. The producers thoroughly test their episodes on children to make sure that the content holds their attention. The PBS show Sesame Street represented a vast improvement in the “stickiness” of children’s television These changes, based in large part on extensive research, resulted in a show that actually helped toddlers and preschoolers develop literacy.

17. Blue’s Clue Television show Blue’s Clues applied and improved most of the techniques from Sesame Street, resulting in the development of a program that research has shown can generate significant improvements in children’s logic and reasoning abilities The Blue’s Clue Show Format First Idea: More kids are engaged in watching something (intellectually and physically) the more memorable and meaningful it becomes. Second Idea: the idea of repetition

18. Fear Campaign “Fear Experiment“, in which 2 versions of tetanus booklet were shown to the university students. One version was a “high fear” version (containing gory pictures) and the other one was a more objective version containing same factual information but without any gory pictures but both results are disappointing. A simple change in booklet (including a map of the campus with health center circled and times shot were available) tipped the vaccination report to 28%. Gladwell references numerous studies in marketing and television to conclude that advice needs to be practical and personal in order to become memorable.

19. Gold Campaign Lester Wunderman has a showdown with the McCann Erickson for the Columbia Record Club Lester Wunderman proposed a test, selected 26 media markets will be use for the TV commercial; 13 will air the McCann "awareness" television ad while the other 13 would air Wunderman own set of TV commercial The one with the greatest response in TV Guide and Parade advertising would win the whole account; Response in Wunderman's market were up by 80% while McCann has 19.5 percent The gold box make the commercial sticky, it gave reason for viewers to look for the ads, it created connection and make reader/viewer part of the interactive advertising system

20. Cluttering As human beings we can only handle so much information at once. Once we pass a certain boundary, we become overwhelmed. This “intellectual capacity” is defined as our ability to process raw information. We have become, in our society, overwhelmed by people clamoring for our attention. This information age has created a stickiness problem. Has our generation become the victim of too much information?

21. Summary Stickiness means that a message makes an impact and doesn’t go in one ear and out the other. It is not the quality of an idea, concept, TV show, or product that makes it sticky, but something about the way it is packaged and presented. For Wunderland... creating a "Gold Box" treasure hunt For Levanthal... giving them a map and a schedule For Blue's Clue... a literal show and repeating the show 5 times For Sesame Street's... mixing real people with muppets There is a simple way to package information that under the right circumstances, can make it irresitable. All you have to do is find it.

22. The power of context

23. THE POWER OF CONTEXT BROKEN WINDOWS THEORY Change can be brought about by a feature in the environment Transit system reclamation Inner states are a result of outer circumstances Zimbardo’s Prison experiment Schoolchildren’s Honesty test

24. THE POWER OF CONTEXT FUNDAMENTAL ATTRIBUTION THEORY Underestimate the effect of the context Character is a bundle of habits, tendencies and interests dependent on the context The “Good Samaritan Experiment” – those who were in a rush did not stop to help

25. THE POWER OF CONTEXT Groups play a critical role The Divine Secrets of the Ya-ya Sisterhood and Book clubs Connections with many groups Close-knit groups magnify the epidemic potential of an idea The Rule of 150 Hutterites Gore Associates

26. THE POWER OF CONTEXT Transactive Memory – store information in other people Explore the bonds of memory and peer pressure PARADOX OF EPIDEMIC Break people up into smaller groups

27. Thank you!!!