The tipping point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference

This is a book to introduce the rules of ‘being popular’, or it can be considered as why something or somebody is liked or pursued by most people. As the author wrote in the contemporary society, the cases are always being observed that something suddenly becomes the hottest topic in people’s daily life; even the news often broadcasts it as well. And he also indicated that the popular event or person always has a point which named ‘topping point’. This point is used to describe the event or the person is in a situation that is going to be popular and has an influence to the public. In his point of view, this situation is possible to observed and made by people. In this case, it is possible for us to control the popular thing or person. In such a society full of information, it is important to make product or person popular in order to make profit. In addition, the author concludes that there are three significant rules for ‘topping point’. They are ‘the law of the few’, ‘the stickiness factor’, and ‘the power of context’. For instance, the first one can be understood as that the significance to make the ‘topping point’ is to find the key persons. The persons can be divided into three types. The first one is maven, who is the professional deeply knowing the knowledge and newest information about a filed. The second one is connector, the people connecting the information with the public, and their jobs need them to contact many different people every day, including opportunity to spread information to the public. The last one is salesman, who is the last person deliver the information to the customer, with the ability to persuade them to accept the products or people.

This is a world which has various new events and persons every day. No matter a person who needs to sell the product in the intense competitive market or a person who needs to be a successful politician, it is necessary to understand and make use of popularity. The ‘topping point’ theories may help these people to consider some effective methods to promote themselves or the product. It is significant to make public know and accept. For these people, they need to focus on the right information and method. As the author indicated that for instance, the name of the product should be easily remembered by customers, the name of ‘Yahoo’ and ‘Google’ are great examples. Both of them are easily pronounced and short enough to be remembered. On the other hand, they need to think from the customers’ point of views. People need to collect the information from all the available accessible recourses. Next step is to find the people who can translate the new concept and thought to the public, to guide them. The idea may be to teach a few people who are interested in new things to use the product and they will introduce it to the people around them. For instance, the new social network app is initially used by a small group of people, then they start to ask their friends to use it as well. And their friends will ask their friends which will spread wildly.

In this book, the author told us that how things become popular, which is in very details. From the perspectives of philosophy and psychology, also connected with human behaviors, the book indicates the process of being popular and how to achieve by systematic method. There are many interesting examples given to support the theories, like the planting corn, fashion and smoking. Also the beginning of the book is attractive, which offers a new way to think about the world.

Reference

Malcolm, G., 2000. The tipping point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference Little Brown