The joy of running with the herd
Jul 25th 2007NiaLLLarkinUncategorized
Damien Mulley recounts a real life and personal example of sales by herd instinct that I was also involved in.Â
Via Walter Higgin’s Twitter is the story of how Gordon Murray from eWrite brought along his Nokia 770 Internet Tablet to Open Coffee Cork. A quick showing around and with a pricetag of €100 ex VAT and Walter decided to buy two, Rory bought one and Diarmuid bought four apparently. Walter’s Twitter evangelising of it then got Conor, myself, Niall and Elly to buy one. So 24 hours later and 11 have been purchased, all as a result of one person at an event yesterday.
Damien’s comments on this social phenomenon are well worth catching here ”if a company can figure out how to make your friend a salesperson then their sales rates would go through the roof.”
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I especially enjoyed observing and participating in this buying experience with the guys because I originally set up RelevantM to create tools that will increase the opportunity for users of social tools to enjoy similar experiences more often. My take on the sales buzz that can spread through group within trusted networks is that there is significant added value to be had from risk you take from running with the herd. And, significant pleasurable from engaging in a shared experience. And, at the end of the day, that’s what’s its all about ;-)Â
I’ve been banging on about this for a couple of years now. Take a trip to the cinema for a group of college students for example.
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Conventional wisdom says that we as rational human beings consider which movies we would enjoy and then proceed to the cinema on that basis. The truth is that for most people, going to the cinema is as much about the social experience as it is about the movie itself. If the movie is tolerable and the social experience promises to be good then we are in or at least quite keen to avoid being the one that’s left out. We love shared social experiences. Good or bad we want to be able to share and reshare that experience. That’s the added value, that’s what easily makes up for any amount of middle of the road predictable cinematic fodder. The same goes for social experiences around sports, nightclubs, restaurants etc and many other industries. And as we have seen, can even be extended quite easily into the purchasing of gadgets. If you want to put your sales through the roof then the way to do it is through tapping into that desire for shared social experiences.
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7 Comments »
Mark on 25 Jul 2007 at 7:55 pm #
Spot on! We do what we do mostly (and even when we think otherwise) because of the influence of other people.
Gordon Murray on 25 Jul 2007 at 8:09 pm #
Thank you, stay tuned for the next gadget next Open Coffee
Niall on 26 Jul 2007 at 1:50 pm #
“That’s the added value, that’s what easily makes up for any amount of middle of the road predictable cinematic fodder. The same goes for social experiences around sports, nightclubs, restaurants etc and many other industries. And as we have seen, can even be extended quite easily into the purchasing of gadgets.”
It’s not as clear-cut. A gadget is a product you’re buying to use again and again; social experiences are transient. What works for a middle-of-the-road film won’t work for a middle-of-the-road gadget. The gadget has to be genuinely good - a film, restaurant or nightclub does not.
niall.p.larkin on 26 Jul 2007 at 3:13 pm #
Interesting point Niall. Some would say that middle-of-the-road gadgets tend to win more market share. Betamaz/VHS, Windows/Mac..etc are examples of people opting for the poorer quality option because of peer influence. Take my Dad for example. He doesn’t want a genuinely good gadget. And he certainly couldn’t be arsed shopping for one. That said, he drives long distances to queue up outside Lidl/Aldi on a Thursday(?) morning with the other Dads to get the special offers that come on a weekly basis. Its all good stuff. Which gets immediately stocked away in the garage never to be used again. In that respect, its a waste of money. But in terms of the satisfaction it gives him and the banter with the other guys waiting in anticipation outside the store, its really the most fantastic value. In this case the social experience is transient, but over time its repeated and is forming relationships of increasing permanence. And the gadgets themselves are permanent in their presence but of the briefest transience in actual use or utility. Its a funky world we live in.
Niall on 26 Jul 2007 at 10:31 pm #
I don’t think many people are going to buy an mp3 player or phone if they know its not the best available just because their friends have one even, although they might choose to go to a film or restaurant even though they know its not the best available just to be part of the social experience.
Regarding middle of the road products gaining market share, I don’t think you can put that down to peer pressure as much as people actually believing that those products are the best on the market. The analogy with going to the cinema is slightly misleading; peer pressure with gadgets is more akin to having a good film recommended to you by friends than meeting up with them to decide which film to go to.
niall.p.larkin on 27 Jul 2007 at 10:32 am #
Fair enough. :-)
Paul Browne on 03 Aug 2007 at 12:02 pm #
Yours arrive yet?
http://www.firstpartners.net/blog/location/dublin/2007/08/03/mobile-internet-without-holding-a-pda-brick-to-your-ear/