Babak Bagheri

To put crowd-psychological conjectures and insights to work, marketers have embraced a number of simple models.

The first model was developed for technology markets and is called the “Technology Adoption Model”. The model is based on the Technology Adoption Curve, a simple bell curve for the distribution of adopters of technology (or innovation in general).

Innovation Adoption Curve

This segmentation of innovation enthusiasts and luddites is presumably the same for all types of new gadgets, services, ideas, etc. Let’s take that for granted.

In his “Crossing the Chasm” book, Geoffrey Moore points out that the lines between the different segments, e.g. Early Adopters and Early Majority, are more like large gaps or even chasms. The upshot is that we need a plan of attack for capturing the attention of each new segment. The basic idea is a familiar military one: establish a beachhead, then expand the conquered territory.

A second famous marketing model or curve is useful in forming each plan of attack. This one is often called the “hype” curve and was introduced by the Gartner group.

Hype Curve

This categorization of attention or visibility across time is also presumably the same for all types of gadgets, services, ideas, etc. Let’s take that for granted.

An interesting question is: can we start or otherwise engineer this curve for each of the adoption segments above?

Note that if the Trough of Disillusionment falls below the horizontal axis, then attention and visibility are zero; one would presumably have to restart from scratch!

If you ask the pundits about generating market frenzy (read madness) in your favor, they’ll give you various lists of things you need. One item is common on most of these lists: a great product or service. Of course, “great” here means anything that the crowd will love madly. So that item is not much help. The more interesting tip lists offer a number of psychological items.

Robert Cialdini

Robert Cialdini wrote a deservedly popular book called “Influence” that expounds on a list of crowd-influencing items:

• Reciprocation
• Commitment and Consistency
• Social Proof
• Liking
• Authority
• Scarcity

The most interesting aspect of this list is its pure subjectivity. There is no direct mention of the object (product, service, etc.) that one is trying to make popular. The only indirect reference is in “Scarcity,” but Cialdini makes it clear that he understands the scarcity doesn’t need to be real.

At this point, one may be skeptical. After all don’t popular people or companies create products and services that are great in some objective way? Aren’t Toyota’s cars better built? Aren’t Apple’s machines more elegant? Well, ask yourself this question: have the crowds always preferred cars that are better-built; have they always preferred machines that are more elegant?

The Leonardos of the Cinquecento had their patrons. That patronage system is long gone; we’ve replaced it with popularity contests on a grand scale. What does this mean for entrepreneurs? It means entrepreneurs need to understand “crowd psychology” more than ever.

Gustave Le Bon

The trail of interest in “crowd psychology” goes back to ancient Greece where there was a great deal of worry about the “tyranny of the masses (demos).” This trail of fascination with the madness of crowds has been meandering through the years. The trail reached a prominent point in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Gustave Le Bon’s “The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind” is a good popularization of the attitudes of the period.

We’ve now made it through the twentieth century, stopped worrying about the madness and started loving it. The madness of crowds can make us money.

Leonardo

It is high time that we update the old saying attributed to Andy Warhol: “Everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes.” We have created a world where “Everyone has to be famous for fifteen minutes.”

Why you ask? Because the world we’ve created is a look-at-me world. It’s a world where obscurity guarantees failure. To many who have grown up with MySpace and Facebook and now Twitter, this will actually be more than obvious, it will be a tautology. “How could it be otherwise?” Isn’t popularity what we mean by success? Well, it is now. But it hasn’t alway been this way.

Let’s look at a well-known example: Leonardo da Vinci. He compiled one of the most impressive collections of drawings and ideas. Not only did he not feel compelled to shout “look at my stuff” from the palazzo rooftops, but he went to great lengths to obscure his work. Yes, I know about the need he may have felt to protect himself from the authorities (especially the Church). But that’s not enough to explain his mindset. To a Leonardo, the work itself spelled success, not his ability to shine in public.

What does all this have to do with the title of this article? I’ll leave that as an exercise for the reader for now.

I’m finally getting around to writing an online journal. Should be fun.