Any TIPS for me?

The Tipping Point

The Tipping Point is a book by Malcom Gladwell that explores exactly what it is that makes something go from simply ordinary to extraordinary, unforgettable, or just huge. Throughout the book, Gladwell thoroughly examines many circumstances in which things have “tipped.” Some of these examples throughout the book include Paul Revere’s ‘the British are coming!’ ride, Sesame Street, Blues Clues, crime rates in New York City, Tetanus inoculations, Peter Jennings, Airwalk, Hush Puppies shoes, the AIDS virus, and cigarette smoking among teens. Gladwell makes a point near the beginning of the book that says that there are three rules of epidemics. They are Law of the Few, Stickiness Factor, and Power of Context.
The Law of Few talks about how there are 3 main types of people that make the tipping point happen: the connectors, the mavens, and the salesmen.
The connectors are, as Gladwell explains, “people with a special gift of bringing the world together” (p. 38). There is a simple exercise for figuring out if you are a connector. A person is given a list of 250 surnames. As the person goes through the list, they give themselves one point for every person they know with a last name listed. The more people someone knows, the more likely they are a connector. Connectors score, on average, double what most people score. “Among every walk of life, in other words, are people with a truly extraordinary knack of making friends and acquaintances. They are connectors” (p. 41). Paul Revere is an example of a connector because he knew people in each of the northern colony towns so that spreading the word about the British coming was easy because he had contacts in each of the towns.
Next and are the mavens. Mavens are explained to be people who retain enormous amounts of information. People are drawn to mavens because mavens do not wish to gain something out of relaying information to people, they simply inform people for the sake of informing. They are like students and teachers alike, they have a zest for learning and accumulation of knowledge. A personal example that Gladwell gives of a maven is Mark who seems to know everything about everything from the weather to Volvo cars.
Thirdly are the salesmen. The salesmen must have charisma. They are very persuasive. An example of someone who was a salesmen type of personality as explained by Gladwell was Peter Jennings. Jennings was a news anchor and he was proved through experimentation to be very persuasive. When other anchors expressions were watched by viewers, the viewers felt neutral feelings to the topics such as the Reagan election. However, when Jennings spoke about Raegan, the viewers who watched his broadcasts were swayed into supporting him for one reason or another.
I think that I personally am a connector. I know many people from many walks of life. No matter where I meet people, we seem to have at least one person we know in common. I am good at keeping in contact with people who I meet.
The stickiness factor is the idea that some concept or idea has the power to stay in someone’s mind. It sticks there. Gladwell explains this by exploring Sesame Street. Many tests and experiments were run on how ‘sticky’ different proposed segments of the show were to young children. Some were more sticky than others and those that didn’t stick at well were cut. The next phenomenon that he explores is blues clues and the way it surpassed the stickiness of Sesame Street as far as keeping children’s attention goes.
Lastly is the Power of Context. The power of context means that for something to catch on and to be a trend, something must be present already so that there is a need for it. It involves the ideas of time and place. Things must be introduced when they are necessary for them to catch on. For example, why would a designer introduce a new type of snow boots in the summer. They simply would not because snow boots are not necessary in the summer, so the fad would not catch on. Gladwell, however, explains this idea with the topic of the crime in New York City. When graffiti was painted on trains, the authorities simply brought the trains out of the station and repainted them before sending them back to pick up passengers so that the graffiti artists would never have the satisfaction of people seeing their graffiti. Since no one would see it, it became pointless, and finally, they for the most part, stopped.
The real question is ‘how can the mean in green dream team make the 2010 bobcat athletic auction tip?’ I believe this is a multipart answer. We need to make this auction sticky, and I don’t mean with sugar. The auction needs to be able to keep people’s attention and keep them entertained. Boredom is the enemy. We don’t want the event goers bored like the children watching certain Sesame Street clips, as Gladwell said. We need to keep them entertained with the decorations, the atmosphere, the food, and the company of the other event goers. The power of context section made me realize that even if people at the event knock our auction, we need to ignore their comments. Like the trains in New York City that had been painted with graffiti, when the problem is ignored, the problem goes away. However, we want to go above and beyond in not only meeting, but exceeding the expectations of the attendees. It is a known fact that people like free gear. No matter what it is, people want it simply because they do not have to pay for it. This is the reason I believe that the swag baskets need to be amazing. The things that people are able to take away from this auction, whether they are memories or tangible things, are what people will look back on and say “wow that was a really spectacular event.” If we give them something to take home from the event, even if it is not an auction item, they will be happier than if they left with nothing at all. Therefore, putting a lot of our budget into the swag baskets and making sure that everyone leaves with at least something would be very beneficial.