The Tipping Point

In “The Tipping Point,” Malcolm Gladwell describes how epidemics can be explained by three rules: the Law of the Few, the Stickiness Factor and the Power of Context. These rules are also the rules for the Tipping Point. A Tipping point refers to a mysterious change or point in a company or trend that usually results in something positive. My favorite example in the book is when Malcolm writes about the Hush Puppies trend because being in college, I have seen a lot of old trends come back. Wolverine, the makers of Hush Puppies, had nothing to do with its rebirth in 1994. One group of kids in New York starting wearing them, and suddenly they became cool again, just like that. Some examples of trends reappearing that I have noticed are Ray Ban sunglasses and Jellies.

For our own class project, the Athletic Auction, there are some possible ways we could make it tip. For the first suggestion, we would use the Law of the Few. Mavens, connectors and salesmen are people who spread or contain a message. “Mavens are data banks. They provide the message. Connectors are social glue: they spread it,” said Gladwell. In the auction’s case, our PR Administration class are mavens. Therefore, we need to find the connectors of Milledgeville and of athletics to broadcast our message even further.

Another idea for the Athletic Auction to tip is to make the event sticky. Hopefully, our theme will play a big role in the stickiness factor because people will enjoy it and be drawn to the event. As a class, we need find out what has not stuck in years past and find ways to present the information to obtain stickiness.

As previously stated, there are three types of peopling according to Gladwell and they are mavens, connectors and salesmen. It is hard to categorize myself in any of these. The one I am definitely not is a salesman. With more time in the public relations field, I hope to become a connector. Networking will play a huge part on my path to becoming a connector, but I feel I already possess a few qualities of a connector. They are a passion for getting to know people and an interest in multiple groups. I doubt I will ever get to the level of obsession like Roger Horchow, but I feel everyone in public relations should be somewhat of a connector.

Through using social media, I have already become more of a connector. Social media opens up opportunities for word-of-mouth epidemics and many others. Now having used Twitter and my blog for a couple of months, I can say I have definitely experienced a tipping point with social media. It can open so many opportunities, and to think I found out about Twitter through a maven and connector!