I found Malcolm Gladwell's "The Tipping Point," to be an easy read. As I'm sure many of us felt when we were assigned this book to read, I automatically assumed it was going to be boring that I would have to lock myself in a dungeon with no windows to be able to finish it. I was very wrong though.
I consider "The Tipping Point" to be a certain point that cause a behavior to "tip." As Gladwell states on page 7, "Ideas and products and messages and behaviors spread just like viruses do." I think that the tipping point is largely based on the environments that the epidemic is exposed to. Along with his example of the spread of syphilis, good things can spread just as easily.
Gladwell breaks his book down into the Three Rules of Epidemics, the first one being the Law of the Few. He states that certain people in our society are responsible for the spread or "tip" of epidemics. In the STD example, Potterat interviewed 768 people from a small community did not spread gonorrhea to any other persons or just to one. That left the other 168 people responsible for transmitting the disease and causing the epidemic to grow. In the Paul Revere example, the Law of the Few was viewed in a positive light. Revere's social personality was able to stimulate the people while Dawes's was not. Gladwell also states that we do not recognize these people enough within our society. The Stickiness Factor is the second rule and the Rule of Context is what he calls the third rule of epidemics. I found it very interesting the ways that Gladwell broke these sections up and enjoyed all of the examples that he used within each.
In order to make this year's Athletic Auction "tip," I think that it is crucial that we focus on the "stickiness" to make an impact on the our guests. Gladwell states on page 132, "There is a simple way to package information that, under the right circumstances, can make it irresistible. All you have to do is find it." I think this quote fits perfect. We want the auction to be somewhat simple and we do not want to have way over the top decor and props, but at the same time, we want our guests to get the WOW effect. We want to impress not only our guests, but also the people that we are working with in the athletic department. We want to leave a lasting impression so a few years from now, Dr. Carter's will be introducing her PR admin class to the auction project and she will always use our class as an example.
There are three different types of people that Gladwell talks about in the Law of the Few section and they are the Connectors, the Mavens, and the Salesmen. The Connector he refers to as someone who is known in society and has a connection with tons of different people. Their relationship is not close as a best friend or anything, but more of a connection; someone to call up for a favor. The Mavens are the helpers and the teach others what they learn. The Salesmen are people with outgoing personalities that allow you to feel a connection and closeness right after meeting them. They can quickly become someone that you are close to, but they have that ability in gaining peoples' trust after a short amount of time. Proceed with some caution with the salesmen!
I consider myself to be somewhat of a Salesman. I realize i just kind of bashed them in the paragraph before, but I consider myself to be very outgoing and always wanting to please others. If I come up with an idea that I think is just fabulous, I will run with it and make anyone else see it my way. I definitely get this from my dad. He works in the insurance business and never meets a stranger. He is so friendly and outgoing and can hold a great conversation with anyone. I like to persuade people and think that I am somewhat effective when it comes to allowing people to see things through my point of view.
Social media in the Public Relations world is crucial, as we all learned at Real World. I want to try and be more of a "connector" and to broaden my contacts and form some type of relationship with those important people. In my Principles of Advertising class last semester, two ladies from and ad agency came to talk to us and I specifically remember one of them talking about how she would keep contact with all of the people that could potentially help her in the future whether it was a simple phone call once a week, or grabbing lunch. Making and more importantly, maintaining relationships is crucial. I feel that blogging and Twitter allow us to keep up with people and maintain our relationships. I still feel that face-to-face communication is more important and makes more of an impact, but with the social networking craze in our society today, if you're not involved, you are losing tons of business and connections every second of the day.
I am still working on tweeting more and blogging more often than our weekly assignments. It is something that is definitely taking time to get used to, but as they always say, "Practice make perfect." I think it is great that Dr. Carter has introduced us to Twitter and blogging so that we can help our future employees benefit from our knowledge.
