There's an interesting little snippet in the February Harvard Business Review (http://hbr.harvardbusiness.org/web/2009/hbr-list/dynamics-of-personal-influence) that
points out that a person’s influence increases as the degrees of separation decrease. The example given is that a person connected directly to a smoker (one degree of separation) has a 61% risk of smoking. By the third degree of separation the risk is down to 11% and goes to nil at four degrees of separation. This may seem obvious at first but the author, Nicholas A. Christakis, points out that this fact is useful to consider when targeting customers in order to build on influencers with specific connections.

The notion isn’t new, it was covered comprehensively in Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point several years ago; but Christakis’ point is in regard to behavioral influence which, in terms of the predilection to use a product or service, can be a useful tool for product dissemination and marketing. The extent to which the adoption or use of a product is based on behavioral characteristics (Christakis uses obesity, smoking, altruism, voting and happiness, to name a few) is the measure for the successful use of this strategic approach.

If your marketing/sales efforts are already based on this concept and are proving effective and you’d like to share some of your experiences and ideas, please let us know at the Centre. We’d like to hear about some success stories in this area.

SHA