The Balloon Seller meter

You are in a street which has three food joints. Two of them have balloon sellers in front of them, one doesn’t. Which one do you think is most popular with children? The ones with the balloon sellers right? Yes and No. Yes, that is the right answer, given these sellers stand here everyday, out of their own choice, there is no margin play between stores and balloon sellers and they are not in a contract with either store.

The balloon Seller Meter is a sign that so obviously tells you something very significant. Just like a regular independent balloon seller in front of a food joint tells you that the joint is frequented by children.

These signs are conclusive proofs by themselves because of a causal relationship and are followed by supporting observations which point to the same. And yet they are such petty everyday signs that they get lost in the background.

If we could have balloon seller meters for all our decisions, it would make life so much easier. The trick is to spot them. We can, given that we understand the one rule that governs the balloon seller meter; the relationship has to be causal or as close as possible.

You might not have a causal relationship for everything, in which case, you will have to look at the next best thing. To qoute from a talk I attended yesterday, a guy walks into your shop looking for a mercedes. Will he buy it? What watch is he wearing? Is it a Rolex? He just might.

Your own display window

When I was doing my summers, I spent a lot of time on the computer and so my gTalk status messages changed pretty frequently because I had to express myself to the world in some way. More importantly, a lot of people actually saw most of those status messages because they were just as bored or felt just as disconnected and spent time browsing through status messages in their gTalk friends list.

More and more I have realized that a lot of us tend to do that. See people’s status messages. And if there is a link there, there is a 80% chance, we’ll click to see what the link is.

What an amazing marketing tool it will make! If only you could figure out how to use it.

Let’s dig deeper. What is a status message? How does it matter? A status message today is like a shop’s display window. It’s the elevator pitch to the passing shopper; he likes it, he considers shopping. Most people want it to reflect some part of who they are, even if it is just sending out a clear message that they don’t approve of status message hopping.

If companies can create compelling content that users will want to associate with and find a way to get themselves into the status message world, then that’s it. That will be the new WoM.

Crowd Vs Crowd

Trend watching in its issue crowd clout explores business models based on the power of crowds. These are of two types based on the kind of crowd that is exploited by the business, the consumers themselves or non-consumers whose interests are aligned with the business’ success.

Sellaband is of the latter type, where music enthusiasts can identify promising musicians/bands and invest in them, thus owning a part in their revenues. MLM is another similar concept where organizations like Amway, use a hierarchy of the crowd as sales representatives, thus aligning their interest with that of the business. Though these seem like similar businesses, there is a world of difference between them.

These kinds of businesses are based upon a few basic insights:

1. Recommendations of friends & acquaintances are the most effective form of advertisement.
2. You cannot align you entire consumer base’s interests with your business’ unless it is in the form of discounts.
3. An opportunity to make money is always received with enthusiasm

Both Amway & Sellaband exist based on these axioms. But, what really marks the difference between them is the central intent in using the crowd. A business like Amway uses the power of crowd as an excuse to exist despite its mediocre products while in case of Sellaband, the product speaks for itself. The crowd popularizes the product so far as it gains the critical mass required for it to take off; post that it is the product’s capability that success depends upon.

It is the difference between shoving food down a person’s throat and letting him taste it and then choose if he wants to eat more. Its needless to say which business model will succeed in the true sense of the word.

About the blog

This blog is an attempt at developing and sharing ideas about marketing and trend watching, the two areas I am active in presently.

This blog might also touch upon business ideas from time to time as that is another domain of interest.