Jonah Berger’s Invisible Influence is in the tradition of informative marketing books based upon behavioral research, think Dan Ariely, Sheena Iyengar, or Chip Heath. He concentrates on optimal distinctiveness and social influence. Some of the details people may know from elsewhere but all of which are interesting.
Optimal Distinctiveness And Social Influence
One of the key themes is that we like “Optimal Distinctiveness”. As he explains:
We want to be similar but we want to be different. We want to do the same thing as others but we also want to be special.
Berger, 2016, page 179
The value of difference to us follows an inverse u-shape. (You’ll never become poor betting that behavioral effects follow an inverse u-shape). In essence, this means that there is a sweet spot, where we get the benefits of being different and feeling unique while not standing out and feeling odd.
Berger talks about how people like to vary on some non-critical dimension. Bankers might have the same expensive car. Being similar and showing that they are part of the “banking club”. Yet they like to vary the color they buy to seem interesting and sufficiently different. Optimal distinctiveness is just the idea that there is a perfect spot at which balance is maintained. Marketers can use this knowledge, especially when introducing new products. The advice is to make the new product moderately interesting. You want a product that is a little different but not too weird. People generally like to express themselves a little, but few want to be very obviously standing out there on their own.
Invisible Influence
One interesting point, which inspires the title, is that social influence is hard to perceive when it applies to us. This is why Berger calls it invisible. We see others being influenced but think we are our own independent people. Somehow we are above being influenced by such superficialities as what the people around us are doing. Berger outlines social influence experiments about nudges in energy use that show what others do impacts us. If nothing else an important lesson of the book is that we are all influenced by other people and we all influence others. Hopefully, that influence is positive.
For more on social influence see here and for more from Jonah Berger see here.
Read: Jonah Berger (2016) Invisible Influence: The Hidden Forces that Shape Behavior, Simon and Schuster Paperbacks, New York, NY
