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New York Times bestseller and named Best Marketing Book of 2014 by the American Marketing Association
What makes things popular? Why do people talk about certain products and ideas more than others? Why are some stories and rumors more infectious? And what makes online content go viral?
If you said advertising, think again. People don’t listen to advertisements, they listen to their peers. But why do people talk about certain products and ideas more than others? Why are some stories and rumors more infectious? And what makes online content go viral?
Wharton marketing professor Jonah Berger has spent the last decade answering these questions. He’s studied why New York Times articles make the paper’s own Most E-mailed List, why products get word of mouth, and how social influence shapes everything from the cars we buy to the clothes we wear to the names we give our children. In this book, Berger reveals the secret science behind word-of-mouth and social transmission. Discover how six basic principles drive all sorts of things to become contagious, from consumer products and policy initiatives to workplace rumors and YouTube videos.
Contagious combines groundbreaking research with powerful stories. Learn how a luxury steakhouse found popularity through the lowly cheese-steak, why anti-drug commercials might have actually increased drug use, and why more than 200 million consumers shared a video about one of the seemingly most boring products there is: a blender. If you’ve wondered why certain stories get shared, e-mails get forwarded, or videos go viral, Contagious explains why, and shows how to leverage these concepts to craft contagious content. This book provides a set of specific, actionable techniques for helping information spread—for designing messages, advertisements, and information that people will share. Whether you’re a manager at a big company, a small business owner trying to boost awareness, a politician running for office, or a health official trying to get the word out, Contagious will show you how to make your product or idea catch on.
- Sales Rank: #17039 in Books
- Published on: 2013-03-05
- Released on: 2013-03-05
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.37" h x 1.00" w x 5.50" l, .80 pounds
- Binding: Hardcover
- 256 pages
From Booklist
We’re all familiar with the idea of something—a video clip, for example—going viral. But how does it happen? Berger identifies six principles that operate, either singly or in combination, when anything goes viral, including social currency (a restaurant makes itself so hard to find that it becomes famous); emotion (the clip of Susan Boyle’s first appearance on Britain’s Got Talent exploded on YouTube because people reacted to it emotionally); triggers (more people search online for the song “Friday” on Friday than on any other day of the week); and practical value (a man’s video showing how to cleanly shuck a cob of corn exploded due to its useful application). Some of what the author talks about here will seem utterly obvious, but there is plenty of insider stuff as well (for example, the brain trust at Apple debated which way the logo should face on the cover of its laptops: rightside up to the user, or rightside up to someone looking at the laptop’s open lid?). On such decisions are fortunes made. An engaging and often surprising book. --David Pitt
Review
“Jonah Berger is as creative and thoughtful as he is spunky and playful. Looking at his research, much like studying a masterpiece in a museum, provides the observer with new insights about life and also makes one aware of the creator's ingenuity and creativity. It is hard to come up with a better example of using social science to illuminate the ordinary and extraordinary in our daily lives.” (Dan Ariely, James B. Duke professor of psychology and behavioral economics at Duke University and bestselling author of Predictably Irrational)
“Why do some ideas seemingly spread overnight, while others disappear? How can some products become ubiquitous, while others never gain traction? Jonah Berger knows the answers, and, with Contagious, now we do, too." (Charles Duhigg, author of the bestselling The Power of Habit)
“If you are seeking a bigger impact, especially with a smaller budget, you need this book. Contagious will show you how to make your product spread like crazy.” (Chip Heath, co-author of Made to Stick and Decisive)
“Jonah Berger knows more about what makes information ‘go viral’ than anyone in the world.” (Daniel Gilbert, Professor of Psychology, Harvard University and author of Stumbling on Happiness)
“Jonah Berger is the rare sort who has studied the facts, parsed it from the fiction—and performed groundbreaking experiments that have changed the way the experts think. If there’s one book you’re going to read this year on how ideas spread, it’s this one.” (Dave Balter, CEO of BzzAgent and Co-founder of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association)
"A provocative shift in focus from the technology of online transmission to the human element and a bold claim to explain 'how word of mouth and social influence work . . . [to] make any product or idea contagious." (Kirkus Reviews)
“Contagious contains arresting — and counterintuitive — facts and insights. . . . Most interesting of all are the examples Berger cites of successful and unsuccessful marketing campaigns.” (Glenn C. Altschuler The Boston Globe)
“An infectious treatise on viral marketing. . . . Berger writes in a sprightly, charming style that deftly delineates the intersection of cognitive psychology and social behavior with an eye toward helping businesspeople and others spread their messages. The result is a useful and entertaining primer that diagnoses countless baffling pop culture epidemics.” (Publishers Weekly)
“The book is just plain interesting. Berger’s cases are not only topical and relevant, but his principles seem practical and are easily understood. . . . I have a strong feeling that this book will catch on.” (Ben Frederick The Christian Science Monitor)
“Think of it as the practical companion to Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point.” (Tasha Eichenseher Discover)
"An exegesis on how ideas really 'go viral' (hint: the internet gets too much credit) by a marketing wunderkind." (Details)
About the Author
Jonah Berger�is an associate professor of marketing at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.�His research has been published in top-tier academic journals, and popular accounts of his work have appeared in�The�New York Times,�The Wall Street Journal,�Science,�Harvard Business Review, and more. His research has also been featured in the�New York Times�Magazine’s “Year in Ideas.” Berger has been recognized with a number of awards for both scholarship and teaching. The author of Contagious and Invisible Influence, he lives in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Most helpful customer reviews
131 of 140 people found the following review helpful.
Fascinating read for marketers trying to unlock the secrets to viral success
By Jim Williams, Influitive
Jonah Berger's Contagious is a fascinating read. Not only is the book packed with entertaining examples of viral campaigns, but each is backed with painstaking analysis into the science of social transmission. What you end up with is a veritable blueprint for creating ideas, campaigns and messages that spread like wildfire.
There are six essential factors that contribute to contagious ideas, shows Jonah, and a quick look at some of the most successful viral campaigns reveals each of them at work:
Social currency. We share things that make us look good or help us compare favorably to others. Exclusive restaurants utilize social currency all the time to create demand.
Triggers. Ideas that are top of mind spread. Like parasites, viral ideas attach themselves to top of mind stories, occurrences or environments. For example, Mars bar sales spiked when in 1997 when NASA's Pathfinder mission explored the red planet.
Emotion. When we care, we share. Jonah analyzed over six months of data from the New York Times most emailed list to discover that certain high arousal emotions can dramatically increase our need to share ideas - like the outrage triggered by Dave Carroll's "United Breaks Guitars" video.
Public. People tend to follow others, but only when they can see what those others are doing. There is a reason why baristas put money in their own tip jar at the beginning of a shift. Ideas need to be public to be copied.
Practical. Humans crave the opportunity to give advice and offer tips (one reason why advocate marketing works - your best customers love to help out), but especially if they offer practical value. It's why we `pay it forward' and help others. Sharing is caring.
Stories - People do not just share information, they tell stories. And stories are like Trojan horses, vessels that carry ideas, brands, and information. To benefit the brand, stories must not only be shared but also relate to a sponsoring company's products. Thus the epic failure of viral sensations like Evian's roller baby video (50M views) that did little to stem Evian's 25% drop in sales.
There is so much this book offers marketers, making it required reading that follows in the footsteps of Malcolm Gladwell and the Heath brothers. It also perfectly demonstrates why advocate marketing is such a powerful idea for modern marketers. Viral campaigns eschew overt marketing messages by cleverly tapping into consumer wants, desires and emotional needs. Similarly, advocate marketing helps marketers reach audiences through a more effective and trusted means than direct messaging. We share our experiences because that act enhances our personal and professional reputation and makes us feel good. When marketers tap into these very human needs, they can reach a much broader audience with a more genuine message than any advertisement can provide.
99 of 118 people found the following review helpful.
The Best Overview of Social Contagion Theory I've Seen
By Jonathan Goodman
I'm not sure where or when I first discovered Jonah's research, but my career hasn't been the same since. In my opinion, there isn't anybody on the planet who knows more about what makes information spread.
On a personal note, his New York Times study featured prominently in Contagious was the final piece of the puzzle behind the theory in my second book. Jonah goes back to the results in this mammoth study a number of times throughout this book to give you a full understanding of the fascinating results.
In full disclosure, I obtained an early copy of Contagious. As a blogger and Internet marketer my livelihood depends on being the first to understand the newest social contagion theories. Because of that, I requested an early copy from Jonah and he was nice enough to oblige.
First, what I disliked about Contagious, and there were three things:
1. Much of Contagious is an explanation of his work in a more organized, concise, and interesting manner. Because of that, not a lot of the material is new if you've already read his studies.
2. The book is based on 6 principles: social currency, triggers, emotion, public, practical value, and stories. Each principle is described in detail and are the major sections of the book.
I was disappointed with the practical value section as I felt that it was a rather superficial overview of what's now become known as behavioral economics. Jonah describes "prospect theory" originally put forth by Daniel Kahneman and uses it to explain how irrationally we behave in our purchasing habits. In particular, he discusses how we value goods and services relative to a precedent and how that precedent isn't necessarily an accurate portrayal of the actual value of the product in question.
I would have liked Jonah to delve deeper into the application of prospect theory and how it could be applied to his own research. If you were looking for a better explanation of behavioral economics, you'd do well to also check out Dan Ariely's "Predictably Irrational".
3. My third point, and I expected this to be the case, is that Jonah is primarily a researcher. In Contagious, he delves deeper and more effectively into social contagion than anyone or anything I've ever seen (and I've spent the last two years researching the subject). What I feel is missing from this book are specific steps for implementation.
What I loved and why I gave this book 4 stars:
The section on triggers is magnificent. In this age of over-stimulation, the most effective communicators need to be succinct--and the best way to be succinct is through the use of triggers. Jonah illustrates this perfectly in his example where he mentions the word dog (and you immediately think cat).
A lot of Jonah's research is fascinating and I won't spoil it all for you, but the entire chapter on emotion is worth 10x the price of the book alone.
In Contagious, one study outlines the power of physiological arousal. Here, the insertion of 60s of jogging increased social transmission by 50%! Imagine getting 50% more people to share your material--that's how powerful the theories contained within this book are.
What was also interesting for me was how Jonah explained the reasons behind a lot of the viral sensations that we've seen over the past 5 years. He explains why views of the worst song ever written, "Friday" by Rebecca Black, spiked on YouTube in a predictable pattern, he explains how an 86 year old made a viral video about corn, and he breaks down the reasons behind a blender company becoming an Internet sensation.
I believe that anybody already doing or planning on doing business online should study this book. It will teach you how, why, and when information will spread.
289 of 352 people found the following review helpful.
Lacks Critical Thinking; Boring Writing
By I am C, Not X
If this material is enough to cover an entire Wharton MBA course, then I'm not sure what that says about Wharton's program. There is just not that much information in this book far beyond common sense most people already intuitively know. I had been looking forward to this book release as the topic is interesting and even possesses its own themed six characteristics, conveniently ascribed the acronym STEPPS, which the author Jonah Berger explains contributes to why products or ideas become contagious. Mr. Berger argues that if we want our product or idea to catch on and spread like wildfire, we must try to build into it as many of these six STEPPS as we can. STEPPS stands for:
Social currency
Triggers
Emotion
Public
Practical Value
Stories
If discussing something makes you look interesting or cool or special, then that something provides you with "Social currency'.
If there is built into a product or idea easy cues that can trigger it to come to mind, then it has a strong 'Trigger'.
If the brand/concept can evoke emotions of anger or good will/ happiness (but note NOT sadness - since we don't want our friends/family to be sad and therefore are not inclined to share something likely to invoke sadness), then it has 'Emotion'.
If your product or cause can be broadcast to others, it is 'Public'.
If it provides 'Practical value', it is more likely to be shared.
Lastly, if a memorable story can be spun around it, then it has the added benefit of having a 'Story'.
Now, let's apply STEPPS to the book itself: 1) Clearly, the answer the book claims to explain (Why do certain products and ideas go viral?) has Social Currency -- it's an interesting topic in which most everyone would be interested; and it makes us look interesting in bringing up that we are read on the subject through this "groundbreaking" book (more on this "groundbreaking" claim later). 2) There are Triggers all around us that cue the topic for discussion (you see hipsters all around you and wonder how a lifestyle of skinny-jeans-wearing-gastrointestinal-issues-causing/fixie-rubber-shoe-braking-bike-riding came to be; or maybe how it is that we've gone backwards to wearing heavy Beats by Dr. Dre headphones and why these retro audio phones [form factor] are fashionable; or why you see Toms shoes all about as they really are plain and resemble the old cheap kungfu shoes that are dirt cheap and available in any chinatown (but they have a strong cause behind them- hence
Public' factor)...you get the point -- these are just my examples; they weren't mentioned in the book - although they would have been good stories for Berger to include. 3) People can become emotional about why some things have become contagious - they can be in awe/angry over ideas and triggered to talk about what they have read in this book. 4) The book is "Public" - its cover is bright orange. Eyeballs will be attracted to it; curiosity will be aroused. 5) The topic attempts to explain a phenomenon of which an understanding would undoubtedly prove of great practical value, especially if you have something to sell/spread. Lastly, 6) it contains (attempts to contain) some entertaining stories to hopefully have a place in your memory prevalent enough for you to tell others about this book.
Now, that, in a nutshell, is the book. That's it. EVERYTHING else - every page after the intro - hammers you over the head with what I've described above, over and over and over again until the insufferable boredom of repetition starts to resemble an old torture technique I watched as a kid in a movie long ago. Thin sheets of wet paper towels are placed one by one slowly over a victim's face. Each sheet is very thin and the victim can breathe through each layer. As each new sheet is applied at slow intervals, it becomes a little bit harder to breathe. This is a drawn out, protracted torture. Finally, the weight of the wet sheets becomes so heavy, the victim, whose breathing has become increasingly labored, eventually suffocates. This book for some awful reason was akin to a literary version of that torture. Books like this usually follow the formulae: tell them what you are going to tell them, tell them, and then tell them what you told them. Well, in this book, everything you need to know is explained adequately in the introduction. Then the body of the book is layer upon layer of thin wet sheets foisted upon you until you are suffocating from the repetition and hammering of simple ideas - over and over and over again.
If you like Malcolm Gladwell's books, you probably will like this book. I do not like Gladwell's books but I do think Mr. Gladwell is a great story weaver and a strong writer. I cannot say the same for Mr. Berger who authored this book. For the same reason I am not a fan of Gladwell's books, I felt like most of Berger's arguments were oversimplified, heavily subject to anecdotal argumentation, left unsubstantiated or unexplained as to the deeper "why" behind a pattern. Mr. Berger explains patterns well - but they aren't anything startling - yet he fails repeatedly to analyze deeply why the pattern exists. For example, this review is clearly not a positive one yet the author points out that bad book reviews *can* be good publicity if there are triggers to inform people that there exists a book, albeit a badly reviewed book, possessing certain characteristics. He cites a study he conducted in his citations. Nothing further. Where subjects need more flushing out, Berger repeatedly disappoints, yet where he's made a simple point effectively, he proceeds to drown you with it. Well, since negative book reviews "can" sometimes boost reviews, here you go, Mr. Berger - my gift to you in exchange for boring me to death - a bad book review that "can" inspire better sales. People will be curious to see for themselves whether I tend toward hyperbole, if there is any merit to what I have stated. Noise is better than silence; some publicity is better than none. That's common sense for selling something.
There are numerous other uninspiring moments in this book, similar to this. For example, in his discussion relating to "practical value", he instructs us that if you find a good Ethiopian restaurant, you are more likely to share your recommendation of it than you would had you had found a good American restaurant. The reason being you probably have many more friends who like American food than Ethiopian food; therefore, you will feel much more conviction to tell those fewer applicable friends about the Ethiopian restaurant. You simply know too many people who would be interested in American food to compel you to recommend the American restaurant. What an unremarkable observation. Blah.
Another example is when he goes on and on about the fact that things that are remarkable are interesting, moving us to share about it. This is why certain cute or remarkable YouTube videos spread virally; we like to share articles or videos we think our friends or family will find interesting. You need research to make such a statement? Or when he claimed he tested at length whether something that inspires awe in us, will evoke us to tell others about it. Such common sense notions like this are laid out and overanalyzed throughout the book. The author needed to conduct research to discover that awe drives people to share? Come on, dude.
This book is a dumbing-down of common knowledge, contributing to the pain of plowing through the book. If not for my habit of sheer reading discipline despite my extreme boredom, I would not have finished this book. I don't need to be instructed that the Nobel Prize is prestigious along with a paragraph of examples. Why do I need to know it was a cold, wintery day when Daniel Kahneman gave a lecture on bounded rationality? Irrelevant fillers like this spread throughout the book - makes for bad writing. There are interesting nuggets of info through some of Berger's examples/stories but they, in no way, compensate for the fact that this book regurgitates what most marketers already know. Most of the material covered in this book is widely known common knowledge in the industry. He reports on why the status/points system works for airlines. Airlines know it works - that's why they entice frequent fliers with status and levels. Game theory is widely applied in marketing. Video game makers have been applying the psychology of levels/goals attainment in their designs for decades.
Which gets to my second-to-last gripe. In the intro and conclusion he claims that he has used cutting-edge science to demonstrate to us how word of mouth, psychology of sharing, social influence, conformity, herd behavior work. In reality, he simply points out patterns of these behaviors. There is no "cutting-edge science" and disappointingly he tosses aside the wasted opportunity for meaningful analysis. He hasn't sufficiently explained the psychology behind any of the the "why's" that naturally arise from the reading (offering merely superficial explanations).
Lastly, I end with the formatting. First, my extreme dislike for the notes format - extremely aggravating for someone who almost always reads the citations/notes. I would read an argument and wonder what basis the author had to make a certain statement. I'd have to check the back of the book to see if there existed any citation. There was no system to indicate that a citation existed for reference to any statement put forth. Perhaps this is limited to the advance release edition; if so, forgive my criticism.
Also relating to formatting, there were innumerous typos. Again, this may be limited to the copy I read but editing was pitiful in my advance copy.
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