Unleashing the Ideavirus

Unleashing the Ideavirus
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 www.ideavirus.com
There’s certainly enough money in those towns to keep the seats filled in several restaurants
of this ilk. It’s simply that the hive that can afford these restaurants don’t have a high velocity
way to get the word out fast enough to keep the restaurateur happy. And it’s not clear that
they’d persist. In other words, eating in a New York-style fancy restaurant probably isn’t the
way these “out-of-town” hives choose to spend their time and money. Same’s thing true for a
New York hive that wouldn’t reward a French restaurant that might do just great in Paris.
All of which is a very fancy way of saying, “If the hive doesn’t want it, you picked the wrong
hive.”
Selecting a hive that respects the core value of your virus is a critical first step in laying the
foundation for promoting the idea. College students want something different from
gardeners, who are quite different from computer geeks. Targeting everyone is a sure path to
failure.
Of course, the real reason you want to pick the right hive is not because their values match
the benefits of your product. It’s because when you pick the right hive (and a small enough
hive) you have a chance of overwhelming it—of pumping so much positive juice into your
digital word of mouth that you really do dominate, that so many sneezers are recommending
you to the rest of the hive that the majority surrenders and the entire hive converts.
Once your idea starts coursing through a hive again and again and again, you’ll have a piling
on effect. People will want to be exposed to your idea just because everyone else in the hive
they respect is talking about it.
The mistake that’s so easy to make is to get greedy as you choose your hive, to say, “this
product is for everyone” or “anyone can benefit from this idea.” Well, there are seven billion
people on the planet, so it’s unlikely your comment is correct; even if it is, there’s little
chance that a virus would spread across a hive that big.
Far better to pick smaller hives and conquer them a few at a time. Far better to identify
consumers when they’re grouped in bunches (at a trade show, say, or geographically) and
then allow the concentrated essence of your virus spread to other hives.

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