The other day I posted this question to a college blog I was writing for and I thought that you might be interested as well.

How should a university be teaching subject matter when, with the present information revolution that has been going on for the past ten years, changes things almost on a daily basis?  This new available information does not have much of an impact on the hard sciences (chemistry, bio-chemistry, physics or medicine) nor does it impact history, philosophy, music or the languages.  However, sociology, business, marketing and communications are changing, literally, daily.

With the accessibility of the multitude of new platforms available and the mechanisms for people sharing information and conversation, societal norms are no longer normal. People are developing new expectations of companies and other people in general.  Sharing is becoming the norm.  Honesty is not just expected but required and interaction is demanded.

You know I have a love of statistics and one of the most common I get a kick out of is:  4 out of 5 pediatricians recommend X.  This is the same thing as saying, 1 out of 5 pediatricians would not recommend X.  Or to belabor this further, 20% of ALL pediatricians would NOT recommend X.  So now, are you going to give X to YOUR kid?

Now the real funny thing about this is, parents are learning not to believe (or even look at) this claim in advertising.  Instead, they will go on Facebook and ask their friends or even go to Twitter and ask the world for their advice.  There is becoming less and less of a need for advertising and even less of a reason to believe claims in advertising.  I don’t have to believe or trust you any longer.  I have access to enough people to ask, that I can find 2 or 3, or 300, which have a firsthand experience with you.  They have nothing to gain or lose from telling me the truth about you or your product.

In the world of everyday issues, collective wisdom is the determinate of the choices being made.  As platforms expand, become the norm and are used throughout society, information will be garnered by means of the collective wisdom of society.  Businesses, marketing firms and universities would be well advised to get out in front of it.

Photo by Gary Hayes

Have you ever paid attention to the fact that all of us have a tendency to go to the same grocery store all the time?  Sure we might stop at a different one to pick up one or two things from time to time but, as a rule, we tend to go to the same one week after week.  We may feel that the store has the best products or the best prices but ultimately we like the fact that we know where everything is at which makes shopping there easier.

Every once in a while though, the store changes things around and we have to learn where everything is all over again.  Everyone fusses and complains but continues to shop there anyway.  After all, what choice do we have?  We can either learn our regular store over again or learn a different store.  Not much point to learning a different store is there.  Why do you suppose they do that?

Grocery stores in my opinion are masters at marketing.  Arranging the store differently is not done because the arrangement will be better.  It’s done to get you to see other products that are there.  When we are used to a store, we tend to go in and buy the same products every week and not look for anything new.  It’s easier.  When we have to find our way around, we look at the shelves much more closely to find what we are looking for and potentially see things we had not noticed before.  Possibly adding another product to our weekly purchases.

How do you feel about the cardboard stands that are put in the isle which seem to do nothing but cause traffic problems?  Quite frankly, I find them irritating but, it’s put there for a reason.  It’s kind of like a speed bump in a road.  It’s put there to slow you down so you see not only what’s in the stand but also what’s on the shelves around it.  The same is true of the end caps (the displays that are at the end of each isle).  People that are going in for a couple of things will go to only the isles that they need to, bypassing the majority.  The things that are in the end caps are there to entice us to buy more than what we went for and it works.

These strategies really do work.  As I said before, grocery stores are masters at marketing.  It would be worth your time to figure out if your store would benefit from these strategies.

How can you implement similar strategies?

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