Social Currency: What Makes Things Go Viral
Let’s keep this a secret, shall we?
John, I gotta tell you something. It’s very important.
What is it, Alex?
I think I like Susan, the new girl from our school. I think she’s kinda cute.
Wow, that’s so cool!
But John, don’t tell anyone I said this. It’s only between me and you. I’m telling you just because we are best friends.
Of course, Alex.
Unfortunately, Alex will find out the hard way that soon enough, the entire class would find out that he has a crush on the new girl, Susan. And, the truth is, this happens all the time. John probably only told one of his other best friends, obviously telling him not to tell anyone else. John’s friend would have told his other friend and told him to keep it a secret. The cycle would continue, and soon, the whole class would be talking about Alex.
Here’s a little secret about secrets: they don’t tend to stay as a secret for very long.
There’s a small restaurant near Tompkins Square Park in New York City that used this phenomenon to its advantage. As a hot dog restaurant, they sell seventeen varieties of hot dogs and have arcade games inside the restaurant. Unique indeed, but that’s not what they’re famous for. Going deeper into the restaurant, you’ll see a vintage wooden phone booth that looks like something from the 90s. Inside, you’ll see an old-school rotary dial phone with finger wheels that are used to dial each number.
If you place your finger in the hole under the number 2, dial clockwise until you reach the finger stop, release it, and hold the receiver to your ear, surprisingly, someone will answer the phone. Suddenly, they’ll ask you to come in, and the back of the booth will swing open. You’ll see a bar behind the door, along with a bartender welcoming you to come in.
Oh, and obviously, the name of the bar is called “Please Don’t Tell.”
People love sharing what they know. It is just an instinct. Even as a kid, after finishing your artwork or your clay sculpture, the first thing you do is to show anyone and everyone. Even as you get older, the idea of “self-sharing” doesn’t go away. This is one of the reasons why social media and online networks became so popular. We are just engrossed by the idea of sharing what we know. This makes us feel smart and important.
This is the basic idea of what a social currency is. Just like regular currency, the more you have, the better it is. However, unlike the regular currency, which is made up of paper or metal, this currency is made up of new ideas, opinions, and interesting facts. As such, if we have a funny story to tell, an interesting observation we’ve made, a unique experience we’ve had, we inevitably tell our friends and family about it. It’s just a new, different type of currency.
The hot-dog restaurant in NYC took advantage of this exact phenomenon. They knew that the secret bar behind a phone booth would provide such a compelling story that those who found out about it would gain the social currency to share it with others. And just like how the secret of your friend’s crush gets to everyone’s ears, this clandestine fact will get to everyone in the local region.
Knowing how to utilize the idea of social currency from a marketing point of view is very different from traditional marketing. Well, because it’s completely the opposite. Instead of blasting your product or service into everyone’s face, you do the complete opposite — you don’t tell. Instead, you make your product or service interesting or unique enough, and only let a handful of people know about it. This way, if the product or service becomes something worth talking about, it will spread.
More on: https://www.amazon.com/Contagious-Things-Catch-Jonah-Berger/dp/1451686587