Conformity and social influence, and the implications this has from a marketing perspective?

[Zak]

Am in my final year of uni and am currently putting the plan together for my research project.
I plan on looking into psych research on conformity and social influence (also drawing on work on social roles and obedience and possibly a few slightly more abstract ideas).
I will then be using this to look at the implications this has for the field of marketing.

Just looking for any general help, ideas, directions, interesting research etc

Thanks in advance

[James]

The Psych Files podcast has a neat video episode which looks at how some ideas of social influence can be applied to selling cars. Good links on the website to. Might be helpful:

http://www.thepsychfiles.com/2012/05/ep-...lesperson/

[Dennis]

Everybody hates deception, but everyone relies on it everyday.

Because we're assimilated into a community, be it by birth, choice, or dependance, we are influenced to go about our daily lives based on the culture of the community.

I suppose from a marketing perspective, trends and fads accepted by a majority become the 'need' or the 'innovation' for that community to live by.

Take Apple for example, majority of their products were just recycled innovations that weren't marketed well. They made it simple, pretty, and played the market with convincing advertisements, and suddenly Steve Jobs is a God and Apple is the way of the future (recently though that illusion has faded and people know better....many do at least). All because they convinced a majority, who then socially influenced the other sheep to say "Hey, Apple is awesome, if you don't have their product you dont' have the BEST product" and suddenly everyone is dependant on Apple. Then Apple smartly applied policies and strategies where your ONLY avenue to accessory products and upgrades is through Apple (integrated computers, iTunes music only usable with Apple products, etc.) and now society has conformed to the means of Apple for technological convenience.

Granted yes there's Samsung, Google, and other companies in competition, but once a trend or fad hits and the people conform it shapes that culture altogether. All it takes is a trend to set and it can change the masses. The trick is to KNOW what trend to set that will appeal to a MASS of people.

That normally involves SIMPLE. People LOVE simple. If you can explain or provide or convenience someone in the SIMPLEST of ways...you have a winner. Bill Gates made using a computer SIMPLE. Apple made phones, tablets and computers SIMPLE...simple in design, simple in advertisement. Google made searching for information SIMPLE, facebook made social networking SIMPLE......Myspace became complicated after awhile, especially with the webcoding open source software, the means to communicate or find others, it BEGAN pretty simple, but it suddenly became more complicated, and then the spammers came and when Facebook came out with SIMPLE...it failed (myspace).

Twitter makes relaying simple information SIMPLE.....the trend continues everyday. Simply because we live in a world of convenience...and it's all about the SIMPLE way to accomplish a goal without much struggle.

Don't know if that answered the question...but meh....gave what I could.

my 2 cents.