A few years ago, Duncan Watts — a network-theory pioneer at Yahoo! Research — wanted to test a theory. He ran a series of tests to see if popular music could be made popular again or if the original success was just plain luck. Watts wondered, can you browbeat people into thinking something is popular when it isn’t? (Sounds like some advertising out there.)
Watts partnered with Matthew Salganik to come up with the right experiment to sort this all out. Their concept? To lie.
They tested some popular music with a sample group that was not familiar with the songs and asked them for their ratings. They then inverted those ratings so that the worst was the best and the best was now the worst, and gave the songs, complete with false ratings, to a different group.
The unsuspecting new group was duped into believing the original ratings were accurate and snubbed the fake-low ranking ones. Apparently, flat-out lying works!
Not so fast.
Over time, the previously top-ranked songs crept back up the charts amongst second group and the previously lower-ranked ones dropped. However, despite the fact that the “good” music eventually did rise to the top, people participating in this topsy-turvy experiment ended up consuming less of everything.
Astroturfing (fake grassroots) is the worst crime you can commit in social marketing. Although lying in this space may get you a short-term gain, the long-term forecast is lower sales and probably (hopefully) a damaged reputation.
• Learn more about this experiment here.
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6 Responses to “Truth in Advertising”
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January 18th, 2010 at 1:31 pm
can you make people believe bad music is good? http://bit.ly/8S9xvg
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
January 20th, 2010 at 9:57 am
Apparently, lying doesn’t work: http://bit.ly/8S9xvg Courtesy @collindouma ^KP #fb
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
January 20th, 2010 at 9:57 am
Apparently, lying doesn’t work: http://bit.ly/8S9xvg Courtesy @collindouma ^KP #fb
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
January 7th, 2011 at 9:08 am
One lie as much as one wishes, but if the product is a dud, it will give itself away, quicker rather than later.
February 25th, 2011 at 10:02 am
I personally don’t think that fake advertising will result in anything, it is just waste of time, money & energy ….
August 18th, 2011 at 11:24 pm
I can’t bieleve I’ve been going for years without knowing that. Now we know who the sesnilbe one is here. Great post! SwissGer Backpack