A Wren Says

“Excuse me, do you have the [insert object] that’s all over my For You page?”

The sales associate sighs and proceeds to locate the product. There will be 20 more people coming to look for the same product as well. They have to have it. Everyone, it seems, is driven by the trend cycle.

Before, this level of peer influence was the bane of teenagers. However now, moms, bachelors, finance bros, everyone is part of an expanded peer group that they strive to be just like. They all want they same products that they saw on social media. If you get one influencer to make your product go viral, you can capture all of those sales. But is that a good thing?

Just as easily as the popular vote is in favor of your product, you are just one trend cycle away from losing all that momentum. Social media frenzies are a finicky way to do business. You can’t rely on virality to drive sales.

Let’s walk it back, back to good marketing. Let’s work on building good products to meet the needs of key groups of consumers so well that they choose to return time and time again. Not just when everyone else is doing it.