During my junior year of college, I starred as Albert Einstein in Steve Martin’s hilarious drama, Picasso at the Lapin Agile. Set in 1904 before either achieves notoriety, the play pits Einstein and Picasso in a Parisian bar.
During a pivotal scene, the barmaid, Germaine, learns Einstein is writing a book about a Special Theory of Relativity and asks him a series of questions about its subject matter, plot, comedic tone, and intended readership.
Toward the end of their conversation is:
Germaine: Okay, in your field, how many people do you figure have to read your book to have some impact?
Einstein: One.
Germaine: No, no, no. In order for your book to have impact, you’ve got to have a lot of people read it; every man in the street has got to have one.
Einstein: No, only one. Max.
Germaine: Max?
Einstein: Max Planck, a German physicist, very influential. If he reads it, he makes my reputation.
Germaine: Well, you’re lucky. If your market is one person and you know his name, you can put a limit on what you’re going to spend on advertising.
I posit that those who expand their social networks to the nth degree are not thinking like Einstein. It shouldn’t matter how many friends, followers, or subscribers agree with you. Size doesn’t matter.
The only thing that matters is to attract one person — and everyone else will come like wildfire.
Thoughts?
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Ari Herzog is an online media strategist and Newburyport City Councilor-Elect.
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I have been wondering about this lately. There are a lot of people that want to connect with everyone they know online. But building an active network or having a vibrant community around you requires conversation, being able to relate, and connecting on more than just a distant memory from the past. Its like having 500 channels – you’re never going to watch them all in a meaningful way. Amidst all the noise that is being generated, strategy still makes a huge difference. Thanks for the post Ari.
- Duncan
This post takes me back to something in The Tipping Point–the section about Mavens. It’s what I remember best about the book. I think one of Gladwell’s points there went something like this: in a universe with an exponentially increasing amount of available information to sort through, the experts wield increasingly greater influence. Add to that the fact that social media gives more people access to the experts than ever before…Einstein was on to something, and so are you.
I am in a real hurry but had caught your link by way of a Google alert so had to visit to see what’s up..
Last night, On PBS or same sort of programming, a friend and I were watching Einstein and I was homing in on him in application to Social media as well. I can’t believe that you hit it at the same time.
I love it when that happens..There are so many more reasons to think he was one of the founders of individuality in social everything. Carved his way..others eventually saw that he was worth the ‘follow’. He strove tooth and nail to make progress, against an otherwise influential society.
And prevailed.
Build it. It will come.
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Ari,
This is brilliant… I’m incorporating it into my blog post – the point is “find the right six people”
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Yea, what SHE said. lol…That’s why I follow her and YOU.
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