Social Anti-Percolation and Negative Word of Mouth

TL;DR

This paper introduces a social percolation model incorporating negative word of mouth, explaining why many products fail to spread despite initial interest, by showing how negative feedback can block diffusion in social networks.

Contribution

It presents a novel percolation theory model that accounts for negative word of mouth effects, highlighting how rejection can prevent product diffusion in social networks.

Findings

Negative word of mouth increases the percolation threshold.

Strong negative feedback can block product spread entirely.

Rejection often prevents exposure rather than direct rejection by consumers.

Abstract

Many new products fail, despite preliminary market surveys having determined considerable potential market share. This effect is too systematic to be attributed to bad luck. We suggest an explanation by presenting a new percolation theory model for product propagation, where agents interact over a social network. In our model, agents who do not adopt the product spread negative word of mouth to their neighbors, and so their neighborhood becomes less susceptible to the product. The result is a dramatic increase in the percolation threshold. When the effect of negative word of mouth is strong enough, it is shown to block any product from spreading to a significant fraction of the network. So, rather then being rejected by a large fraction of the agents, the product gets blocked by the rejection of a negligible fraction of the potential market. The rest of the potential buyers do not adopt the product because they are never exposed to it: the negative word of mouth spread by initial rejectors suffocates the diffusion by negatively affecting the immediate neighborhood of the propagation front.