Creating cultural change to sell products isn’t easy. But it has been done been done before. Deodorant, cigarette’s for women, and razors have all successfully created cultural change.

Not wearing deodorant is now considered gross. Hairy arm pits or legs are now considered gross. Cigarette companies targeted women by calling cigarette’s “freedom torches”. All three of those changes were backed by companies in order to sell more products.

There are four main things that go into Cultural Change:

1. Doctors (or a bunch of smart people) must approve it vocally
2. Successful people and people you know must be seen using it
3. Must be a mass consumer product (sold in the hundreds of millions)
4. Mainstream users would say the wrong thing to do is to not buy it

I believe Orabrush, an easy to use tongue scraper, is going to make cultural change happen. I predict in the next 5 years not scraping your tongue is going to be considered gross.

I learned about Orabrush yesterday because my twitter and facebook stream was filled with likes. Here is how they are making it happen:

#1 The person that invented the Orabrush is a doctor and they use “Dr. Bob” in all email communications and on their website whenever they need to establish credibility.

#2 They are getting everyone you know to tweet about it. If your friends are doing it then it is totally okay for you to get one as well. The power of social influence is a big one here. They strongly incentivize you to “follow” and “like” it. Here is a break down of how they are getting a ton of people to follow:

A. On their website they have a call to action asking if you want the Orabrush for free? Yes of course I want one for free.