I TOOK PART in a viral marketing discussion over at WebProWorld yesterday. As the discussion went on, I realized that the value of word of mouth marketing is not fully understood. Too many people believe that it’s something you implement for an immediate affect – a wave of traffic or a jump in sales. As I tried to expalin in the forum, word of mouth marketing is a longtail investment in your primary asset – your customers. The idea is that if you provide your customers with a great experience; by providing a high quality product, offering great service or value, or anything else that makes your customers happy; they will naturally act as ambassadors for your company – not because they have to, but because they want to share something good with their friends, colleagues or family.
When you see a good movie, and have a good experience at the cinema, you will say to your friend “You just have to go see X-Men: The Last Stand, it was the best movie I’ve seen in a long time!” That recommendation, which spreads from person to person, friend to friend, blog to blog is organic and happens when businesses invest in their customers to provide good experiences for them. As a matter of fact, the movie and theater industries are both good examples of how buzz and viral marketing can make each show a success – or a failure.
For a great overview about word of mouth marketing, read the Word of Mouth Marketing Association’s (WOMMA) free whitepaper: Word of Mouth 101: An Introduction to Word of Mouth Marketing.
tags: word of mouth marketing womma webproworld viral marketing
Thanks for the link Todd. I took a quick glimpse and it certainly appears to be chock-full of great information about WOM! I’ll take a more in depth read this week and provide a review here.
All the best
Tom
Hey Tom,
Thanks for your post. I thought I would point you to a study our firm published with Osterman Research titled Perceptions, Practices and Ethics in Word-of-Mouth Marketing. Here’s a link to the pdf:
http://www.boldmouth.com/studies/word_of_mouth_marketing_research_boldmouth.pdf
I’d love to hear your feedback on the study which focuses on the challenges facing organizations that are using or considering WOMM.
All the best,
Todd Tweedy
CEO
BoldMouth.com
My friend just launched brilliant ad site yesterday.
I wanted buy one but then I don’t have sites to promote but I just let you know guys it is pretty good.
Site called adcubes and he is hosting at the online newspaper.
Check this out it is cool.
http://www.ibtimes.com/adcubes/