It may surprise some people that something once thought of as genuinely spontaneous now merits its own trade association, a code of ethics, and a panel of experts. But word-of-mouth marketing has emerged as a medium whose time has truly come and, as this first summit showed, one now deserving of its own professional organization and guidelines.
Word of mouth, of course, has been around since the beginning of human interaction. What has changed now is that marketers and communicators are finding it increasingly difficult to cut through the media clutter, so they have turned to word of mouth as a non-traditional way to reach consumers. At the same time, ample data now exists that proves word of mouth can have a dramatic impact in reaching consumers in ways that traditional mass communication can’t. As a result, the question arises: “Is there a more effective way to employ word of mouth to cut through today’s media clutter, and, if so, is there a way to do it credibly and ethically?”
The Word of Mouth Marketing Summit offered us an exciting opportunity to compare tactics, debate issues and identify trends related to this question. At the event, we had a unique opportunity to come together with fellow word-of-mouth communicators and exchange insights about everything from age-old word-of-mouth communications to techniques now on the cutting edge, including blogs, message boards and product seeding programs. In the end, we found the summit invaluable in not only furthering our own understanding and application of word-of-mouth marketing but also in confirming the focus and direction of our own firm’s word-of-mouth services offerings.
We were invited to help shed light on the connection between word of mouth and customer evangelism. Specifically, we were asked to explain how customer evangelism can be extended from a one-to-one process to a one-to-many process with the same effect. To do this, we focused on how public relations tactics can be used to deliver what we call “customer evangelism in overdrive.”
Gaining individual customer evangelists to extol the rewards of a business experience represents a proven and critical communications tactic. But by building on this basic word-of-mouth process, many organizations can gain the capability to dramatically expand and strengthen their network of customer evangelists and their impact.
In particular, we have identified four ways that public relations techniques can be used to unleash the power of “customer
evangelism in overdrive”:
- Mutual Benefit – Asking customers to do something for your business without reciprocating the benefit will not work in the long run. Thus, it’s important to structure a customer evangelism program with mutual benefit for both you and the customer. This may entail helping clients talk to the media in a way that helps their businesses, helps them connect with prospective customers or helps link them with other valuable third parties.
- Media and Analyst References – Leveraging positive customer testimonials with the media and analysts is a cornerstone of public relations. Thus, it’s critical for companies to foster relationships through which they can gain testimonials to parlay with media and analysts. Having a customer testify to a company’s value delivers credibility that is invaluable in comparison to a company trying to promote its value directly.
- Customer Gatherings – Many customers don’t have the ability to connect easily with other industries and fields. So when you can gather different customers to exchange information with and provide feedback for your organization, you can open a bridge and build a bond among customers that can reinforce positive experiences and shared challenges.
- Customer-based Research – When you can get customers’ opinions and feedback before you launch a product or service, you gain more than valuable insight. You can also recruit advocates who feel they have contributed to the development process and who have developed loyalty and attachment to the product or service.
Identifying these four methods represents just one of many steps in the program Ketchum is developing to leverage word-of-mouth communications and reach media through unconventional means, such as blogging, podcasting, and other viral marketing techniques.
Word of mouth is going through a dramatic shift. Marketers are learning how to encourage and amplify this natural phenomenon while still respecting and protecting its honesty and integrity. Using blogs, online communities, buzz marketing, customer evangelism and other word-of-mouth tools, WOMMA and its members are helping define this new field as honest, authentic two-way communications between marketers and customers.
As a charter member of WOMMA, Ketchum looks forward to building on the lessons learned at this conference and seeking to provide a greater understanding of word of mouth to our clients, colleagues and industry peers.
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