Word of mouth marketing
Word of mouth marketing is a term used in the marketing industry to describe activities that companies undertake to generate favorable word of mouth publicity about products and services.
Word of mouth promotion is highly valued by marketers. It is felt that this form of communication has valuable source credibility. People are more inclined to believe word of mouth promotion than more formal forms of promotion because the communicator is unlikely to have an ulterior motive (ie.: they are not out to sell you something). Also people tend to believe people that they know. In order to manufacture word of mouth communications, marketers use publicity techniques.
A very successful word of mouth promotion creates a buzz. A buzz is a highly intense and interactive form of word of mouth. Word of mouth is essentially a linear process with information passing from one individual to another, then to another, etc. A marketer has successfully created a buzz when the interactions are so intense that the information moves in a matrix pattern rather than a linear one. Everyone is talking about the topic.
Examples
- Gmail - Google did no marketing, they spent no money. They created scarcity by giving out Gmail accounts only to a handful of "power users." Other users who aspired to be like these power users "lusted" for a Gmail account and this manifested itself in their bidding for Gmail invites on eBay. Demand was created by limited supply; the cachet of having a Gmail account caused the word of mouth, rather than any marketing activities by Google.
- FreshDirect - FreshDirect did no marketing to cause the word of mouth. They did exceed expectations of consumers who used their service. These consumers in turn raved about FreshDirect to their friends voluntarily and even spent time convincing them to try it. Word of mouth resulted from FreshDirect so far exceeding expectations that their customers naturally wanted to share, brag, or talk about it.
- Chain email about certain product/service can be considered as word of mouth marketing.
Contrast with (non-examples)
- Hotmail - Hotmail "piggybacked" on personal emails from one person to another to publicize their free email service. At a time when few people had email, the first and only free email service in the marketplace was appealing and novel -- hence their rapid adoption and spread. However, the same "piggybacking" technique currently employed by all free email providers (except gmail) no longer works. Furthermore, the Hotmail users did not voluntarily pass it on; they had no choice about Hotmail adding the "sign up" link at the end of their personal emails. Hence this is not a good example of "word of mouth."
- Burger King's Subservient Chicken - Burger King's marketing program called Subservient Chicken did indeed generate a lot of word of mouth, but the word of mouth was about the marketing campaign instead of the product that was bring marketed. Also, those marketing efforts which rely on being edgy or on some kind of stunt fade quickly when the novelty or edge wears off. Finally, this type of marketing is not reproducible or sustainable since it won't be edgy the second time around.
- McDonald's LincolnFry - a fake blog was discovered, and it generated lots of negative word of mouth and little participation.
- American Express' billboard - a fake blog poster who told readers to check out a great Amex billboard was found to be an Ogilvy employee; this violation of trust resulted in massive negative word of mouth which spread around the world.
See also
References
- Grewal, R., T.W. Cline, and A. Davies, 'Early-Entrant Advantage, Word-of-Mouth Communication, Brand Similarity, and the Consumer Decision-Making Process,' Journal of Consumer Psychology, October 2003.