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• 5 Triggers for Igniting Online Word of Mouth
  
  

  Pat McCarthy 10:06 am on December 8, 2009 | 1 Comments Permalink | Post Your Comment!
  Tags: Brands and WOM (503), Guest Column, Influencers (60), WOM How-to (591)

  By Brandon Evans, Managing Partner, Chief Strategy Officer, Mr Youth

  Word of Mouth is clearly one of the fastest growing sectors in marketing. PQ Media’s recent study has it growing 14.2% in 2008 to $1.54B and expects it to reach $3B by 2013. Powering that growth are social technologies that have made it increasingly easier for individuals to grow their sphere of influence and quickly spread content to their expanded social networks online. While creating a campaign that ignites word of mouth online is far from an exact science, here are five core triggers that have driven successful campaigns for brands.

  1. Target Online Oprahs
  With the advent and rise of social platforms, influence has been democratized more than ever. As a result, brands need to expand the breadth and range of individuals on their radar. Brands that successfully identify members of key communities and empower them to utilize their influence and credibility gain relevance through personalized messaging that resonates with these influencers’ audiences.

  2. Strike a Chord
  While more and more brands realize a new set of influencers exists for their brand, the way they communicate with them can often lack substance. Brands should seek to create programming rather than messaging in an attempt to generate word of mouth. Thinking more like a TV producer and less like an advertising exec will result in creating compelling content that has value and is more likely to generate interest and spread.

  3. Give it Up
  It’s no secret that people love free stuff and promotions. While this has long been a motivator used by brands to get consumers engaged and get products in consumers’ hands, social media has made this tactic highly viral with reach well beyond just those who get the goods. Web site building companies like Squarespace and Moonfruit both instantly became top Twitter trending topics for their giveaways of Apple products by asking users to tweet their hashtag for a chance to win. Many such promotions have quickly spread on Twitter.

  4. Cast your Consumers
  Dunn, North Carolina’s local paper “The Daily Record” boasts the highest penetration of any newspaper in the United States at an astounding 112%. Their secret? Post as many local names and pictures as they can. The newspaper realized early on that when people are featured in the paper, they will not only purchase their copy but others to share with friends and family. People simply like to see themselves in print. The same rule applies online.

  5. Summon your Spielberg
  Content is king. This cliché is even more applicable when applied to sparking word of mouth online. Unlike TV, where there are limited built in audiences waiting to tune in, online views are earned by creating content that users feel compelled to spread. With competition for eyeballs more difficult then ever, marketers must identify the content that will really resonate with their consumers and execute in an innovative, shocking or laugh out loud way.

  While there have been some outliers, the majority of online word of mouth successes can be traced back to at least one of these triggers. Incorporating a trigger alone will by no means guarantee success; they do, however, provide a blueprint by which brands can access the strategies that will best resonate with their consumers.

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  A pioneer in word-of-mouth and social media marketing, Brandon Evans is Managing Partner, Chief Strategy Officer for NY-based social marketing agency Mr Youth. In this role, Brandon oversees strategy and innovation, helping Mr Youth continue to create cutting edge solutions that truly engage consumers with clients like Microsoft, Pepsi, T-Mobile and Nike. He founded Mr Youth’s proprietary WOM network, RepNation, the first and largest word-of-mouth network for Millennials that has over 125,000 members. For more information, visit http://www.mryouth.com.

  

  

   

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• Wading Into the Social Media Pool? Try a “Twebinar”
  
  

  WOMMA Editor 9:27 am on June 24, 2008 | Comments Off Comments Permalink
  Tags: Guest Column

  Social media guru Chris Brogan and I had been busy shooting video interviews over the course of three days for a webinar series featuring some of the most recognized names in social media and online WOM. Looking at our production timeline, we expected it would take a few months to edit the video — so we were looking at a launch of three webinars smack in the middle of the summer vacation season. Heck, there’s never much on TV during the summer, but would people want to sign up for yet another series of webinars?
  We had shot the video interviews during two conferences, SNCR’s NewComm Forum in Sonoma County and Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco. While the timing didn’t afford us the time to attend sessions at the latter, we did get to join in on the fun at SNCR’s event. While sitting in on the sessions, we had both noticed that there seemed to be a digital divide between those using Twitter and those who were not. For those familiar with Twitter, it’s rather commonplace for some significant backchannel conversations to happen via Twitter during any social media event.
  So, why the disconnect? Twitter is a free service and quite easy to use, so why weren’t more people jumping in with both feet and joining the conversations that were furiously happening in parallel to the “offline” conference? In fact, why weren’t those new to social media — attending the conference to learn about how to join in on the action — actually taking the opportunity to connect with the numerous experts sitting next to them physically and virtually online? To further illustrate my point, I saw a complete room of social media newcomers clear out faster than you could say “Fire” at the end of one session I attended. And this was after an amazing presentation by both Kami Watson Huyse and Geoff Livingston — where, coincidentally, none other than social media news release inventor, Todd Defren, helped out by advancing the slides. Three top experts who were more than willing to network, but no connections seemingly made. Perplexing for sure.
  This was certainly not the first time I had seen this phenomenon. In fact, at every single conference I had attended over the previous six months — seminars dealing with social media and generally packed with standing room only crowds — newcomers frantically took notes on the websites they should visit, the tools they should consider, and the authors they should read. But sadly, after each talk, real uptake — the kind that requires you to actually join that social media conversation already in session — did not seem to occur in any significant way. Lots of preparation taking place, but with implementation saved for a later date. A bit disheartening.
  So would we launch another webinar series, an online simulation of a one-way presentation of information, or could we create something more dynamic, more interactive?
  Enter the “twebinar.” A mashup between the real-time, multi-directional messaging and networking power of Twitter with the convenience and rich media experience of a video webinar. It’s an experiment to see if the format, requiring a Twitter account to get the full value of each one-hour experience, catches on with those attendees hoping to learn more about social media.
  The idea of the first twebinar was first introduced to the Twitter crowd earlier this week, and the uptake has been tremendous. We are now running online campaigns — both e-letter and targeted Facebook ads — to reach those wishing to dip their toe into the pool of social media in relation to business, public relations, and marketing.
  Each twebinar will attempt to link participants both with speakers and with each other. The connections will begin in advance of each event in order to help to spread the word. The tweets will occur during each webinar video broadcast to promote Q&A and feedback, as well as after each event to promote continual learning through participation within the supportive social media community that already exists.
  Will the experiment work? We hope so. By listening in real-time, from a promotional nature, from a topic discussion, and from an event-feedback perspective, course corrections can be made along the path to success. And for those who do decide to participate wholeheartedly they will definitely come away with useful examples, valuable connections with leaders in social media, and the knowledge that they’ve finally put all the preparation to bed and jumped into the world of social media with both feet.
  For more information on the Radian6 Twebinars — a social media summer series with host Chris Brogan featuring interviews with over 30 leaders in social media — go to http://www.twebinar.com.
  David Alston is vice president of marketing at Radian6, a WOMMA member and leading provider of a social media monitoring platform for PR and marketing professionals. He arrived at his current role with previous experience at several tech startups in the interactive advertising and the video over IP space. Most recently, he was partner and vice president of marketing strategy at PR firm, Revolution Strategy. He blogs at TweetPR.

  

  

   

• Publishing and WOM: An Experiment in Book Distribution
  
  

  WOMMA Editor 10:18 am on June 19, 2008 | Comments Off Comments Permalink
  Tags: Guest Column

  Some would say the word of mouth industry has officially entered its second chapter. For the past decade or so, word of mouth has evolved from a nascent idea into an organized group of companies providing value to clients everywhere. Ask most companies today if they have a word of mouth strategy and you’ll no longer get a deer-in-the-headlights stare.
  That’s one reason I included a volume number in my latest book, The Word of Mouth Manual, Volume II. The other reason being that the title begins a conversation (Where’s Volume I?), which is what word of mouth marketing is all about: the ability to activate and engage in discussions about products and services.
  The challenge I laid out for this book was to make everything about it an embodiment of word of mouth, itself. The book isn’t just a book about word of mouth; it is word of mouth. There’s a monkey on the cover. It’s water resistant which makes it perfect as a rainhat (though, regrettably, it’s not completely water proof, as some bloggers have claimed). Its compact size and rounded corners make you want to pick it up. The content is fed in bite sized portions: Thirteen of the 14 chapters are simple and easy to read, but stylistically unique for a business book. The content connects Casey Kasem to Scooby Doo and the Numa Numa dance to Lacoste; there’s a bonus chapter that paints Captain Crunch as an abusive husband and it even touches on Toucan Sam eating LSD (horribly written, which is sorta worth talking about). There are dozens of other instructive word of mouth challenges like this in the book.
  Many of you may have already learned about The Word of Mouth Manual, Volume II through its unorthodox distribution model, which is the ultimate word of mouth challenge. In this day and age, how do you 1.) make a book worth talking about, and; 2.) ensure that enough people read it to get the dialogue going. To jumpstart the dialogue about the future of publishing, I published an “open letter” to the industry on the Harvard Business School Press blog, so I won’t spend much time on the backdrop for change. But, let it be said that few publishers will help you harness word of mouth, so it’s best to look in other directions.
  I began my search for the ultimate word of mouth distribution model by self-publishing. Even with the ability to work with a major publisher, controlling the entire process and creating the “right” book had more than a few people talking. The publishers raised their eyebrows and told each other I was crazy. Co-workers murmured in halls, “He’s producing the book himself. Why?” Word of mouth is generated from getting as many communities to talk as possible, so this was the place to begin.
  I set up my own Amazon page and bulk order process with 800 CEO READ. Today’s Internet tools create an equal playing field with many major publishers’ distribution models, so it’s easy to sell on your own. I then did three things to make selling matter.
  - First, I only printed a few thousand copies because scarcity is worth talking about.
  - Second, I ensured that every book was special. Each is hand-signed and comes with a one-of-its-kind piece of artwork from BzzAgent’s artist-in-residence Seth B. Minkin, because original is worth talking about. (You can find the YouTube video of Seth’s creative process, I bet.)
  - Finally, I priced it at $45. Yes, this is a high price for any book, but for one as good as this it’s cheap. (Ok, I tried, but you can all probably see through that.) The truth is: The price premium is an important element of talk-worthiness. No one talks about the fact that a paperback is $14.95.
  Our final element, though, is the most critical factor. A $45 price doesn’t seem so egregious when you realize that you can read the entire book for free. If you want the real thing, say to give as a gift or because you like holding physical books, you can get it. But you can also download the electronic version at no charge. Yes, I spent countless hours writing this book and then I’m just giving it away to anyone who wants to read it. You know the answer: If a tree falls in a forest …
  But how do you get the idea of a free PDF to be heard far and wide? This past Monday, 20 bloggers were given the opportunity to distribute the free PDF to their readers. Seth Godin, Tom Peters, Guy Kawasaki, Jason Fried’s 37signals, Bill Taylor at Harvard Business School Online were some of the best known participants involved in the project. But a critical component was to include individuals from a broad set of communities: Emmanuel Vivier of Culture Buzz in France (for global readers), Todd Defren from Shift Communications (for those who follow PR), John Jantch of Duct Tape Marketing (focusing on small businesses). John Bell, Mitch Caplan and Rohit Bharagava’s digital prowess; Jackie Huba and John Moore’s WOM perspective; Jeremy Gutche’s Trendhunting; Chris Brogan, Chris Carfi, Greg Verdino, and Mitch Joel’s social media chops; Mitch Caplan’s marketing agency intellect, Todd Sattersten’s publishing expertise and Jeff Bussgang’s Venture Capital hat.
  So everyone wants to know how the book is doing thus far (does WOM really work!)? In the first 48 hours, more than 35,000 people downloaded it and the “real” copies are selling. The free distribution model has been talked about in hundreds of blogs and the press has been calling for interviews.
  In short, it’s been worth talking about.

  

  

   

• 5 Ways to Make WOM Matter to Skeptical CEOs
  
  

  WOMMA Editor 9:04 am on July 19, 2007 | Comments Off Comments Permalink
  Tags: Guest Column

  “Stop on that slide. Go back to the first point. That’s the big issue,” said a CEO during a recent talk I was giving about conversational marketing to a group of C-level executives from major companies like Disney, Motorola, and AT&T.
  The slide was about obstacles to adopting conversational marketing and the first point was this: CEOs have a “command and control” mindset, but there is a lack of control in our talk world. Customers control our brands, and customers dictate how they want to engage with us and talk about our products and services. This CEO mindset gets in the way of how customers want to get to know their companies. Big time.
  The room was quiet for a few minutes.
  “Okay, okay, I get what you’re saying,” said another executive. “But I’m NOT going to abandon control. That would be irresponsible, and maybe even dangerous. How do we let go of some control and evolve into conversational and word of mouth marketing?”
  The other executives fiercely agreed. Show us how to wade into this new talk business world with some degree of control, or at least proactiveness. And show us the business value. The last thing we need is another marketing fad that sounds like dot-com mania all over again, said the executives.
  So to continue that conversation, here are five ideas from our conversation that day — the very same ideas that helped turn around some very skeptical CEOs.
  #1. Make meaning, not buzz
  ———————————————
  “Talk” marketing isn’t about superficial buzz that sizzles fast and fades fast. The goal is to help people make sense of information through conversations. The more meaningful the conversations, the faster people are able to connect to your organization, product, or service. This shortens sales cycles and helps employees buy into change more quickly. For companies selling a considered product or service — which includes most business-to-business companies, professional service firms, and pharmaceutical, health care, and educational organizations — the goal is making meaning, not making buzz.
  #2. Listening leads to innovation
  —————————————————
  Conversations are at least 50% listening — and perhaps much more. Marketing’s purpose today isn’t just pushing out information and producing things; it’s listening and bringing ideas back into a company. Ideas that can spark innovation, influence product development, and pinpoint ways to get access to and attention from decision makers. Listening is a new strategy, and it happens through conversations, whether those conversations are face-to-face or in online communities and social networks.
  #3. Points of view are more interesting than your products
  ————————————————————————————–
  Unless you’re Steve Jobs talking about the iPhone, people don’t want to talk about your products or capabilities; they can look that up on the web. What they do want to talk about are your points of view about the industry or category. What common mistakes do you see? What are one or two emerging trends you believe may upset business as usual? In what area are most people wasting money and don’t even realize it? What “best practice” do you think is a waste of time? Points of view jumpstart meaningful conversations and distinguish your organization on more than products. And every CEO has those points of view to share with their organization, with customers, with media, and with employees. So share those interesting views. They’ll get talked about.
  #4. Nothing to talk about is why people don’t talk
  —————————————————————————
  The reason everyone in a company is often telling a different story — or not saying much at all — is that they don’t have anything interesting to talk about. Elevator statements, product messages, and mission statements are — let’s face it — pretty boring and not something that makes you want to get together with a prospect or an analyst. Nor are they something employees want to talk about when they get together with company partners and agencies. Take your points of view and set them free. Share them with everyone in the company and encourage everyone to talk about the ideas, as well as what they hear from the resulting conversations. People will remember and will talk about fresh point of views that get people to say, “Gee, that’s interesting. Tell me more.” But they’re not going to talk about messages and value propositions.
  #5. Measure involvement vs. awareness
  ————————————————————
  The new measure of marketing effectiveness is involvement. The more involved people become with your ideas or your sales reps, the more vested they become in those ideas and people. More importantly, involvement is the prerequisite to action, whether that action is changing your mind, asking for an RFP, or making a decision to buy. The objective is to engage people in conversations that get them involved with you and you with them.
  One last point that resonated at that skeptical CEO meeting: I played the new Paul McCartney song,”Fine Line,” which includes the lyrics, “There’s a fine line between recklessness and courage.” Not embracing conversational marketing and letting go of some control is reckless because it puts a barrier up between you and your customers, I reminded the execs. Change that makes a big difference, however, requires just a small bit of courage.
  And what CEO wants to be seen as lacking courage?