WOMM: WORD OF MOUTH MARKETING by Andy Sernovitz

According to the WOMM book by Andy Sernovitz, WOMM is generally the marketing strategy that the companies or individuals try to encourage people to talk about them and their products. WOMM is one of the most effective marketing strategy that people have applied to the business for a long time, but nobody realizes how important of WOMM until the technology is developed. The technology accommodates people to express their ideas and talk about particular topics with other people, not only their friends and family, but also people who have common interests through different channels, so it makes people have opportunities to gather information before making decisions, for example, people usually go to check the reviews before buying a new gadget. Even though WOMM is effective and easy to implement to the business, the marketers should be aware of the negative impact when they are not able to apply WOMM appropriately. Therefore, the WOMM will be effective when it is implemented with proper 5Ts.

The 5Ts are Talkers, Topics, Tools, Taking part, and Tracking. These following are some important thoughts about each T.

Talkers

There are many different talkers mentioned in the WOMM book. The best way to find the proper talkers is to create the persona to describe who should be your talkers and why they want to talk about you and your products, as well as how to reach them. In addition, it is important to feed your talkers about the up-to-date and insightful information in order to motivate them to talk constantly. Finally, you should say “Thank You” publicly and personally to appreciate their actions.

Topics

Good topics are simple, organic, portable, and unexpected. They also need to be tested and up-to-dated to make sure that they are relevant and effective. To make continuously talks, there are three different topics that need to be created along with the WOMM campaign, which are immediate topics, worthy topics, buzzworthy topics.

Tools

WOMM cannot be a powerful marketing plan if you are not able to spread the messages out to other people. There are many tools to let people share their thoughts. The book focuses on the Internet that is the most effective multiple sharing tools, including blogs, social media and online communities, as well as testimonial and customers reviews.

Taking part

Since WOMM is dialogue, it needs to be interacted by initiators and respondents. Taking part is your and your peoples’ roles to engage in the conversations and keep the conversation alive. The most important manner to keep in mind is to make people happy whether you are dealing with positive or negative WOM.

Tracking

It is not only the step that you can use WOMM as a research tool to understand what people in the real world think about you and your products, but also the step that you can see how effective the WOMM plan you implemented by listening to what people talking about you and your products publicly and privately.

My Takeaways from Andy Sernovitz's book "Word of Mouth Marketing"

I consider myself an avid social networker. I have an account on almost all of the usual social networking sites, Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, and even a dusty account on Myspace. Of them all, I use Linkedin for my professional network and Facebook primarily for my more casual social networking. After reading Andy Sernovitz’s “Word of Mouth Marketing”, I see that I already follow some of the rules he outlines for being a successful social networker, but I also found areas where I could improve that I had not necessarily thought about before.

Sernovitz’s first rule is to “Be Interesting”. On facebook, I find it particularly interesting to look at the pictures and status updates my friends post to see how many comments or “likes” they received. I often try to post insightful, funny, and even controversial content to see how many comments or “likes” I can get myself. Although I had not previously viewed being interesting from the framework of being a successful social networking requirement, I have thought about it in sense of being an effective marketing strategy similar to Seth Godin’s assertion that one should strive to make their business or product “The Purple Cow” that sticks out and has staying power amongst all the other “cows” in the market. I have practiced it in the past so Sernovitz’s book gave me confirmation that I am on the right track. From now on I will actively think about how I am “being interesting” and try to maximize the effect in each with each post.

In his second rule, Sernovitz touches on something I had not thought about before, which is to “make the message easy to be shared and (to) find the ways to make it easy to spread”. The key point here is to make it EASY. It seemed like common sense after reading it, but for some reason rule two really jumped out at me. I suspect the ease with which something spread could be correlated with the rate at which its spread and the level of penetration it achieves in society before it becomes disinteresting. I’m taking this rule to heart and I will definitely be crafting posts that are “easy” and observing the outcome.

In addition to his rules for successful word of mouth marketing, Sernovitz also outlines the five “T”, one of which is the “talkers”. When I read this, I instantly thought back to another concept from Godin’s “The Purple Cow”, the “sneezer”. The “talker” and the “sneezer” are one and the same in that they are both avid users or reviewers of your products, services, blogs, etc., that spread the word (sometimes good, and sometimes bad) for you. They are often the experts, the connoisseurs, or the “go-tos”. Both Sernovitz and Godin emphasize the importance of utilizing them to your advantage and capitalizing on their social capital and ability to market for you.

3 Takeaways

My first takeaway concerns the nature of positive and negative feedback that occurs on the web in various places throughout the lifetime of one's business. In my experience over the years I have treated this as simply part of the business cycle, where I had little input or overall control of it. Sernovitz teaches us that this is simply not the case, this kind of feedback is something that we can not only control, but one that we should be making very definitive steps to control. We are in the driver's seat and need to be taking every measure possible to not only give the customers something great to talk about or remark to a friend about, but also help direct them to the places we want this information shared. It is a change of mindset that is begun in me and I look forward to seeing what positive benefits I can bring to my own small retail business by way of it.

The second takeaway is the nature of the content we as business's are supposed to be bringing to the table - to start the conversation and give our customers interesting things to discuss/comment on. Before now I was under the impression that is was just fine to post out things like "Magic Tournament at 5pm" or "Warmachine Event 6pm" - but this, now that I look at it, is only just regurtitating my Calendar of Events through Facebook and really has no interesting/fresh info at all - giving people little reason to actively read/support my facebook/twitter etc, and most importantly, giving my customers little reason to talk about my store in general, digital or not. We do have great information/content/stories that can be shared at the store and I am going to be binging that into the conversation, and creating the infrastructure to bring more pure content into the various digital communication mediums.

The last major takeaway I got from his message was in that there are definitely those who are your talkers, those who enjoy being "in the know" and who will gladly help and support the communication process that goes on inside and outside the store and on the web. These people are a fantastic resource, and one that I personally have done a very mediocre job of involving in this overall aspect of the store. I have them running tourments and such, involved on the events within the store, but there is no reason I can't take that a step further and get them involved online. There are aspects of what we do in store, event winners, painting competitions, league standings, that people take real pride in and would seem to me a great place to start with, and I need to start with the leaders of the store - a resource I should not be under utilizing.

WoMM 3 Takeaways to Get People Talking

Since the beginning of class one week ago I've started to look more closely at the fact that we are all marketers. Every person who has ever clicked "like" on a Facebook page, joined Netflix and added friends to their cache to share movie ratings, or checked in at a restaurant or business via Foursquare with a statement like, "You gotta check out Restaurant X, best food EVAR!" is obviously participating in marketing. I do these things every day, my Twitter page reads like a WoMM campaign for local Seattle businesses. In fact as each member of this class blogs about Andy Sernovitz book, Word of Mouth Marketing we are subsequently contributing to the WoMM campaign for the book. Each person’s entry could be the summary found inside the book sleeve and helps to generate buzz about author Andy Sernovitz and his renowned colleagues Seth Godin and Guy Kawasaki. In addition to noting highlights from the book such as "The Four Rules of Word of Mouth Marketing," "The Three Reasons People Talk About You," "The Five Ts of Word of Mouth Marketing," "The Word of Mouth Marketing Manifesto," and a myriad of other acronyms, steps and sayings; there are three primary lessons learned.

Consumers Are in Control and Your #1 Marketing Asset

Every person who makes a purchase, comments about a business, forwards an email, recommends a new restaurant or shares a link with a friend is a marketer. If your business isn't capitalizing on this free advertising tool you are loosing revenue and potentially killing your brand image and company. As Sernovitz emphasizes, people are already talking about you and your business the challenge exists in leading, joining and continuing the conversation in order to maintain a sustainable competitive advantage. Word of Mouth Marketing is Consumer-to-Consumer marketing (CtoC) and includes everything you can possibly do to get people talking about your brand. Join the conversation!

UR the UE
You are the user experience. The power of advertising and marketing lies within the consumer and their shared opinions. The company brand is no longer defined by clever marketing agencies and ad campaigns. The consumer defines the brand through regular interaction with the products, services and customer experiences. Allocate a portion of the marketing budget toward WoMM in addition to traditional media mixes that are often limited to, “Advertising, Direct Mail, Promotion and Sales.” Although WoMM is essentially “free” a portion of the marketing budget should be allocated toward customer service. By ensuring positive experiences with the company and sales staff, creating good products and treating each customer as special, positive WoMM will result and yield the highest returns. Additionally, listen to what people are saying about your brand and address the negative feedback. Turn a negative into a positive by responding promptly to complaints and striving to improve upon services and product features identified by your customer, not just your R&D department. As Sernovitz states, “UR the UE...marketing is what you do, not what you say.”

Your Job: Make it Easier for the Message to Spread

After identifying your “talkers” and encouraging what they should talk about; how can you help the message travel? The challenge is ensuring the message doesn’t die out or morph into something entirely different, literally “lost in translation.” Identify a simple, fresh, unique and perhaps even quirky talking topic that is easily portable, then ask people to help you spread it around. It’s such a simple idea and concept but sometimes people forget or fear asking for help. If you’ve properly identified your talkers they should be chomping at the opportunity to spread the message. It also helps your talkers feel like they are privy to inside information and part of the brand's family. Some ideas include putting the words "Tell a friend" or "Pass it on" on your website or at the end of every email. Place a similar request on receipts and signs on doors. A reminder email after every online order also helps to engage talkers. Make it easy to forward emails, video links and blog video links while clearly indicating that the talkers privacy is protected.

We all participate in Word of Mouth Marketing as consumers. By following some of the steps and practices outlined in Andy Sernovitz book Word of Mouth Marketing, you can successfully create positive buzz around your brand and lead the conversation.

Simplicity, Engagement and Letting Go

Simplicity.What with all the time (not to mention money) that I'm commiting to getting an advanced business education, some of the things Andy Sernovitz says is almost a slap in the face. Which is not to say that he's wrong, simply that, as complicated as marketing can be (there wouldn't be so many classes about it if it weren't complicated) Word of Mouth Marketing is founded in simplicity. The more complicated and convoluted a WOM campaign is, the less effective it will be. It's pretty contradictory to the way an MBA student thinks of business, but makes perfect sense. WOM is predicated on speed of transfer. Make it stand out and make it simply to relay.

Engagement. Old-school marketing models are about blasting your message at consumers. Force your jingle onto the radio or TV enough and people start humming it and looking for a Safelite when they need to "repair" or "replace." But a bad customer experience can inspire pretty negative associations with your jingle if you don't do something about it. The engagement part of WOM means addressing the commentary of your customers, good and bad. No longer does the business just throw advertising at people and cross their fingers (if they want to be successful at least) but must be actively engaged with customers, being proactive in providing buzzworthy topics, but more importantly, but listening and responding to customers. That need for engagement is intimately tied to my final take away, Letting Go.

Letting Go. This is a frightening prospect for any business, but it is the new reality. Businesses want to control their marketing message and that is still possible, to a point. But the internet is out there, bloggers are out there and they will write what they want to write. The control that the business does have is the ability to address customers concerns. If someone had a bad customer experience and wrote about it, it's a chance to transform that into a positive experience. The marketing professional has less ability to control the message, but she now has more ability to address the perceptions. She can't control the ship, but she can certainly nudge it this way or that i an effort to keep things pointed in the right direction. Ironically, this gives the marketer more control because she has more up-to-date information on how the business or products are being perceived and thus a better opportunity to correct problems and address concerns.

3 takeaways from World of Mouth Marketing

I just done with this book. It was fun and easy to read. There are three things I learned the most from this book:

Ask your customers

This book told me if companies asked their customers t and delivered what they want, they would have big success. Companies can gather a lot of good business ideas and find great opportunities from customers.Customer feedback also allows companies to better understand how customers rate and use their products versus competitive products. WOM is all about listening first, understanding the conversation, and then speak or act last. Sometimes, customers may tell you why they like Company B’s product better than yours or they may complain something about your products. Don’t be upset, because these feedbacks are even more valuable to your company than positive feedbacks. Like Andy Sernovitz said to make unhappy customers happy can get larger effect than to make happy customers happy.

Find the talkers and build trust

The key factors of WOM are finding the people who are eager to share their experiences with their friends, building good relationship with them to make people comfortable to talk and giving people interesting topics and easy tools to continue talk. The author of this book mentioned talkers usually are those happy customers who want to share their pleasant experiences or the ones who have the outgoing personality. I want to add one more thing: talkers also can be the unhappy customers. Studies have shown that: An angry customer will tell up to 20 other people about his/her bad experience. A satisfied customer only may share good experience with 9 people. It is important to make people like you, build a more lasting relationship will result in more sales and greater word of mouth. One more thing I learned from this book is, the talkers can be much more than just your customers. Maybe they are your employees, neighbors or even someone just walk pass by your store who like your decoration. Mouths are everywhere. Companies need to have good stage performances. But don’t forget to build trust with people who are at backstage.

Join the conversation

Listen what people said about you first, and then join their conversation. Try to be transparent, honest and open. Answer your customers’ questions as soon as you can. Let them know you are listening and you care about their feelings and opinions. Be ready for those negative discussions about your products. Try to find the opportunities from these negative feedbacks to improve your products. Sometimes, you just can’t please everyone. If there is nothingyou can do about it. At least, you should show them you care and you are listening.

For WOM Marketing, I agree with Sernovitz's point that the power is back with the customer or that consumers are now in control. While the advent of social media clearly makes the reach of every consumer much broader and quicker, this is not necessarily a new problem. Consumers have had the power to organize a campaign against companies that conduct their business poorly. Sometimes this would be to affect change to that company's product line or services and sometimes to take down the company. Rarely, if ever, were companies able to leverage a "good" customer experience into a promotional campaign. In the social media age, the customer does not need as much effort to organize, because any feedback can go viral and become a movement, often without any traditional sense of organization.

This is why it is important to have genuine, meaningful customer conversation. It seems that companies need to treat customers like the most valuable employees, and determine ways to retain those individuals and even use them for recruiting new valuable persons. The customer needs to feel valued and respected. Some of the most successful companies also give the customer an experience that gets them excited about the company or product and engages them in the evolution of the business. Some examples of this are the use of social media to vote on the next flavor of a soft drink or helping select a product model that a retail chain might carry for the next year. In both cases, the customer now has "buy-in" to the process, and if they value that, they will tell their "friends" about this preferred product and where to get it. There is also significant opportunity to get word of mouth from an excellent consumer experience in purchasing. The Sporting Goods company EVOGear, for example, has promoted the experience of the sports themselves - skiing, snowboarding, wakeboarding, etc. - as a primary vehicle for excitement about EVO, and that has translated into retail sales.

Becoming buzzworthy is clearly needed, as long as it is a good buzz. In the case of WOM Marketing, the old addage of "there's no such thing as bad press" no longer holds. If you are buzzworthy for completely failing on the basic customer-service promise, your customers and any potential customers, will know this and know it quickly. The response you give to customer complaints or problems will need to be just as quick and clear enough so that the buzz will get out that if there's a problem, it will get fixed. A company does not have control over what people will say or whether they will say something. What the company can control is the output. The company website or the product information provided should be accurate. For instance, Sernovitz's own website claims that the book is available in most Barnes and Noble bookstores. However, two different Barnes and Noble stores did not stock it nor was it at the warehouse. A problem with information accuracy, benign in this case, could become a disaster for Barnes and Noble or for a supplier that makes a claim that is no longer true. The risk in WOM marketing is that one small slip-up that you might think is innocuous can lead to a tide of bad feedback.

WOM- thoughts

The first four chapters of the book were at the same time enlightening and common sense. I felt as if the content was very intuitive, yet at the same time, spelled out in a way that I haven't heard before. As someone who very heavily relies on customer reviews when buying just about ANYTHING now (even a $7 tube of mascara warranted a 30 min long review hunt), the principles presented by Sernovitz really resonated with me. It really is interesting how our generation is bearing witness to in some ways, the death of copy writing and traditional advertising. (I can't say that I think it's a bad thing).

What really helped put some of the ideas introduced in the book into perspective was the ample use of examples. Stories I will remember for a long time include the Jones Soda (my group's company) crazy flavor campaign, and the Freshbooks method of engaging and forming relationships with customers. As I finished the first part of the book, I couldn't help but wonder if the only method to initiate word of mouth was excellent customer service or a vastly superior product that would generate buzz on its own. After reading chapter 5 and the methods one can use to at least start (but not necessarily sustain) WOM, I felt like I had a clearer picture about the principles of WOM marketing. I appreciated that Sernovitz pointed out that not all customers are "talkers", and highlighted several ways to identify and encourage these "talkers".

As I was reading, I began thinking about my own "talker" characteristics. At first reflection, I wouldn't consider myself to be a quintessential "talker, but as I began to consider my facebook activity, I began to recognize some of my regular fb activities such as checking in to restaurants and commenting on if I liked the food or not served as a pretty powerful WOM tool. Most of the times I check into a location, I get at least a few comments or questions about the restaurant or business. Seems like fb is proving to be a powerful WOM tool in more ways than I had previously thought....

Key Takeaways from Word of Mouth Marketing

I just finished reading “Word of Mouth Marketing” by Andy Sernovitz (disclosure it was for an assignment for Joe Barnes Word of Mouth Marketing Class). As a relative newbie to the world of word of mouth marketing, I think Andy laid out a simple, very understandable groundwork for someone like me to follow. My biggest and top three takeaways were the simple framework he laid out around the 5 T’s; (1) Talkers, (2) Topics, (3) Tools, (4) Taking Part, and (5) Tracking.

Talkers could be anyone that you deal with. Jeremy Epstein, on his blog, describes these people as your raving fans—the ones who “will paint their face for you.” Andy makes a good point that these Talkers don’t always have to be your most dedicated fans, but sometimes your newest customers or previously dissatisfied but now happy customers can often be the instigators of some of the best word of mouth.

Topic. You absolutely need a stellar topic and I like how Andy puts it, “Be interesting—nobody talks about boring companies, boring products or boring advertising.” Diesel created a “Be Stupid at Work App” which disguises Facebook as an excel spreadsheet. Though this does not have much to do with the trendy clothing they sell, it does get people talking and downloading the app. Interesting approach to a topic.

Tools. There seems to be an overwhelming amount of tools with the explosion of social media and smartphones Andy makes the point to not to forget to just nicely ask people to spread the word. I received a simple, well written email from Alex Harris last week, a classmate at Seattle University who just launched a new website—IPABI.com—which stands for Its Probably A Bad Idea. It was a very nice, simple request to spread the word—and here I am spreading the word.

Taking part. I like the idea that Andy presents in that “word of mouth is as much about customer service as it is about marketing.” He talks about giving employees the power to fix problems help make customers happy. I think using social media to honestly and authentically help ensure your customers are happy is a very smart approach.

Tracking. The tracking of word of mouth marketing is interesting and it will be interesting to see how advancements in social media (for example: the new foresquare and American Express deal) will help marketers track their ROI directly back to their campaigns.

Word of Mouth Marketing -- 3 Most Important Things

The three most important things I learned from Word of Mouth Marketing by Andy Sernovitz are:

1. The power is back with the customer. I know that customers have always had some power; however, in the past, we haven't had a way to vocalize our thoughts/feelings about a company that other customers could see and use as a reference. In the past (before the internet), the only way to communicate our displeasure was to either purchase or not purchase their "stuff." WOM did exist pre-internet as people would tell friends about products/services they loved/hated; but we could only reach our friends. Now we can reach everyone which is quite empowering.

2. Word of Mouth Marketing is cheap with huge rewards. It's also undervalued. It's hard to show and measure WOM marketing and it is often missed in marketing budgets so the ROI is also missed. A lot of companies undervalue WOM marketing and seem to view it as a fringe benefit. The book made it very clear that the companies that embrace WOM marketing have a clear and distinct advantage over other companies that discount it's impact on their bottom line.

3. Negative feedback can be turned into positive feedback with the right response. I've viewed this personally on Alaska Airlines Facebook page where a customer had a bad customer experience. The response from AA was almost instant (within minutes) and offered a personal e-mail address and direct phone number to address the problem. I've never had a bad experience with Alaska but was immediately impressed with how active they are with their Facebook fans and customers. They even offered to address the problem of another customer who missed a plane because they did not show up to the airport with adequate time to get through security. The customer was upset and Alaska offered the same thing (personal contact information to address the issue). What was interesting about that post was other customers (Facebook fans) started responding standing up for AA and informing the customer that it was probably their fault they missed the plane, not Alaska's. Even the most negative review can be turned into a positive experience with a prompt and helpful response. This ties back into the overall emphasis that good customer service will give "talkers" something to talk about even if there is nothing else to talk about. Good customer service is quite refreshing in this day and age.

Overall, I thought the book was a great and easy read. Any person can use this book to help their business and the practicality of all the exercises was impressive. It's not another book that offers lots of theories with no practical advice on how to use them.

WOM Marketing - Thoughts on Key Points from Sernovitz

I'm a newbie when it comes to word of mouth marketing, so reading Sernovitz's book was pretty enlightening. I took away several lessons from this read, but the following were the key points:

1. Consumers are Now in Control
If I were a traditional advertiser relying on buying large media blocks to make money, I would be terrified for my job after reading this book. The comment Sernovitz makes, that a single consumer voice has a greater impact than any advertisement, was particularly insightful. A consumer talking to the masses via social networks, blogging, or other media can either be a company's best friend, or their worst enemy, depending on the message. It is truly amazing to think that one person can affect the perceptions of a company in ways that few traditional ads could ever think about. Companies would be wise to focus their attentions on communicating with their customers rather than on spending on media.

2. Questions to ask About Customers
This is the section that really stood out to me. Sernovitz suggests that companies ask themselves four questions about their customers: When they leave, what has the company given the customer to talk about to others? How will the customer remember to talk about the business to his or her friends? Could the business have made it easier for that conversation to happen? And was any part of the customer's experience remarkable? I hadn't thought about engaging with the psyche of a customer in this way until reading the book, but I think about customers differently now. Rather than just thinking about whether a customer is happy in general or not with my product or service, it is important to question how to get them talking about the company.

3. Become Buzzworthy
This was an interesting section, but I took a different perspective. Sernovitz says a company's brand becomes talkworthy after relationships with customers change. But this got me thinking about word of mouth marketing focused on non-customers. Meaning companies can use word of mouth to their advantage in ways other than to grow or service their customer base. Employees, shareholders, suppliers, and other stakeholders in the community can also be subjects of this strategy, and are often as important to focus on as customers. The techniques in this book can all be used to build better relationships with these other groups, as many of the questions mentioned above can be asked of them as well as of customers. Employees are a key example - these people are often the best ambassador, or the worst marketer of a company. They have the power to tell the real truth about a product or service to customers, and can greatly impact whether others choose to come work at a company or not. Suppliers who are treated well or poorly will also have an impact on a company's ability to work with vendors. Being buzzworthy is bigger than just customers, and companies can apply the lessons from Sernovitz to other groups as well.

Word Mouth Marketing - 3 Most Important Points

When starting this book, I was already looking for answers on why word of mouth marketing is important. Sure, it is easy to look around at numerous modern and successful companies and notice that they are participating, but I was wondering if it was actually making a difference. Then I came across this idea in the book: "word of mouth is about genuine consumer conversation." That is exactly the point, GENUINE. There is nothing more detrimental to trust than realizing someone is not being genuine. A similar point to this is drilled into leadership students who study that authenticity is one of the most important traits a leader should follow. Marketing is the same in that you are going to trust authenticity (or genuineness) more than not. This quote solidified the idea to me that people will be influenced much more by their trusted friends and acquaintances than by marketing campaigns.

The second idea that struck home with me is that word of mouth marketing only works if you have good "stuff", or products and services. In other words, "give people a reason to talk about you." Like Andy said, the conversation will not last long when you are the only person talking. This idea very much follows the pull philosophy, as opposed to push. If you can get the customers to create the buzz for you, then you have genuine communication from customer to customer. Instead of perceived non-genuine communication between the company and the customer. Talk about a lot of output with little effort., versus less output with a lot of effort.

The first two points illustrate why word of mouth is important, and the main idea behind how to do it. The third point I was searching for had to answer another question - how to sustain the conversation? The answer to that question starts on page 121 of book and says "Your Job: Make it easier for the message to spread." I believe the most important subset of this is to build word of mouth into your product. To me, that has to be value of some kind. Whether it is the most unique and interesting thing, or the most simple but great experience. I think hands down, if you have a product that inherently has the capability to keep the conversation going between customers, then you have a winner.

3 Takeaways from Word of Mouth Marketing

Here are some things I learned from reading Word of Mouth Marketing by Andy Sernovitz.

Participation in the conversation is now mandatory. With the advent of the internet and proliferation of instant communication, it’s imperative that companies join the conversations posted online by their customers. It’s easy for negative stories about your company to go viral (think of the story about United Airlines breaking that guy’s guitar), so companies need to stay on top of what their customers are saying and react quickly to any negative experience. On the other hand, offering thanks to people who say good things about your company can further the goodwill with that customer and lead to more word of mouth conversations.

Word of mouth marketing isn’t just one strategy in the marketing playbook, it encompasses all marketing strategies. WoMM can be created from advertisements, products, customer service experiences, promotions, sales, etc. It’s really similar to the concept of the “brand”. Both are difficult to quantify and both are products of many areas of the company (marketing, customer service, product management, etc). In a sense WoMM is the customer to customer interaction of how people feel about your company’s brand, so it’s important for companies to take a holistic view of all of their operations and determine how they might affect this conversation.

Tracking WoMM efforts is a huge and critical opportunity moving into the future. This was barely touched on in the book because this topic is a little too advanced for what this book was designed to do, but I believe this will be the area of greatest growth within WoMM. Gathering and analyzing data is becoming a big trend in business today and as techniques to gather WoMM data mature, more and more information will be available for companies to use to hone their marketing efforts. Being able to more accurately quantify WoMM programs will lead to better marketing campaigns overall and hopefully better products and services.

Word of Mouth Marketing - Important Takeaways

Let me begin by saying that Word of Mouth Marketing by Andy Sernovitz was a very relevant and interesting read. There were several important ideas that I learned from the reading and I will briefly touch on a few of them in this blog posting.

First, I really appreciated the inclusion of the honesty concept. Far too often consumers see fake reviews published by folks who believe they are being stealth. Andy makes a great point that these disingenuous attempts to persuade potential customers are easily spotted by consumers are do far more damage than good. I have noticed several of these postings on popular sites such as Yelp and Amazon. My urge is to avoid any organization that uses false pretenses to promote their business or products. Andy’s simple rules for honest word of mouth marketing are clear and concise. My hope is that more and more companies will catch onto this message.

I believe the idea of honesty ties well into the topic of positive customer service. I believe that Andy’s message that great customer service will create positive word of mouth marketing is the most important topic in the book. Too often companies try to hide behind expensive advertising to boost positive opinions rather fixing the root of the problem which often relates to poor customer service. Companies with great customer service are talked about often and in a positive light. I am glad that Andy devoted a great deal of time to this topic and included several examples of how customer service can be tremendously powerful (both positive and negative).

Word of mouth marketing is not something new and has been driving business for hundreds of years; however the emergence of technology has certainly impacted the power and spread of word of mouth communication. I think Andy did a great job of discussing how this change took place and how organizations can positively harness this powerful tool. I believe that any marketer and/or manager should pay close attention to these topics (e.g. joining the conversation, being genuine, and being proactive).

I am glad that Andy brought up the power of customer feedback. Though he did not go into much detail, I thought this was an extremely important topic to mention. I am glad that he discussed the importance of client feedback and how companies can use this free information to innovate products and improve customer service.

Lastly, I really took away the fact that word of mouth must be interesting or it will not spread. Too often I see companies trying to join in the conversation with uninteresting product plugs and other self-interested motives. Andy makes a great point that word of mouth marketing must be interesting in order to be effective.

Word of Mouth Marketing Takeaways

 

Jason here - I just finished reading Andy Sernovitz’s book, Word of Mouth Marketing.  It’s a great read, and I would have enjoyed reading it even if it weren’t required for class!  I scrawled down a bunch of notes, but here are the three biggest takeaways for me, as someone who works for a fairly large company that just hopped aboard the Social Media Train:

• Savings from Public Participation. 

Sometimes it’s a challenge for me to quantify to others the savings and importance of social media and other forms of word of mouth marketing.  The section on Putting Value on Your Word of Mouth gave me some great ideas to help better quantify those values in the future.  Being able to articulate that solving customer service problems on a customer website saves customer service costs is a powerful idea I can take to management.

• Honeymooners/ new customers can be the most powerful word of mouth advocates for your company. 

I’ve usually avoided recruiting Talkers who are new to my company with the logic that they’re still not familiar with the services and products of my company, and that they’re a bit of an unknown quantity.  This bit reminds me how excited new customers are about discovering something great – I’ll keep this in mind when I’m doing more Word of Mouth brainstorming.

• It’s Less Risky Thank You Think

Word of Mouth Marketing means you give up a lot of control on your marketing message.  It’s definitely still a bit scary for the business I work in, particularly with the amount of time and energy we put into shaping our company image.  But Andy Sernovitz points out that your WoM bloggers could be doing something inappropriate, stupid, anyway, through any number of mediums.  Delete it, apologize, and move on. 

Simplicity, Talkers+Topics, and Opportunities in Negativity

Andy Sernovitz’s “Word of Mouth Marketing” guide provides keen insights to both the logic behind and the success of word of mouth marketing. The balance of power has shifted with the greatest leverage with the everyday consumer and their entire experience with any company’s product and service instead of the company’s passive actions or pushed advertising campaigns behind it. The most important lessons are simplicity underlies all the innovative and creative word of mouth (WOM) marketing strategies, identifying the talkers and topics (of the Five Ts), and seeing negative WOM as an opportunity. Sernovitz repeatedly emphasized (and proved) that participating is not an option, it is a must. Participation, and eventually profit, relies on your finesse with these three lessons.

Simplicity underlies all innovative and creative WOM strategy, Sernovitz says. This lesson is a cornerstone to WOM because any consumer’s daily lifestyle involves sharing opinions beyond just friends and family…and if it is complicated, it is not going to be shared. Moreover, this cultural shift demands that in order for a company to participate and earn respect from the consumer, satisfaction must come from the great majority and not the small minority. Often simplicity is over-looked for traditional gimmicks, tired advertising slogans, or complicated plans. Innovation and creativity can be simple and, thus, memorable, which creates a great story and experience for the consumer. The lesson of simplicity underscores all of the strategies and suggestions in the book and that is why it is such a great take-away.

Identifying the talkers is the hallmark of the Five Ts strategy. If you have the right people talking about your product, you are well on your way to getting word of mouth out there and the possibility of it all going viral. Sernovitz discusses a few ways to recognize a talker and he points out that this customer or loyal fan may not be the one who spends the most money, but is rather the one that is the most excited. To me, this notion demonstrates the significance of a level playing field we are seeing in today’s market, shows great respect for the consumer on the company’s part, and holds such great empowerment for any consumer. He discusses other ways to recognize a talker and, just as importantly, there must be a tailored program for each talker group to be able to really harness the shared vision and enthusiasm. One cannot forget customization once the talkers have been identified.

Along with identifying people, readily and creatively giving talkers the reasons for conversation is key. It is because topics have to be simple, yet also unexpected, organic, timely, and portable that I find it to be such a great lesson to remember. Securing a unique spot in conversation requires all of this and Sernovitz discusses topics at length and to my delight.

It cannot be said enough that negative WOM is not the end of one’s business or a sign that this type of marketing will always go towards the negative rather than the positive. Sernovitz cites negative WOM as an opportunity and gives tips on how to respond. The fear of negative WOM is only justified when one does not participate in the conversation. However, when negative WOM is combated with participation in the conversation (and especially backed up by the other strategies in this book) it seems just a part of business and another great opportunity to let your company shine.

To survive in today’s consumer climate and to utilize WOM marketing, one should take heed of Sernovitz’s lessons of simplicity in innovation, using talkers and topics, and seeing negativity as an opportunity.

Word of Mouth Marketing by Andy Sernovitz

I like how Sernovitz wrote this book in a simplistic yet meaningful way. I have to say that I managed to stay awake almost throughout the entire book and it didn't take me too long to finish it. The book is divided into two parts; In the first part, Sernovitz explained the concept of word of mouth (WOM) Marketing and why it has become more and more important nowadays. In the second part, Sernovitz wrote about the practical steps for implementing word of mouth marketing campaigns.

From reading this book, I learned that one of the most important things companies can do is the to be truthful and honest about their brands and their products. Sernovitz mentioned that it WOM only works if your brand is likable and can be trusted. In today's age where any information is readily available through the internet, no advertising or PR campaigns can make consumers believe that an inferior product is worth their time and money. You might deceive consumers for a short period of time, but sooner or later, people will figure out the truth and you will lose your sales.

One of the keys for implementing successful WOM campaigns is reaching out to the influencers and "talkers" who will spread the word about your company's products. In the book, Sernovitz taught us how to identify and reach out to the people who would be willing to talk about your company. Sernovitz pointed out that while some people think talkers should be well-influenced people in the community or society, he said that sometimes, the people who will be willing to talk about your company are everyday people such as people in the neighborhood, your recent or current customers, people who post reviews on online review sites etc. Thus, it is important to keep your customers happy and pay attention to everyday customers who fill out comment cards or submit suggestions online.

As I progressed through the book and learned about WOM techniques such as finding good talkers and topics, Sernovitz also reminded us that the WOM effect of unhappy customers made happy can be larger than the effect of happy customers. Sernovitz explained that the shock and unexpected acknowledgement that a unhappy customer's concerns matter can convert detractors into powerful talkers, which can lead to free positive advertising for your company.

Word Of Mouth Marketing -- Lessons Learned

After reading Word of Mouth Marketing by Andy Sernovitz, I came away with these important key points:

1. Simple actions that show your gratitude for your customers can win you customer loyalty and big word of mouth. It seems intuitive that companies would treat their customers with respect, and that they would strive to provide excellent customer service. However, this isn't the norm, and unfortunately many businesses refuse to listen to their customers, and continue, time after time, to provide anything but service. Yet, if companies spend the time to show their customers that they ARE appreciated, they will be successful. One tip that Andy mentions in his book is to send thank you cards to "talkers" to show that you appreciate them. I can personally attest to the power of the thank you card: After shopping online at a clothing store and purchasing a few items, I received a personalized, hand-written thank you card from the company. Most of the time, shopping online is impersonal, but the thank you card made my experience memorable, and I felt appreciated (and told all my friends). 

2. Great word of mouth is spread through topics that are "portable, clear ideas that one person can repeat successfully" (pg. 19). Sometimes, companies present ideas that are too complex, and customers get lost trying to figure out what the company is offering. By keeping the idea simple and easy, word of mouth can be spread quickly without distortion. To illustrate this, Andy used the example of kids playing "telephone," where a simple phrase is passed from child to child until the last child reveals what he/she heard. Usually, it's completely different from the original phrase. 

3. It is imperative to say who you are. This concept stood out to me quite a bit. I have read "customer" reviews that appeared not to have been written by customers, and it turns me off from products completely. If companies want to generate positive word of mouth, they need to join the conversation but identify themselves so that customers are not turned off. The "Stay out of Trouble" Checklist is helpful for making sure that you don't make blunders when participating in conversations with customers. 

Three most important things

The three most important things which I learned from the book Word Of Mouth Marketing by Andy Sernovitz are as follows:

1. I liked how the author explained “The four rules of WOM” which are as follows:
• Be Interesting: As per it make your company and its products interesting soo that people can talk about it. No one talks about boring and uninteresting stuff. One should be creative and unique in his findings.
• Make people happy: Try to please your customers to max. Produce really great stuff and provide best customer service. Afterall these happy customers are the ones who’ll convey their experiences further to others and will do free WOM Marketing for your company and its products.
• Earn Trust and Respect: Try to win your customers trust and respect. Make them feel proud about yourself, be good to them. These happy people are the ones who’ll grow your business.
• Make it Easy: Lastly try to share simple and understandable topics as they can be easy to remember, recall and share.

Thus, I learned that simply by keeping above four points in mind and implementing upon them intelligently, a company can make easy money and become popular in a healthy way with least investment in marketing through social media.

2. The second topic that attracted me was “What about Prizes and Rewards”. I liked the author’s concept of not mixing love and money together as then you may make your loyal customers feel dirty and low. Hence, some things are just not for sale like emotions and feelings. Sometimes it can not only turn a friend-to-friend relationship but also can make family members less believable and less trust worthy among eachother. At the end one should always think before working for rewards or incentives among known ones as it can create differences.

3. Lastly, I liked the topic “WOM Marketing isn’t deception”. I liked the author’s view that Deception, infiltration, dishonesty are the attempts to manipulate customers and are not long lived in WOM marketing. WOM marketing is not stealth marketing it can’t be faked. WOM marketing is about listening to consumers and giving them a voice which cannot be done by untrue and false means. Therefore one should never post fake reviews or false stories about themselves as they can create negative impact and can soon be caught. Consumers/customers are never foolish.