Word of Mouth: The Greatest Influencer

whisper

Want proof? On July 6th, Dave Carroll uploaded a self-made video to YouTube complaining about the poor treatment his luggage received on a United Airlines flight a year ago and the ensuing customer service runaround he has received. Big deal, right? Happens to many travelers according to various industry reports on domestic airline customer service complaints.

The difference is his video United Breaks Guitars was a well-produced music video with support from his band illustrating the storyline behind baggage handlers “playing catch” with his guitar on the tarmac in plain view of everyone on board the flight, and the personification of the “I don’t care” attitude he encountered afterward. Virally the news spread and within days his video had registered well over 3 million views and copycat complaints were making their way onto YouTube. United Airlines had their PR hands full. Word of Mouth. It can help you, or in this case it can hurt you.

Paul Rand, President-elect for the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, provided this as an excellent example of the power of Word of Mouth (WoM) marketing at a recent Marketing Executives Networking Group meeting in Chicago. He made some other interesting observations from his 20+ years of PR experience: 80% of WoM occurs offline.

However, Paul was quick to point out the very positive effects of WoM by praising Comcast, a cable provider, that has moved customer service to the uber-level via their Twitter page comcastcares where cable service issues are openly shared by customers and responded to with calm, specific resolve in near real-time by a CSR who started the dialogue as a means to help restore confidence in a company many love to hate.

Paul provided another strong observation: recommendation is the #1 influence on decision-making. No surprise there, marketers have paid honor to testimonials for decades. But his point is that unsolicted recommendation carries enough power to move a mountain. Both examples above secure that point.

So we have the extremes of WoM noted above which put it right on the table. Marketers can no longer push their one-way messages to the marketplace alone. They must also nurture relationships, create buzz for their products or services, and react more quickly to customer sentiment.

Colman Brohan Davis created its own buzz recently when Chip Grogg, our Executive Creative Director with a penchant for markers opined on his blog post about the old days of creating ads with paper and markers instead of Adobe CS3…”love that smell in the morning.” Kindred souls spoke of their old-school days of doodles. And quite possibly this has spawned a support group.