Recently, I was posed this question: Is it possible that people no longer trust advertising?
Without going into it too deeply take a look at this; a recent study done by Yankelovich (a noted social researcher since 1958), says that more than three-quarters of people believe that companies don't tell the truth in advertising. As a member of the marketing industry, do we deserve this? It's no secret that more than half of the people out there resist being exposed to or even paying attention to marketing and advertising. Overall most consumers have a more negative view of advertising than they did just a few years ago.
No matter how you look at it, these are not good trends. And as a marketing
professional, I just don't like the way any of that
sounds. But who can blame these people? There's
a lot of misleading and manipulative messaging out
there. "Free iPod!." "Lose 20 pounds
in 20 days."
Running alongside to this distrust is the consumer's. Because of us the advertisers, they're demanding and getting more control over media and content. New devices like MP3 players, personalized websites, Google alerts, blogs, National Do Not Call Registry, TIVO, commercial-free content, et cetera, are giving them more control and they're electing to filter are less than honest marketing messages out. Consumers are empowered, they self-select freely and even more telling, are willing to pay for their control! The traditional media that we the marketing industry have developed and relied on, is now losing its punch.
Today there are new and more meaningful ways to reach and connect with consumers. I'm not ready to say that traditional mass-marketing is no longer effective, but even a blind man can see the game is beginning to change. I feel a new day is dawning and these new developments are requiring all of us to adapt.
They are forcing marketers to look at the types of relationships we must have with consumers. We shouldn't be creating potentially adversarial relationships with customers where they feel they are constantly being interrupted, put under attack and manipulated.
Many marketers, and I'm including myself, are looking forward to word-of-mouth marketing (WOM). Word-of-mouth marketing is nothing new. It's as old as mankind itself, however it's really come into its own since the internet came along. It's become a new way to campaign and cut through the clutter and connect with consumers. And in the last couple of years this phenomenon has really taken off. Marketers are only now beginning to learn how to harness, amplify and improve.
According to the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, (Yes there's an association) word-of-mouth marketing is "giving people a reason to talk about your products and services, and making it easier for that conversation to take place."
Word-of-mouth as you know, can work for you or against you. Even if you don't participate in the conversation, that conversation still takes place. Let me give you an example, if a consumer is unhappy with your product, they can (and will) take pictures of defective products and post them on blogs, message boards and online communities.
They can and will tell the world why they hated (or loved) the latest blockbuster movie on Yahoo-Movies. And if they want, they can tell everyone who uses Epinions know that the hotel they just visited in Miami was a sewer pit or out of this world.
What makes word-of-mouth so powerful and so credible is it's ability to self-regulate, self- correct and is the only consumer-reviewing, consumer-protecting marketing out there.
Until now there's been no form of marketing that elevates the consumer to the level of the marketer. Word-of-mouth marketing is entirely dependent on real people to spread the message for you. You can't buy it, you can't rent it-- you have to earn it.
Only those companies with good products and good service will benefit from word-of-mouth marketing.
By its very nature, Word of mouth has built-in limits that force it to be honest. When you give customers the power to advertise for you, you give them the power to criticize you too. Bad traditional advertising runs as long as you pay for it. Bad or unethical word-of-mouth marketing is stopped by the same people you are asking to talk about you.
Many companies start using word-of-mouth marketing because it's effective marketing. They soon realize however, that the very act of embracing word of mouth forces them to be more responsive and more respectful. It makes them realize the value of their customers and treat those customers like real people.
Companies that treat people well, that earn good word of mouth, will make more money. For the first time, we have a phenomenon that puts marketing and social good on the same side of the table.
Footnote
Professor Chrysanthos Dellarocas of MIT has recently written a white paper that analyzes the economic impact of companies that pay employees or others to seed message boards, with comments that are favorable to company products. My suggestion is you just don't do it. The backlash is so severe, it's not worth it.
Word-of-Mouth Marketing page
