IWOMC (International Word of Mouth Conference)
May 18-19, 2006 – Barcelona
There was a real mix of speakers at this years conference, perhaps with a bias to the role technology plays in word of mouth and viral communications. Below are some of the key themes that came through the array of topics:
Engagement and CGM
One of the reasons that WoM marketing techniques work so well is the high level of engagement customers can have with them compared to traditional ‘push’ marketing methods. Mark Kingdon CEO of the online agency Organic began his presentation with a discussion about what people are naturally interested in; “sex, pets and the absurd”. He pointed us toward the ‘most emailed photo’ feature in Yahoo to demonstrate this (check for yourself click here)
Another website demonstrating this phenomenon is YouTube.com, where members can post any piece of video they want as well as view and comment on others. What’s astounding is the number of viewings that some files get - in excess of 10 million – for zero cost. Mark’s point was that these viewings (or impressions), were willingly made by users - not pushed at them during unwanted TV commercial breaks.
For example, on YouTube the visually stunning Sony Bravia plasma screen ad has been sought out and viewed more than 3 million times. Consider the extra impact that each of these voluntary viewings had over those beamed uninvited at consumers in their front room. This extra impact is at the centre of engagement theory.
Mark continued on to talk about how Organic apply this thinking to CGM (customer generated media) campaigns for clients. For the Dodge Charger they enabled prospective customers to ‘mash-up’ their own video clips and then mail them virally to friends.
In their latest campaign for the Dodge Caliber, they’re exploring the myspace.com phenomenon by creating characters called Pig & Bear that MySpace users can nominate as friends. As you’ll see if you visit the site www.myspace.com/anythingbutcute, this creates a unique level of dialogue between customers and the brand. At time of publishing more than 5500 my space users had nominated pig and bear as friends since the campaign launch last week!
Buzz marketing
Two companies presented on this topic at the conference; BuzzAgent from the USA and Buzzer from the Netherlands. Both work by providing samples of new products (anything from OTC medicines to comedy acts) to a network of people who will use the product and if interested pass on recommendations to their networks of friends.
These people (known as ‘Buzzers’ or ‘BzzAgents’) are unpaid and are open about their involvement with the campaigns. Their motivation comes from knowing about the ‘latest thing’ and perhaps even shaping the development of the product through their feedback. They are required to report back about each WoM interaction they have.
Dave Balter CEO of BzzAgent (which has more than 180,000 BzzAgents in the USA) said that in markets where buzz campaigns are used in conjunction with traditional media, there is an up to 66% lift in sales (Wharton School Publishing case study). Both companies have been approached by pharma but are not set up to work with prescription only medicines or disease areas.
the Blogosphere
This is perhaps the hottest topic in WoM marketing right now. Blogging (where customers publish their own personal opinions in a ‘weblog’ on the internet) has become a phenomenon. Miguel Acostas from AskJeeves.com reported that there are approximately 35 million blogs being published globally and their power to spread both positive and negative word of mouth to a huge audience in a short amount of time has become renowned; a recent example being the impact a small number of dissatisfied bloggers had over the launch of the ipod Nano and its issue of defective screens.
Blogs and online discussion groups therefore provide a ‘free’ medium through which word of mouth can spread quickly. The difficulty of working with blogs (once you’ve gotten over customers saying whatever they want about your brand and you) is that there are very few ways to get directly involved in the conversation. The unanimous opinion at the conference was that seeding blogs is a grave no-no; bloggers quickly recognise it and such practices will only lead to the devaluation of the medium. Rather than helping your brand, it will harm it.
Miguel estimated that only 2% of the UK population regularly read blogs. On top of this, with an estimated 70 million blog stories published each day and rising – over time it could well be that this overpowering noise devalues the power of the blog. The overall consensus among speakers was that although blogging is newsworthy right now, the reward it offers marketers as a communications medium is probably outweighed by the inherent risk.
Active Listening
For now, where Blogs offer best value is the insight they provide into what customers really think about the brand both positively and negatively; thereby providing untainted feedback in a way that traditional research methods can’t. As Laurent Flores, CEO of CRMMETIX put it “asking questions is not listening”.
Blogs and online discussion forums give us a way to listen into real life word of mouth as it happens. We can act upon it in at least 2 different ways:
- to pick up on the real brand stories and memes used by customers to enhance our story’s“stickiness”
- to put right what isn’t working within the brand experience
So what – the relevance for healthcare and pharma
Our three key takeaways for us from the conference:
- How much do we truly listen and engage with customers (especially opinion leaders) and how much do we just try to push messages at them? In the light of the thinking above, the classic ad board or meeting at which we present data and messages would appear to be wanting. Our strategic positioning processes need to be able to genuinely engage with customer thinking (without being dictated to by it)
- How have we embraced the online (blog) world as a strategic communications tool? It would seem that in healthcare this area tends to be on the fringe of PR activity, rather than as a key way to gather precious customer insight
- Viewing the conference as a whole it’s clear that WoM marketing in its many guises is now finding its way into mainstream marketing plans. We believe that healthcare – with its technology based products and the delineated opinion leader structures - has the potential to lead the way in the strategic application of WoM thinking.
For more information, or to comment on the above, please contact matt.rowley@thecentralgroup.com
The Sony Bravia ad on YouTube.com
The Pig and Bear site
Track the blogosphere with technorati.com
