Audience confidence in direct-to-consumer advertising is declining, and it is not as effective as it used to be. It has been replaced by native advertising and word of mouth: personal recommendations, reviews and online reviews are now much more effective, becoming a key factor in consumers’ purchase decisions and building trust in the brand.
We can see that consumers trust recommendations from friends and reviews from strangers more than they trust product advertisements — this should be taken into account by marketers, when developing a marketing strategy.
What is word-of-mouth
Word of mouth is a form of communication that involves the free and voluntary dissemination of information about a brand and its products by consumers.
Through word of mouth, the focus of marketing shifts from collecting likes and followers to actively seeking connections with customers.
The main fuel of word-of-mouth is a community of users willing to voluntarily share information about a brand’s product and content.
Influence mechanisms to activate word of mouth
Here are some tactics you can add to your marketing strategy to develop word of mouth:
Don’t spare any investment in customer marketing — all your costs will be recouped several times over.
When customers get more than they are promised, it feels good. So the likelihood that they will choose you over a competitor next time is increased.
For example, take care of the customer’s comfort and offer them a delicious coffee while waiting for a manager. Instead of an answering machine, call back and resolve the issue in person. Say Happy New Year with a nice greeting card and a small gift — perhaps the client will share it on social media, and more people will know about you. Along with the delivery of the product, send the customer a welcome letter from the company director, with nice words of thanks and a few words about the brand values. There are many more options to choose from, depending on your brand positioning, finances and creativity.
2. Highlight your customers
A great way to differentiate your customers is through the use of UGC.
UGC is great because it benefits both the brand and the customer. Thanks to UGC, the company receives constantly updated content that does not require time or money to generate. Its authors are the clients of the company. You, as the representative of the product or service, only need to directly or indirectly motivate them to create and distribute it, and then use the material intelligently on your resources.
3. Launching a referral programme
We all have a lot to do and very little free time. Even people who genuinely like your product are unlikely to spend a lot of time and energy recommending you on social media or writing a review.
So you need to come up with something that will motivate consumers to leave reviews about your product, share recommendations and links to your service.
A great example of using a two-way referral programme is demonstrated by Dropbox. The service offers 500 MB of extra storage space not only to the user who submits the referral link, but also to the person who registers using it.
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