I just finished the book “Word of Mouth Marketing” by Andy Sernovitz and it was a great read. Here are a few bullet points to get you started on word of mouth advertising. I’m going to make a full post later on how companies like Johnny Cupcakes, Threadless, and Linty Fresh have used word of mouth to great success.
- Look on the web for people talking about you.
- Decide who will join those conversations. Start today.
- Create a blog.
- Make a new rule: Ask “Is this buzzworthy?” in every meeting.
- Come up with one buzzworthy topic keep it simple.
- Put something on your site that will remind them to talk to a friend.
- Let your talkers sign up for a private newsletter.
- Pick one easy way to track down word of mouth.
- Put a tell-a-friend form on every page of your website
- Put a special offer in an easily forwardable email.
- Add a small gift and word of mouth tool to every package you sell.
- Have a private sale for your talkers.
- Apologize for mistakes and solve problems fast.
- Partner with a charity.
- Do something unexpected.
- Be nice.
Do something worth talking about!
I would recommend this book to anyone out there trying to find inexpensive ways to spread the word about thier company. You can get it at Amazon for under $17. Click the link below for a link to the book.
Word of Mouth Marketing: How Smart Companies Get People Talking
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December 30th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
No matter how often I think about buzz and viral marketing, whenever I read a list like yours, I get inspired to try harder to get the word out about our company.
Tx for putting an inspirational list (with a few good tips) together.
January 7th, 2009 at 2:01 am
Marketing is very important in the success of any business. I’ve found Myspace.com to be a great way to free advertise and market a product(s). So many people you can blog with.. have people leave comments on your latest creation, etc. So many websites out there are free and have a ton of users on them. Take advantage of the free part. A key ingredient in great business is spending less money, which frees up extra money to continue building your clothing company or whatever you do. This website has been a great help to me! Thanks a bunch!
January 20th, 2009 at 6:03 pm
This here is good stuff. Especially the one about doing something unexpected. Small businesses usually have trouble with this because it seems all they’re Ideas require large amounts of money. But if you really dig deep you can always find something that no one/not a lot of lines are doing.
March 12th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
This advice is really going to help, thanks.
March 22nd, 2009 at 1:03 pm
I wanted to comment and thank the author, good stuff