The Value of Word of Mouth to Marketers - Coursework Example

CRITICALLY DISCUSS THE VALUE OF WORD OF MOUTH TO MARKETERS due: Introduction Marketing is anintegral part of every institution. Many organizations, therefore, strive to achieve the best strategies and methods for marketing their products. Since the emergence of marketing, this field has been undergoing a metamorphosis with business focus growing from transaction type to more of a relationship type of business engagement (Barber & Wallace 2010, p. 19). Since the age of the industrial revolution with the emergence of many companies, each and every of these companies has been working ways to maintain and grow their market size. Many of these companies have, therefore, embraced relationship marketing as it builds trust with the customers, enhance reputation and grows business. A customer will always go to who he/she trusts most, where she feels loved and always leaves with a smile. Relationship marketing is a way of customer retention and acquisition. Word of mouth is an excellent technique of relationship marketing where a satisfied customer usually recommends the service to another potential customer. As easy it sounds this concept originates its roots from the human nature of passing information from one person to another and becomes complex as it evolves. It entails how a customer is treated; the wow experience and word grows (Kelly 2007, p. 193). In my work, am going to discuss word of mouth (WOMM) as a valuable marketing tool, how it has evolved, and how it builds relationships, comparisons to other means of marketing, limitations and role of organizations using this form of marketing, how to grow and spend less on marketing and why it is the most effective marketing tool that has survived the test of time. Evolution of Word Of Mouth in Marketing The emergence of the word of mouth marketing originates as far back as the preindustrial age periods with most organizations using it unknowingly. This emergence might have been due to evolutionary advantages i.e. the rule of reciprocity where humans would exchange tips on how to find shelter and food, the do good to me and I give back to you kind of society. At the onset of Agrarian revolution farmers produced more, markets emerged where conversations reign and word of mouth became a marketing tool from which one could tell who sold what, how, when and service became important to the people (Rosen 2002, p. 46). Industrial revolution brought in a more sophisticated aspect with different industries manufacturing same products to suit same needs. Marketing became more important with other forms like the use of media to advertise emerging, but word of mouth never lost relevance mostly to those with little capital to do media adverts; such as use of television to advertise ones products. The digital revolution set in with the internet and word of mouth became a viral tool globally with business reviews both positive and negative being exchanged through the internet from one person or a group to another in a matter of seconds. This was a new word of mouth platform, one that is currently shaping up businesses referred to as the electronic word of mouth marketing (EWOMM) (Martinez-Lopez 2013, p.34). Powered by the social media that is highly embraced with the current generation makes word of mouth more relevant and an important business tool than ever before. Many scholars have since been working on models to enhance this form of marketing. For example, George Abraham Silverman; he created a model to portray the word of mouth marketing. In his works, Silverman gathered a group of professionals to discuss new products in the market as he analyzed their behavior. It is from his works that he deduced the power of influence and positive referrals from one person to another that many marketers are now using to enhance businesses (Silverman 2011, p. 223). According to Chen & Xie (2008), media information moves in two different stages. We have opinion leaders who listen to the mass media and later pass the information as they understood it to the general public. The study showed the voting patterns and influence of people to others when making voting decisions (p. 447-491). It elaborated that informal and personal contacts were mentioned far more than the radio and newspapers as a source of decision-making; that is the word of mouth. Qualitative and Quantitative Review on Word Of Mouth In Marketing As I have discussed earlier how good and to how many the word gets to rely mostly on service delivery. It, therefore, mainly gives a qualitative view to the products and services being offered i.e. you get either positive reviews if your services are liked or otherwise negative reviews based on the quality of your product (quality). The target of the marketer is to get as much positive reviews as possible as it works as a selling point for the business (Obbelode 2009, p. 6). With the emergence of EWOMM, the number of reviews (quantity) to a product or service is also a matter of concern. Let’s take a look at for example amazon.com or eBay online shopping malls. A buyer is likely to be influenced to buy a product or service as per the number of likes, downloads, and or reviews which is basically the consumers rating of that product (Cakim 2009, p. 94). Companies have, therefore, embarked on online campaigns to have their products liked by as many people as possible to improve their ratings and influence consumer decisions towards their products. The way companies’ take social media have been seen to bring a positive impact on the success of that company. With this type of evolution, companies that do social media promotions otherwise referred to as social media influencers have been set up and are acting as second parties assisting other companies market their products through social media campaigns. This has also seen the development of socialites who are hired to do online media campaigns to increase online ratings. Some companies have also taken the initiative of starting own social media platforms acting both as customer service and marketing points (Kirby & Marsden 2007, p. 24). Word of Mouth Marketing Campaign Strategy With reference to Lazarsfeld, Berelson, & Gaudet, (1944), two-step flow model opinion leaders play an integral role in word of mouth marketing due to their exposure to external communication (p. 1). The power of this group of people has since been recognized and used to move marketing information in a certain direction rapidly. The main problem to most marketers is to who the message should be addressed to first in order to experience the full virility of the word of mouth and how to reach this group of persons. An effective word of mouth campaign strategy is, therefore, essential in order to realize the target market numbers. Specialization towards ones interest as most opinion leaders have specialty in a particular topic of interest. Preferential choices with people acknowledging opinion leaders differently compared to others and the ability to influence these opinion leaders with some being hard to influence than others and with different timings to adopt and grasp an idea or innovation are some of the difficulties encountered before a word of mouth campaign is enrolled. Marketers are, therefore, placed at a position of designing an effective WOMM campaign. This might include coming up with a set of guidelines to achieve the set target (Silverman 2011, p. 223). These guidelines might include, identifying people in the society who are willing to share the information and what they have experienced with a product and give their opinion willingly. Educating potential and onboard customers on the goods and services offered on a wider scale, noting the limitations, features and benefits can also serve as a guideline to achieve effective WOMM. Customer satisfaction is the most influential of the guidelines that a marketer should set. Satisfied happy customers are the best marketers of any market produce (Kelly 2007, p. 193). High level customer satisfaction is always reciprocated by positive referrals to friends and families and word moves round. To achieve the set market target using WOMM the marketer should also be involved in research and analysis of information on how societies share opinions, where and when. The media, through which these opinions are shared, will change the speed of flow of the information and its general acceptance will also depend on where the opinion was given. Taking a look at for example social media, if an opinion is passed via social media e.g. Facebook or Twitter on a certain product it will take seconds before it globally goes viral assuming it was well executed, however the target market might end up being only a certain age of people who frequent social media. In another case, if an opinion originated from a community leader at a social event the flow of this information will depend on how far the attendants of this event will communicate hence achieve more of less virility. These are two scenarios showing different virility of the same opinion but it is also good to remember the ultimate outcome is also dependent on which of the two media has the influencing power on these two groups of people (Kelly 2007, p. 194). The marketer might also be required to come up and plan for ways of facilitating the process as it flows. This might include offering free samples to a referral network, giving incentives and other ways that can make a customer market the produce (Sernovitz, 2012, p. 27). Appealing to the most influential people in a group to be comfortable with the promotional brand or the market produce is also a way of steaming word of mouth campaigns since they also serve to be the opinion leaders. Having a strong media campaign with humor and attractive to the general public coupled with a strong brand will make people talk about your company, give positive opinion and market the product. As easy as it looks WOMM campaign can also get more complex and uncontrollable if not well executed. Understanding the Value of Word Of Mouth to a Marketer As a marketer, marketing by word of mouth falls under the most effective approach to reaching out to the consumer. Word of mouth can originate as a consequence of other forms of marketing, as an accident when a consumer loves a product or service and starts talking about it or as an intention when companies use socialites and celebrities to create a buzz on a certain product (Kelly 2007, p. 193). Silverman (2011) critically explains on how both the pull and push strategies can enhance word of mouth marketing. Silverman elucidates that word of mouth has always been the force behind most of the marketing stunts that have gone viral. Word of mouth becomes viral when the content stops pushing itself, and the users now start promoting the content (p. 224). With the development of social media and the number of people flocking this sites any important business cannot ignore this form of marketing. Electronic word of mouth marketing (EWOMM) is a force to reckon with in today’s business world. WOMM has evolved from the one to one mode to a more sophisticated one. Social media seems to be influencing the way purchasing decisions are made. This form of the word of mouth marketing is more viral, and the effect is always felt globally through the World Wide Web. Making use of the social media effectively to market products should always be one of the goals of a marketer in the current business world due to the number of people the marketer can reach out to. The volume reached out using this form of marketing compared to other forms is also incomparable. Whereas a billboard will only reach out to people in the locality it, is placed, word of mouth will flow over borders (Cakim 2009, p. 96). Word of mouth is an extremely cheap and effective mode of marketing compared to traditional marketing techniques using mass media. It is not purchased by the consumer hence easily available to the target market vis-à-vis mass media marketing where the target media needs to be in possession of a receiver. It is also relatively expensive to post ads on the mass media and using millions to do campaigns might not be as effective as a simple word of mouth. The other important value of WOMM is that it reduces the operational cost of hiring a huge sales and marketing team to go talk about your products. Since the available clients will be doing the marketing work at a cheaper or even at no cost talking about the product. The company will, therefore, be marketing itself. The value of the word of mouth in accelerating other marketing strategies can also not be left out. A good TV advert will always be in the mouth of listeners. Some of the TV ads that were pulled from our TV’s long ago are still being talked about despite the fact that they are no longer being seen on television. This shows how word of mouth remains relevant even after we stop the other forms of marketing. It’s therefore important for a marketer to always have a post advert design plan focusing on the aftermath of an advert and what the consumer/viewer is likely to say about that advert and how much he/she will talk about it after it has been aired or published to pass the content around. Speed and the power of influence with which a concept is past to the desired party by word of mouth is also relatively fast and in most cases an influence to the target. A message communicated between two people who know each other is more likely to create a decisive impact than one passed from an unknown person. The power of the word of mouth also lies in the fact that the person passing the message is trusted and mostly known by the person receiving the message. Enormous spending on advertising campaigns may not be as valuable as a word of mouth from a trusted friend. With increased market competition, there is a paradigm shift towards a market that is consumer-focused with individuals buying products dependent on what a fellow consumer says about the product not what the company says. This is evident from various articles which reveal the influence of word of mouth along a product life cycle with its effect in the developing markets being huge. The role of WOMM in developing seller-buyer relationships is also enormous. If the available client is in a good relationship with the business, he/she will pass the relationship to friends and family. This creates a kind of a close relationship with the customers who feel appreciated and always work on enhancing the relationship. Companies, that use this form of marketing, will likely maintain their clients and grow a trusted customer base where sharing of information on different products becomes easy. Conclusion Marketing, as a tool of communication about a product value to potential customers in a business, being able to gain as many customers as possible and to convince them this is the right product is every marketers dream. As seen from my discussions with the evolution of the word of mouth from the agrarian to the digital age where social media reigns and flow of information from one to millions is possible, word of mouth marketing if implemented strategically is a form of viral marketing that can reach out to millions in seconds and influence the purchase power of a product. The value of the word of mouth to a marketer is, therefore, large and as shown for those working in the emerging markets word of mouth influences most of the purchase decisions. By employing the technique of the word of mouth, eventually, a product markets itself. Bibliography BARBER, P., & WALLACE, L.K. (2010). 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