On Remarkability and the true spirit of WOM

Published 20071011 by Olivier Blanchard | E-mail this post

Let's travel back to 2005, when Word-Of-Mouth (WOM) hadn't yet been hijacked by clueless and myopic marketers looking to make a quick buck off the promise of this strange but powerful thing called authenticity:

From a two-year-old post by John Moore on his Brand Autopsy blog:

"My advice to clients is to spend dollars to make the product more remarkable, not to make the word of mouth tactic more remarkable. Otherwise, all people will be talking about is what your company did and not what your company does.
When working with clients, I stress the importance of TELLING THE STORY and not Making Up a Story.

TELLING THE STORY is about designing marketing communications to deliver on the promise all the while being clever, savvy, authentic, and true to the brand. It’s about treating consumers as being interesting and interested.

While, Making Up a Story is when marketers engage in outrageously gimmicky attention-grabbing antics that over-promise and woefully under-deliver. These marketers treat consumers as being boring, indifferent, and brainlessly gullible.
To me, the Subservient Chicken, Ugoff, Dr. Angus, and The King are diversionary marketing actions designed to get consumers to focus on the kooky creative Burger King did and not on the food Burger King does."

Next time a marketing firm or ad agency comes to you with a WOM strategy, do yourselves and your customers a huge favor by making sure they aren't just talking about messaging or creative.

Spend dollars to make the product more remarkable,
not the word of mouth tactic more remarkable.

Can we officially make this one of the ten commandments of Word of Mouth Marketing?

Pretty please?

Have a great Thursday. :)

Labels: bionic woman, messaging, WOMM, word of mouth