Several months ago, in a blog post titled “Content Marketing is Peanut Butter and Word of Mouth is Chocolate” I drew an analogy of the two marketing approaches to the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup slogan: “two great tastes that go great together.”
I realize, though, that I’m too much in the habit of thinking about this primarily in terms of online marketing, social media, etc.
If this describes you, too, you might interested in reading what Rod Brooks, CMO of Pemco Mutual Insurance Company and President of Word of Mouth Marketing Association, shared in a recent blog post citing a Keller Fay study:
“despite our industry’s focus on digital engagement, the vast majority – 91% – of conversations about brands occur in-person or on the phone. Among Keller Fay’s survey participants, there were 10 times more offline conversations daily about brands versus online. The study also found that 60% of respondents reported a high likelihood to make a purchase based on an in-person interaction and that 67% of offline conversations are mostly positive.”
Here are 3 ways that Content Marketers can “loosen the tongues” of their audiences to encourage offline conversations about their brands:
1. Great Creative Drives Word-of-Mouth
Great creative drives word-of-mouth awareness. This may sound obvious, but I think it’s what’s missing from a lot of social media initiatives. To date, I think there’s been a tendency to view social media channels as a cheap way of avoiding paying for great creative. However, to the contrary, I believe that good creative today is as important as it ever way. So, ask yourself this question when starting your next content marketing initiative: “What content can we provide our audience that is so fascinating, remarkable and even fun that they’re going to talk about it with friends and colleagues?”
2. To Become a Talkable Brand, First Become a Definitive Resource
We only need to look at our own patterns of behavior to recognize how people habitually use the Internet to search information and reviews about purchases we want to make, or causes we want to support, etc. Often, we turn to Google to search for this info, and the web sites with the best, most resourceful content typically rank highest in Google search returns.
At the same time, the quality of content that most often delivers high search return rankings also has the potential to drive offline, word-of-mouth discussions.
Try this experiment: keep track of the number of times in a day, or in a week, that you or a friend or colleague makes a comment similar to “go to so-and-so’s site, because they’re the best resource on that product/service/cause.”
So, would you like to be a “talkable brand” as indicated above? Then use your content marketing strategy to become the definitive resource.
3. Empower Great Customer Support to Create Great Conversations
I don’t know about you, but for me personally, a bad customer experience today will send me flying to a competitor. Oh, and by the way, I’m going to tell all my friends about the reason for my flight. Sound familiar? Probably does, because I don’t think my feelings about customer service today are unique or unusual.
Keeping this in mind, think about and implement customer support content that can help you retain and maintain relationships with your customers. This may range from product or service training materials, to fun and amusing ways of keeping your customer support efforts in front of your clients.
Tags: content marketing, content strategy, womma, word of mouth
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