The Time Scale of Word of Mouth - What's the Shelf Life of Your Buzz?

This diagram and text are taken from the Buzz Canuck blog. The full post can be found here. It is interesting to see how powerful experiential marketing can be. When executed correctly it can help promote customer evangelism.

Experiential marketing - providing a transforming and immersive experience for a fan, customer or influencer, typically in the form of an event - lasting impressions of what the brand stands for and who it attracts may have ongoing attraction for participants (as only 10% believe they ever receive a positive customer experience anyway, this can come as a nice surprise), however, given experiential nature - feelings and memories do wane off over time unless repeated

Relevant occasions where used: where full scale experience can't be provided to all prospects (automobile sampling), creation of lifestyle brand/sentiment, affiliation with lifestyle property or values and where customers or fans like to congregate offline for entertainment, information, aesthetic enjoyment or escape


Customer Evangelism - the nirvana of brands seeking community strength - customer evangelism and zealotry, where oftentimes organization of this form of word of mouth is hosted by the fans themselves not the company (Ikea positive fanatics, Apple fans ) - this is truly the area where lifetime value of the customer plays a role as brand loyalty and affinity can span decades - obviously, from an orchestrated word of mouth approach - this takes year over year investment, company-wide embrace of customer/community centricity and dedicated resources to incubate sustainable enthusiasm

Relevant occasions where used: where the customer experience is so good, where a strong trust bond has been built up between brand and customer, premium and/or well-differentiated brands, brands with a strong point of view and experience that lives it, where employees are as big in the brand as most rabid customers

So as the women bar owner in the Blue Brothers movie responds to the question- "so what kind of music do you have here? Oh we have both kinds, country and western". I find word of mouth is considerably more discriminating and variety-driven.

Heineken Follow Up

In a follow up to their hugely successful walk in fridge ad that I previously posted Heineken have released this:



It is a lesson for making sure your get the brief correct...! Not as cool (pun fully intended) as the original but I still want one.

Who told you about Susan Boyle?

One of this week’s most widely reported and talked about stories has been the appearance of Susan Boyle, a 47 year-old singer from Scotland, on the show Britain’s Got Talent. If you haven't seen Susan or heard of her meteoric rise to internet fame where have you been?! Susan has taken the World by storm and in only a few days has become one of the biggest viral hits of all time. According to Visible Measures and Mashable Susan Boyle related videos had achieved 93.2 million views by 10pm ET (USA) on Sunday.

How did everyone find out about it? Word of mouth used to be a face to face recommendation however with social networks such as facebook and twitter the reach has increased exponentially while the personal recommendation remains. Obviously this is one of the advantages of social media and I am not telling you anything new. In the case of Susan Boyle it is great to see a good news story getting the treatment. As the people at Domino's know only too well it is usually the bad experiences and the detractors which get the attention.

The tendency to spread bad news is human nature and is beautifully illustrated by Mario Vellandi in response to a challenge by David Armano on the Logic & Emotion blog.



Perhaps bad news travels well as it is inherently more interesting, shocking, confronting. Whatever the reason it is great to see the SBP (Susan Boyle Phenomenon) spread across a variety of networks solely on the basis of the underdog coming good. Best of luck Susan although I doubt you'll need it.

Fancy a game of Chess?

BMW makes an audacious move here in its battle against rival Audi. The latter apparently erected a billboard taunting, "Your move, BMW," for its redesigned 2009 A4, on a thoroughfare in Santa Monica. Shortly thereafter, in a bit of inspired luxury auto one-upmanship, signage for BWM's M3 sedan appeared across the street with the line, "Checkmate." It's a fun, in-your-face concept that's fast earning kudos in auto and ad media worldwide. (Juggernaut Advertising, an independent agency in Santa Monica, created the response ad for BMW of Santa Monica.) Audi should just shrug it off and respond with an ad proposing "Two out of three?"

- Tim Nudd AdFreak

Lindt Gold Bunny Eggsperiential Campaign

Lindt chocolates brought a little family magic to the Westfield London shopping centre over Easter whilst also raising much needed funds for Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital.



Lindt Gold Bunny World created a magical atmosphere for the whole family. The Gold Bunny oversaw the proceedings which included an engaging bunny maze created from real hedgerows. The maze took families on an exciting journey to the centre, where they found a Lindt Gold Bunny surprise. To make sure no-one got lost there were Lindt Master Chocolatier stilt walkers to help families through the maze and to find their chocolate treats!

There was also free colouring and painting activities for children and an exclusive Lindt Gold Bunny pop up shop where families could purchase their own Lindt Gold Bunny or Bunnies! With a minimum £1 donation from the sale of each delicious Gold Bunny going to Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity; the aim was to raise £25,000 in order to assist with the upkeep and maintenance of patient family accommodation.

While I am unaware if they achieved their target it is a fantastic piece of work for a good cause and deserves all of the attention it can get.

If you missed out on this great event but would still like to help please go to the GOSH site for more details.

Experiential marketing versus features and benefits

Marketing has traditionally been all about features and benefits. Marketers have assumed that customers are rational decision makers who can weigh up the features and benefits of a product easily against narrowly defined competition. Advertising companies have used these assumptions as a strategy, by emphasising these features and benefits to persuade consumers to purchase. For example an advert for a car may talk about the antilock braking system, the built in roll cage and the airbags and side impact protection system (the features) to emphasise the safety (benefit) of the vehicle.

Experiential marketing builds on these assumptions. Today, customers take functional features and benefits, product quality and a positive brand image as a given. Consumers still expect all of the above attributes but in addition they expect to be entertained, to have their senses stimulated and to be able to incorporate the product into their lifestyle.

Traditional F&B marketing still has its place however it is primarily focused on influencing the behaviour of the consumer up to the point of purchase. There is no follow up for the brand as to whether the customer enjoyed the consumption experience. This can lead to trial and brand switching. Experiential marketing focuses firmly on the consumption situation as an experience. In order to get repeat purchasing a consumer has to enjoy the whole brand experience. By influencing the consumer in the post purchase period the experiential marketer can increase customer satisfaction and brand loyalty.

By focusing on the consumption situation and the customer experience experiential marketing treats the consumer as a human being whose decisions are based on rational thinking as well as emotional influences. Instead of focusing on narrowly defined product categories such as shampoo or shaving cream the experiential marketer thinks “grooming in the bathroom.”

This holisitic approach allows experiential marketing to build upon traditional F&B marketing. In his book, Experiential Marketing, Bernd Schmitt highlights some great examples of companies using experiential marketing to build upon their established F&B campaigns. What is becoming clear is that while experiential marketing doesn’t replace the need for emphasising the features and benefits of a product it is becoming an essential part of the marketing mix.

More feel good street theatre

Bet this puts a smile on your face...



Told you so!

7 things you didn't know about me!

I haven't had time to keep up to the latest goings on in the marketing World this week so thought I'd throw in a random post. Not that there's much structure to this blog anyway...

1. I am slightly accident prone and tend to get injured often.

To be fair you probably did know that but having broken around 20 bones I curiously have never had any stitches. I have lost a lot of skin over the years, the worst being at a wedding in Perth where I fell as I grabbed 2 kids from running on to the road. The skin loss was obviously sore but when Jill ripped the dried baby wet one from my head I fainted for the only time in my life hitting my head off the sink on the way down. That hurt too.

2. When I was a kid I wanted to be a vet.

I even did my work experience at the local vet surgery where I got to give a dog an injection to put it to sleep. This was supposed to be a privilege but the owner wanted to come in at the last moment to be with his life-long companion and thanked me for putting him out of his misery (the dog that is). I will never forget the old man sobbing as he was escorted out by the nurse while the vet dropped the dog in to a bin bag and threw it in the shed for collection. Guess you don’t have to be an animal lover to be a vet...

3. I used to be in an orchestra.

I played the clarinet for 7 or 8 years when I was at school. I never got round to practicing though so any potential the teacher thought I had was and remains largely unfulfilled. I still have the clarinet but it hasn’t held a tune in quite some time. Maybe one wet weekend it will make a long overdue appearance.

4. My biggest fear is not being successful.

Well, not making a difference anyway. For as long as I can remember I have wanted to be a millionaire. This isn’t based on any notion of what I could do with the money or even what it means but just because it was difficult to achieve and somewhat exclusive. I guess the value of 1 million pounds in 1985 is quite different to 1 million dollars in 2009. I am not sure what it really means anymore but I would still like to feel like I was making a difference and contributing something meaningful.

5. I was a member of the National Ferret Welfare Society.

I had a pet ferret called Gnipper when I was a teenager. He used to live in a hutch in our porch and was very playful if a little head strong. They make great pets although they can smell a bit if you don’t clean the cage out often enough. My brother was not a fan.

6. I love being a dad.

Despite Eilidh only being 9 months old I can’t imagine (or remember) life without her. She is fascinating to watch and great fun to play with. She does something different everyday and is always laughing which is contagious. I guess I am biased but I think she is gorgeous. Having discovered how much fun it is being a dad I would like to have 2 more as soon as possible. Jill is still to come round to the idea. Twins would be fun...!

7. I have an irrational dislike of random people.

I sometimes develop a dislike for someone famous based on no logical or even reasonable cause. Mick Hucknall from Simply Red is at the top of the list. Martine McCutcheon from Eastenders is a close second. Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman take out the couple crown. They all irritate me greatly for no known reason although I must emphasise that ginger hair has nothing to do with it.