#Share

Natalie T. Wood, Caroline K. Muñoz

• Publisher: Business Expert Press
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781631574429
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Advertising
• Index: Business

Each day, millions of consumers venture online to search and exchange product information and to seek out and share opinions. Electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) communication has been shown to influence consumer actions across a variety of industries (King, Racherla, and Bush 2014). A significant portion of eWOM occurs on social media platforms. Whether it is a status update to Facebook of an upcoming vacation, a picture of a laundry room makeover on Pinterest, or a YouTube video discussing the features on the new iPhone, consumers are turning to a variety of social platforms to make everyday purchasing decisions easier for themselves and others. Indeed, social word of mouth (sWOM)—a subset of eWOM—has incredible reach with the potential to influence over two billion active social media consumers. The purpose of this book is to examine the influence of sWOM and provide guidance on how to operationalize its growing power. The goal of this book is to bring together industry best practices and academic research to help construct social media content that speaks with your brand voice, stimulates engagement, inspires consumers to share (#share), and complies with industry and federal guidelines. Each chapter highlights a key area of sWOM that will further your understanding and provide actionable information to assist you in mobilizing positive sWOM for your company.

CHAPTER 1

Social Word of Mouth Marketing (sWOM)

Figure 1.1 An example of social sharing on Twitter

Source: Courtesy of C. Munoz.

Too personal? A tweet can say a lot. And a tweet with a hashtag and an image not only communicates more, but is also much more likely to be shared. The screenshot in Figure 1.1 embodies many topics that this book will explore: the role of storytelling, the persuasive power of images, emotional appeals, personalization, and social sharing. It also marks the beginning a positive story—which is where all good social media campaigns (and books) should begin.

In the summer of 2014, Coca-Cola launched the personalized, “Share a Coke” campaign. Twenty oz. bottles of Coca-Cola, Diet Coke, and Coke Zero were adorned with 250 of the most popular American names for millennials and teens. Consumers were prompted to share their photos of the personalized bottles using #Shareacoke on social media. They could visit shareacoke.com to create, then share virtual, personalized bottles on Instagram, Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter. They could also be featured on Coke billboards by using #Shareacoke (Hitz 2014). Consumers were drawn to soda bottles that were emblazoned with not only their name, but also the names of their family and friends. Coca-Cola’s bottle personalization was putting into action something that Dale Carnegie taught us long before—“A person’s name is to that person, the sweetest, most important sound in any language.” So, naturally, consumers wanted to share their name discovery on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

Over the course of the campaign, consumers shared their experiences via the #Shareacoke hashtag over 250,000 times (Deye 2015). During the 2014 campaign cycle, more than 353,000 bottles were disseminated virtually (Tadena 2014). Geo-tagging and sales were correlated, and sure enough, there was a significant relationship between social sharing and sales (Deye 2015). By all accounts, the campaign was a sales success; Coke saw sales growth of more than 30 percent in one week (Deye 2015). Part of this success was certainly attributed to the power of social word of mouth (sWOM) marketing.

84 percent of consumers worldwide trust recommendations from family and friends more than any other type of advertising (Nielsen 2013).

Why Word of Mouth Marketing?

You are reading this book because you get it. Word of mouth (WOM) marketing is powerful—it impacts not only product preferences and purchasing decisions, but it serves to mold consumer expectations and even post-purchase product attitudes (Kimmel and Kitchen 2014). The beauty of branded WOM marketing communication is that it is a natural, normal part of our everyday conversations. In fact, 2.4 billion conversations each day involve brands (Google; KellerFay Group 2016). The ample number of conversations related to products and services is attributable to the fact that we need and actively seek out input from family and friends before we make a purchase. A 2016 study from the referral company Ambassador found that 82 percent of the respondents surveyed sought out recommendations before making a purchase (Patton 2016). One of the reasons that family and friends’ recommendations matter so much is that they are simply trusted more—84 percent of consumers worldwide trust recommendations from family and friends more than any other type of advertising (Nielsen 2013).

Marketing executives (64 percent surveyed) agree that WOM marketing is the most effective type of marketing (Whitler 2014). The creation and membership roll of WOMMA (Word of Mouth Marketing Association) who are devoted to “representing and improving the WOM marketing industry” underscores the importance of WOM. Outside of an implicit understanding that people seem to prefer the opinions of others over a TV advertisement, billboard, or branded website, on what information are marketers basing these beliefs? Can we quantify the effect of WOM?

In 2014, WOMMA along with six major brands commissioned a study to determine the ROI on WOM marketing (WOMMA 2014). This was the first major study addressing not only the differing category impact of WOM, but also its role in the overall marketing mix. Not surprisingly, the results reinforce many established beliefs about WOM’s level of importance.

• $6 trillion of annual consumer spending is driven by word of mouth (i.e., on average 13 percent of consumer sales).
• WOM’s impact on sales is greater for products that consumers are more involved with (i.e., more expensive, higher-risk).
• Most of the impact of WOM (two-thirds) is through offline conversations, whereas a third is through online WOM.
• WOM, directly and indirectly, impacts business performance. For example, it can drive traffic to website or search engines, which can then impact performance measures.
• WOM can amplify paid media (e.g., advertising) by as much as 15 percent. The value of one offline WOM impression can be 5 to 200 times more effective than a paid advertising impression.
• Two weeks after exposure, online WOM (85–95 percent) has a quicker impact than offline WOM (65–80 percent) and traditional media—TV (30–60 percent).

Are these numbers compelling enough?

If you were paying attention, you would have noticed that according to these statistics, offline WOM appears to matter much more. Wharton Professor and author of Contagious, Jonah Berger, also suggests that we are spending much too much time and effort on looking at online WOM (Berger 2013). Research supports Berger’s statement—a 2011 study from the Keller Fay Group found that only 7 percent of all brand-related WOM conversations occur online (Belicove 2011), with 94 percent of brand impressions happening offline (Google; KellerFay Group 2016). Berger suggests that this overestimation of online WOM occurs because we can easily see the conversation and we spend a lot of time online. And, we do spend a lot of time online; global online users spend more than six hours per day online (Mander 2015) with 50 minutes (on average) devoted solely to Facebook properties (i.e., Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger) (Stewart 2016). In the United States, 73 percent of consumers are online every day, 42 percent are on the Internet multiple times a day and 21 percent reporting an almost “constant” online presence (Perrin 2015). Without question, offline brand-related WOM matters more. But is online brand-related WOM limited to only 7 percent?

The truth is offline and online WOM are not like oil and water; they can and do mix. The 2014 WOMMA study illustrates that offline and online work together to, directly and indirectly, impact business performance. Consumers today move seamlessly between online and offline communication, making it increasingly difficult for us to pinpoint whether the message that we saw came to us in-person or via social media. And, the 7 percent?—that is from a study completed in 2011 (aka 35 years ago in Internet dog years). To offer some perspective, in September 2011, Snapchat launched and Instagram only had 10 million users. Smartphone adoption of American adults was at 35 percent (Smith 2011). Things are different in 2016. Instagram now boasts over 500 million monthly active users (Instagram 2015), and by the time you read this, smartphone adoption will be close to if not greater than 80 percent (comScore 2016).

Socializing online is seamlessly integrated into our offline lives. For today’s consumers, particularly those from a younger generation, there is no offline or online socializing, it is simply socializing. Even when we are supposedly offline, we are drawn back through a symphony of chirps and beeps alerting us to an online conversation we should be responding to. We are being normalized to believe that we should upload images of our food, family outings, and post about positive and negative consumer experiences. Consumer e-commerce websites, such as Amazon, are providing more opportunities for not only consumer comments, but also allowing individuals to upload images and videos showcasing their recent purchase. Consumer feedback or input is essential in the purchase of the product. This feedback is becoming increasingly visual. Take for instance, the online rental dress company—Rent the Runway. On the primary product screen for each dress, Rent the Runway shares photographs taken by their consumers wearing the rented dress. The company encourages consumers to review the dress and provide personal information such as their height, weight, bust, body type, age, size worn, usual size, and event occasion. For any one dress, there could be well over 100 photos highlighting not only the fit, but “how others wore it,” illustrating how to accessorize and wear one’s hair with the dress.

With the advent and ubiquity of smartphones, image and video creation is easy and uploading almost instantaneous. In 2015, consumers uploaded 700 million photos per day to cross-platform mobile messenger WhatsApp, 350 million to Facebook, and 70 million to Instagram. Relative to the number of users, Snapchat had the most photos shared with 8,796 per second (Morrison 2015). Video uploads are also incredibly high—up to 400 hours of video is uploaded each minute to YouTube (Brouwer 2015). Video consumption is even greater—eight billion views or 100 million hours of video watched is viewed each day on Facebook (Constine 2015a; Constine 2015b). And, if industry reports are accurate, consumers collectively watch close to five billion YouTube videos each day, totaling over three billion viewing hours per month (Statistic Brain 2016).

Marketers also seek to further blend online and offline worlds. Television and print ads are prompting consumers to go online and watch, follow, and like. Traditional televised news programs routinely integrate social media conversations and “what’s trending” segments. While old and new media continue to become more integrated, the line is also blurring between types of online media. Owned media (e.g., company website, blog), earned media (e.g., shares, reviews, reposts), and paid media (e.g., sponsored posts, tweets) are becoming fused. For example, finance website The Penny Hoarder (owned media) pays guest bloggers (paid media). The Dunkin Donuts website (owned media) has a rotating consumer social media feed of consumer content curated from Twitter and Instagram posts (shared media), which include the hashtag #DDPerksLove. Fashion-orientated discount store, Marshalls, has a very prominent, dedicated section of the website (owned media)—dubbed #MarshallsSurprise—devoted to displaying consumer (and ambassador) images from Instagram and Twitter accounts (earned and paid media). While Dunkin Donuts and Marshalls simply take a gallery approach to integrating social media, furniture store Pier 1 Imports takes it a step further, integrating social WOM to direct purchases. On the Pier 1 store website, under the heading, “#Pier1love,” there is a curated list of photos taken from consumers’ Instagram accounts. When you click on each Instagram image, it enlarges, and consumers are asked to “Shop This Look.” A Pier 1 store item taken from the displayed Instagram picture is then pictured separately and linked to the retail landing page for purchase. Another approach that creatively blends earned and owned media are branded Snapchat lenses and Facebook filters. Taco Bell turned consumers’ heads on Snapchat into large tacos on Cinco de Mayo (with 224 million views by May 5, 2016), while IronMan Masks covering individuals faces using Facebook filters resulted in over 8 million views by March 9, 2016 (Meeker 2016). So, why are marketers exerting this level of interest in both shaping and spreading sWOM? You know the answer—many consumers are more likely to purchase a product after seeing it shared on social media via a friend or family member (Patton 2016). WOM marketing matters. So let’s explore it together.

Traditional WOM and Electronic WOM (eWOM)

Without question, WOM marketing is powerful and perhaps is one of the most persuasive factors in the consumer decision-making process. The focus on WOM marketing has grown exponentially and with it, related marketing constructs intended to increase its potency: influencers, referral programs, brand ambassadors, viral marketing, seeding campaigns, and brand communities (Kimmel and Kitchen 2014). A growing number of companies have been created to capitalize on the power and potential of WOM. But what exactly is it and how does word of mouth extend to the Internet?

WOM marketing is not new—but rather our appreciation, evolving technology, and growing number of firms and resources devoted to the topic is what has changed. The WOMMA trade association defines WOM marketing as “any business action that earns a customer recommendation.” Academically, numerous definitions have been put forward that are typically more complicated than industry’s (see Kimmel and Kitchen 2013 for a review). For example, “word of mouth is the interpersonal communication between two or more individuals, such as members of a reference group or a customer and a salesperson” (Kim, Han, and Lee 2011, 276). Or “in a post-purchase context, consumer word-of-mouth transmissions consist of informal communications directed at other consumers about the ownership, usage or characteristics of particular goods and services and/or their sellers” (Westbrook 1987, 261). Both definitions focus on the activity or the result of the activity (i.e., similar to WOMMAs) (Ki...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Preface
• Chapter 1. Social Word of Mouth Marketing (sWOM)
• Chapter 2. The Social Consumer: The Who, What, Why, and How Behind Sharing
• Chapter 3. Social Business: It’s Not Just About Marketing
• Chapter 4. Legal and Regulatory Issues: Clear and Conspicuous Disclosures
• Chapter 5. Social Media Policy and Guidelines: The Rules of Engagement
• Chapter 6. Storytelling: What Do You Say and How Do You Say It
• Chapter 7. Social Influence: The Power of Persuasion
• Chapter 8. sWOM on Popular Platforms
• Appendix: List of Resources
• Index
• Adpage