WhipperSnaPR

This morning, I was at a BIMA roundtable event spearheaded by Dave Balter, founder of BzzAgent. It was titled, “Bringing Word of Mouth into your Marketing Mix.” Most of the content of Dave’s presentation and the succeeding discussion was a nice review for me, but it also sparked a few thoughts that dug a little deeper.

Finding a balance between traditional marketing and the new forms of “grassroots” marketing can be difficult. But, before that can be accomplished, I think the industry must first find a balance between the many segments of this new avenue of communication.

(Maybe, even before that, we should decide on an umbrella name for grassroots, word of mouth, collaborative marketing, viral marketing, etc. I like customer,constituent or audience engagement)

Dave summed up his presentation into 5 key points of word of mouth marketing:

1. Don’t use entertainment as a substitute for the brand
2. Consumers will do what they want with your brand
3. Buzz does not always equal word of mouth
4. Don’t lie, cheat, steal or deceive
5. The only for successful word of mouth marketing is a great product

Dave caught my attention right off the bat. He began by explaining that viral and word of mouth are not the same. He explained that viral marketing substitutes the brand for entertainment and, therefore, breaks the number one rule of word of mouth marketing.

He used the Paris Hilton commercial for Carl’s Jr. as an example:

It was extremely viral and it is easy to see why. I counted 333,702 views on YouTube from the first search page alone. I’m sure the clip was viewed just as many times on any number of websites, communities and blogs. But, as Dave pointed out, there was a problem: during the time this ad aired, sales dropped 3%. Why? The Carl’s Jr. Brand was compromised. They focused all of their energy on creating a viral campaign rather than a word of mouth campaign.

I’m not going to dispute Dave’s claim here. In fact, I’ll support him. The commercial, although eye catching, does not include any call to action. If their goal was increased brand exposure, they got it; but, this ad may be giving the brand a new identity. If they were aiming to build a stronger brand or increase sales, they failed.I have to ask, though: can’t word of mouth and viral marketing function successfully together? In fact, if executed successfully, wouldn’t they compliment each other? Wouldn’t one serve as an accelerator for the other, and visa versa? Shouldn’t the two be symbiotic?

If you compromise your brand in order to create a viral conversation, then chances are you won’t reach any goals tied to that brand. And, to many companies, the brand is everything. But, not all viral campaigns have to substitute brand for entertainment. A great viral campaign would find a way to make the brand entertaining in a way that the audience will be laughing with you… not at you. Once you’ve found a way to creatively develop the right balance between brand and entertainment, you will need word of mouth conversations before your campaign will ever go viral.

I’m not quite sure how to conclude this drivel. It reality, I may never reach a conclusion. I have a feeling that by the time we as an industry find the right balance, the medium du jour will have morphed into something even more exciting, confusing and frustrating.