Research
On the art of triggering word of mouth
By Louisa Ada Seltzer
Aug 26, 2008 - 1:10:05 AM

Last year word of mouth marketing topped $1 billion for the first time, according to PQ Media, making it one of the fastest growing areas of media. But in an era of increasing emphasis on return on investment, with media budgets down and the media economy lurching, some media people remain wary of WOM, for good reason. It’s difficult to control and it’s harder to plan than, say, a commitment to print or TV. Those concerns are part of what prompted the new book “Conversational Capital: How to Create Stuff People Love to Talk About.” Authors Bertrand Cesvet, Tony Babinski and Eric Alper discuss not how word of mouth is spread but how it is triggered. Their argument: Giving consumers a place to talk, via social networking or user-generated content, isn't enough to create buzz about your product. You need to give them something really good to talk about. Cesvet, chairman of Sid Lee agency and co-author of “Capital,” talks to Media Life about creating versus transmitting word of mouth, why Corona has a good strategy, and why Budweiser’s Wassup? guys became the ultimate buzz generators.
 
What is conversational capital and how does it differ from buzz?
 
Buzz is about communication. It’s something that happens or doesn’t happen, but it’s not something that’s understood.
 
Conversational capital is a call for intensity. The product can become a media or a message, but the more intense the better. It’s all based on a low-saliency message that’s repeated a lot. Frequency is what our industry is banking on. It doesn’t matter if it’s an ad or not, just make sure the message is so intense that people get it the first time around.

How can you engineer word of mouth? It is possible to develop products to generate word of mouth, which as we know can be an incredible currency. So that’s what differs.
 

What's the most important thing media buyers and planners need to know about conversational capital?
 
I’m hoping to challenge media buyers to revisit what they consider media. I’m saying, if you take Red Bull, it advertises but it’s also focused on creating very intense moments for consumers to be close to the brand.
 
The entire media industry is based on the notion that frequency is required, and I agree it’s very good, but the other elements are the quality and intensity of those messages.
 

We obviously know how word of mouth is transmitted, especially in the internet age. But how is successful WoM created?
 
It’s created basically by embedding some engines of conversational capital. I discuss eight engines of conversational capital -- we’re not claiming we’ve invented this thing, but we’ve observed WoM success.
 
Cirque du Soleil is very successful but it’s not driven by advertising. People are compelled to talk about it when they come out of the big tent.
 
To me a great example of salient advertising is the infamous 1984 Apple ad that only ran once. 
 

What's an example of a successful WoM campaign?
 
A very interesting one was in beer. A few years ago the “Wassup” ad from Budwesier. That started online and wasn’t developed for TV. They did it and only placed it online. Then people became interested online and were sending it to each other. The question is, what was so special about those ads? And that’s what we have to look for in creating advertising.
 
For instance, very often we produce ads to convince people. And that’s one mindset. But if we’re creating ads to convince people and make sure it generates WoM, it’s a completely different mindset.
 
In advertising what I’ve found that works is if we’re capable of inserting words that make it into the language of people, that’s a very strong word of mouth. It adds meaning to the ad, and it creates currency people can use in conversation.
 
Once you recognize consumerism is part of people’s conversational fabric, then you have to develop stories to work your way into that fabric.
 

What are some of the biggest myths about WoM?
 
The biggest myth to me is the way it’s understood.
 
If Richard Branson wants to launch an airline in the U.S. and shows up in Times Square with 20 women wearing wedding dresses, we all talk about it and then we all think the job is done.
 
But on Virgin airlines you can get a massage, and that’s unique, which I call product exclusivity. All of a sudden there you have a story. It’s not a big massage, it’s not all that great, but it’s a massage nonetheless.
 
In my opinion I think conversational capital and positive WoM lives in authenticity and truly embedding people into the product.
 

How important are real-life examples to successful WoM campaigns?
 
Well, say you’re starting a restaurant in the scene in New York and you want it to be known. You want to create a singular experience that people talk about rather than place an ad in The New York Times. So what the restaurants do is find amazing ways of creating an experience that are so unique that people are compelled to talk about it.
 
If you look at a lot of categories, it’s naturally done that way. My question is, why can’t we apply the same principles elsewhere?
 
In packaged goods, for instance, Corona under-spends everybody. But they have the ritual of inserting the lime in the bottle. That very small ritual creates a way to consume the product that’s very different, and then people talk about it, communicate it, etc., with a lot of enthusiasm.
 
In the book I talk about Ikea, and how that whole experience is very ritualized, and very unique. This kind of example has created a mammoth global brand that’s very successful without much advertising.
 
I’m not saying that all eight engines of conversational capital have to be there, but by thinking about them it makes a big difference.
 

Is it possible to manage and control WoM?
 
Manage and control, no. But what I’m saying is take a long hard look at what you do. Try to build the engines into it and let it happen.
 
Yes, it’s possible to engineer word of mouth. But once you’ve done that, it exists in the brains of people and it’s up to the consumers to want to talk about it. What I’m saying is, give them something to talk about. That’s how very clever marketers have done it for the longest time.