The Digital Vibes

For newbies to the field of Word of Mouth (WOM) marketing, do visit the Word of Mouth Marketing Association’s (WOMMA) website at: http://womma.org

Like you, I was surprised to learn that there is an association dedicated to WOM, I guess if we are curious enough we do learn something new everyday. Anyway, its website is a good resource for those of us looking to build greater buzz for our brands online.

Listed below are common types of word-of-mouth marketing described by WOMMA:

• Buzz Marketing: Using high-profile entertainment or news to get people to talk about your brand.
• Viral Marketing: Creating entertaining or informative messages that are designed to be passed along in an exponential fashion, often electronically or by email.
• Community Marketing: Forming or supporting niche communities that are likely to share interests about the brand (such as user groups, fan clubs, and discussion forums); providing tools, content, and information to support those communities.
• Grassroots Marketing: Organizing and motivating volunteers to engage in personal or local outreach.
• Evangelist Marketing: Cultivating evangelists, advocates, or volunteers who are encouraged to take a leadership role in actively spreading the word on your behalf.
• Product Seeding: Placing the right product into the right hands at the right time, providing information or samples to influential individuals.
• Influencer Marketing: Identifying key communities and opinion leaders who are likely to talk about products and have the ability to influence the opinions of others.
• Cause Marketing: Supporting social causes to earn respect and support from people who feel strongly about the cause.
• Conversation Creation: Interesting or fun advertising, emails, catch phrases, entertainment, or promotions designed to start word of mouth activity.
• Brand Blogging: Creating blogs and participating in the blogosphere, in the spirit of open, transparent communications; sharing information of value that the blog community may talk about.
• Referral Programs: Creating tools that enable satisfied customers to refer their friends

I’ll be keeping you updated with more knowledge of WOM, stay tuned!