Consumers are talking — online. What are they saying about your company?
I love to find little gems. Design gems. Wisdom gems. Fashion gems. I recently stumbled upon a marketing gem, and it couldn’t be more poignant or timely. Joseph Jaffe, in a recent article in “Deliver” magazine, argues that starting a conversation with your target audience is what business should be thinking about now. Where is a large portion of this conversation already happening? You guessed it, on the big bad Web. Jaffe suggests that tools like blogs and social network sites like YouTube and MySpace have shifted marketing from a “one-to-many” conversation — business to the masses — to a “many-to-many” conversation — consumer to consumer with business joining in.
Here’s an example Jaffe gives: consumer is mad at his ISP and records his phone conversation with customer service, posts the audio to his blog, blog gets noticed by a newscast and consumer gets interviewed, someone uploads the interview to YouTube — now it’s gone viral. Okay, this isn’t going to happen in all cases, but new media has empowered consumers to share his or her experiences with their peers, who in turn share with their peers — instant online conversation. Smart businesses will learn to join that conversation in meaningful, honest ways.
Think you don’t need to be online? Think MySpace is just for kids and blogs are just for internet geeks with too much time on their hands? Think again. Your customers are online and they’re already part of the conversation. What will you do to join it?
Read the full article on www.delivermagazine.com
Visit Joseph Jaffe’s site at www.jaffejuice.com
