By Dr. Ivan R. Misner & Vince Vigneri
The latest catch phrase being bandied about in the
word-of-mouth crowd is “buzz.” Buzz is
defined as: creating awareness in the
marketplace of your business and/or product by stimulating conversations among
the consumer base.
The question I have to ask is, “Is buzz marketing
enough?” I have taught for years that
more people will talk about you, more loudly, when they are NOT happy with your
product or services. I want to be the
voice of discretionary caution in a world a-buzz with buzz!
I’m concerned that as more people flock to the
buzz-marketing concept they will think of it as a short cut to generating
referral business for themselves! There
is a sequence of events when marketing yourself with word of mouth that cannot
be shortchanged. You cannot eliminate
the development of relationships that need to be built in order to create solid
referral sources for your business.
Spending a lot of time, energy and money on stimulating buzz in the
marketplace and expecting a lot of new business as a result is probably not the
strongest way to go about developing referral sources for yourself.
There is a formula for developing a strong word-of-mouth
based business that is proven to work:
Visibility, Credibility and Profitability. Buzz is not a short cut for this
formula. You cannot go from visibility alone
to profitability where generating referrals is concerned. If you go about creating buzz for yourself
with the expectation that you are going to see a huge jump in your profit
margins, I think you will be sadly surprised.
Buzz can be difficult for more traditional businesses to
create. Some entrepreneurs, who are
frustrated with their lack of buzz, will even hire others to start a
“word-of-mouth” campaign for them. They
pay others to start blogging about their business, keeping their name in the
public’s attention by many very creative and ingenious methods.
Paying others to start talking about you feels like ordering
a quarter pounder with cheese and then opening the wrapper to find all you have
is the bun! People who are looking for
referrals want to get that referral from a genuine “raving fan”.
I submit that when you start to think about creating buzz
for your company, you should look first to the customers and clients to
generate that buzz.
That being said, if you are honest about how many customers
your clients are currently sending your way, most of us would be hard pressed
to identify ONE client who is sending 50 or more people a year our way. Over the last 10 years, I have asked tens of
thousands of business people, as I speak to audiences all over the world, for a
show of hands if “any customer has been so thrilled with your customer service
that he or she has referred 50 or more new clients to you.” I have yet to have anyone ever raise a hand
affirming that this is happening. What
this says to me is that good customer service is not enough to substantially
increase you business by referral.
People EXPECT good customer service.
Rather than expecting to see more and more referrals come
your way because of buzz about how great your business is, I encourage you to
focus on the relationships with your customers.
If you had to identify a customer you knew so well, whom you trusted and
who trusted you, based upon your willingness to hand him or her the keys to
your new car, or the keys to your house, and vice versa, could you identify
even one?? Think about this: each
customer, client, or patient has keys to contacts and referrals that can open
doors for you that you have so far only dreamed about! Deepening the friendships you have with your
potential referral sources is the only way you are going to have access to
those keys.
Where does buzz marketing work the best? I believe that buzz marketing is powerful for
SOME businesses, like restaurants, plays that are on in the community theater,
the weekly farmer’s market; however, the more mundane, every-day businesses,
like your tire shop, the bank you frequent and your health food store depend on
building solid relationships with customers and vice versa for referrals to
begin to fly.
People simply want to do business with others they know and
trust; buzz can be a great place to start meeting these people, but it doesn’t
eliminate the need to spend time and energy getting to know others so that they
can refer you with confidence and without hesitation.
I believe this must be done very systematically, by doing
things like catalyst events, one-to-one meetings where you conduct the GAINS
exchange interview with each other, putting into place incentives for others to
refer you, and developing Contact Spheres of inter-related business people who
can cross refer each other (for example, if you are a florist, spend time
developing strong ties with a photographer, videographer, travel agent, wedding
planner, and a real estate agent). I
have written articles here covering each of these techniques for developing
your referral business. I encourage you
to go back to the archives and review them.
Please understand that I’m NOT saying the buzz is not
effective. In some cases, it can be very
effective and for some businesses and events, it can be just what is
needed. I’m just not convinced that it
is a core strategy for building a solid word-of-mouth based business. There simply is no shortcut to developing the
relationships that are needed to see an appreciable increase in the number of
referrals you will receive to your company.
It all goes back to the farming vs. hunting metaphor. There is no shortcut for sowing the seeds of
referrals, tending the soil and caring for the budding relationships that
result.