11 ways to fail at word of mouth marketing

Great research from Sean Moffitt at Agent Wildfire.

Being inauthentic   70.7%
Not creating two-way dialogue  51.2%
Lieing about identity i.e. fake blogging 51.2%
Not measuring what happens  46.3%
Not having a strategy   43.9%
No links to achieving business objectives 26.8%
Not changing company practice as a result of it 22.0%
Losing the brand message  14.6%
Not taking enough risk    9.8%
Not spending enough on it    9.8%
Not building it over time    7.3%

Look here for the full survey and a chance to participate.

Comments

Alanna said... (Jul 22, 2008 1:29:16 PM)

It misses one biggie - having a lousy product. Word of mouth depends on being good enough to be worth talking about.

Sean Moffitt said... (Jul 22, 2008 7:54:34 PM)

Thanks for the link, Alanna is right in the comment above, unfortunately a lot of marketers have lost control of what the product is to truly affect that sin.

Daniel said... (Jul 23, 2008 6:38:47 AM)

Perhaps if a marketer feels they can't effectively market a product or service, for whatever reason -- passion being a big contributor -- they shouldn't take the job in the first place.

I'm talking about agencies knowing when to pass on a client and client-side marketers knowing when to give up on a gig they know they can't do well.

Then again, everyone loves maxing out those billable hours...