Word of Mouth Tactics — 57 of Them


57 techniques to build word of mouth“Word of mouth” is becoming one of those overworked phrases. Everyone talks about the importance of having others spread the word about your business or your product.

But rarely does anyone ever stop to explain what you can do to trigger word of mouth.

Here’s the good news: as a business owner you can take steps to increase and accelerate the process of getting people to talk favorably about your business. You can get your staff involved in the process, too.

Ron McDaniel, CEO of Buzzoodle, tells you exactly what to do. His new book, Buzzoodle Buzz Marketing, gives you 57 specific tactics to get people spreading the word about your business.

The main part of the book covers the 57 tactics (or Challenges, as Ron calls them). Each tactic is quick and easy to read. Each tactic takes up just two pages. For instance, here is a short quote from word-of-mouth tactic #11 in the book:

Buzzoodle Buzz Challenge #11

Squidoo Expert Lens

Difficulty ……………………………. Simple
Time ………………………………….. Quick – Medium
Cost …………………………………… Minimal
Technology Required ……………. Simple

Squidoo is a free service that allows you to build an expert lens (a single Web page on a specific topic). It is a portal you build with links and resources that create a portal to the subject. You can find it at www.squidoo.com.

A Squidoo Lens will drive more traffic to your organizational Web site, to your blog, and to articles and news that has been published about you and to anything else you want to promote. To see an example of what can be done with a Squidoo Lens, visit the Buzzoodle Squidoo Lens at www.squidoo.com/buzzoodle.

The site is easy to use even if you do not have any skills ….

Check out Buzzoodle Buzz Marketing. The book is practical and a quick read. It will give you a road map of specific techniques to build word of mouth about your business.

9 Comments ▼

Anita Campbell Anita Campbell is the Founder, CEO and Publisher of Small Business Trends and has been following trends in small businesses since 2003. She is the owner of BizSugar, a social media site for small businesses.

9 Reactions
  1. Thank you for the mention. I bet you already knew everything in the book!

  2. I agree with Ron, you probably do already know everything in his book, but it is always refreshing to see it presented in a different way.

    I think it is great that you consider his approach as being useful to others.

  3. Hi Rick, I wish I knew everything in the book!!! 😉

    Actually, my next step with the book is to send it to Staci, my Program Manager. I think it will be an excellent way for her to learn about some of these word of mouth techniques. I have been training her, and it is much easier to refer her to a specific section of the book, than my constantly sending emails trying to outline a technique that I would like her to undertake.

    Anita

  4. So I’m curious as to what your thoughts are on actually being able to trigger WOM. Many marketers believe that WOM cannot be forced and is often a natural process. If the product/idea/service is good enough, it will become viral on it’s own. Sure there are things you can do to try to up your chances, but none of them will guarantee that “it” will become viral…

    Seems as if the only sure fire way is constant product development and improvement…

    What do others think?

  5. I would argue that constantly getting your story out as well can create buzz and wom. (But if your product is bad, it is not going to help)

    Many great products never get found and die out. They key is to keep creating a little wom and buzz every day and sometimes people will pick it up and help it take off.

    Each time you do it you increase your odds.

  6. I’ll be waiting for the book, Anita! Sounds incredibly helpful and insightful. . .looking forward to it!

  7. Vmunster,

    I think any “word of mouth” can be assisted and helped along. You can’t substitute marketing programs for a crappy product. But certainly, the most talked-about products and companies I’ve encountered have been helped along by able marketers. Good marketing can mean the difference between 5 people talking about a product, and 500 or 5000 talking about it.

    Anita