Church of the Customer Blog Ben McConnell & Jackie Huba Blog Writing Speaking About Contact Church of the Customer Blog October 08, 2008, 07:06 PMThe word of mouth mayorBy Jackie Huba To support Austin's participation in Thrill the World, an attempt to break the world record for the largest synchronized “Thriller” dance on earth, Austin Mayor Will Wynn showed off his moves. Not bad for a tie-wearing politician.Check out the video press coverage.Being in charge sometimes means doing weird things to build enthusiasm for a program or rallying the troops. Mayor Wynn isn't afraid to venture out toward the weird to generate some word of mouth. It is Austin, after all. The weirder the better.In his two terms, he has also: Strutted down the runway in a revealing outfit to support a local clothing designerJumped off of a city bridge to help promote a local independent filmDressed up like a zombie to support yet another local independent film(Thrill the World Austin is one of the many things you can watch or participate in during SWOMfest's Word of Mouth Weekend. I'll be there doing the dance.) Link| Comments (4)| TrackBacks (0) October 06, 2008, 11:51 AMHow bad is it?By Ben McConnellA quote from a shopper in suburban Chicago in the Times today summarizes what many people are experiencing from the increasingly louder drumbeat of bad economic news:“All the talk about how bad it is out there has started getting in my head."And the financial crisis hadn't even affected her family. That's the trickle-down effect of perception.Economists have been warning that the trickle-down effect of the credit crisis on Wall Street will spread to any business that relies on credit as a capital resource.Has it? Is the credit crisis affecting your company and how it spends money on marketing, sales, or operations?&amp;amp;lt;div&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;a href="&amp;amp;quot;http://www.micropoll.com/akira/mpview/484531-110060&amp;amp;quot;&amp;amp;gt;Click" Here for Poll&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;a href="&amp;amp;quot;http://www.questionpro.com&amp;amp;quot;" title=&amp;amp;quot;survey software&amp;amp;quot;&amp;amp;gt;Survey Software&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;BR&amp;amp;gt; | &amp;amp;lt;a href="&amp;amp;quot;http://www.micropoll.com&amp;amp;quot;" title=&amp;amp;quot;Polls&amp;amp;quot;&amp;amp;gt;Polls&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;BR&amp;amp;gt; | &amp;amp;lt;a href="&amp;amp;quot;http://www.contactpro.com&amp;amp;quot;" title=&amp;amp;quot;email marketing&amp;amp;quot;&amp;amp;gt;Email Marketing&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;BR&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;BR&amp;amp;gt; | &amp;amp;lt;a href="&amp;amp;quot;http://www.ideascale.com&amp;amp;quot;" title=&amp;amp;quot;innovation management&amp;amp;quot;&amp;amp;gt;Innovation Management&amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;BR&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;a href="&amp;amp;quot;http://www.micropoll.com/akira/MicroPoll?mode=html&amp;amp;amp;id=110060&amp;amp;quot;&amp;amp;gt;View" MicroPoll&amp;amp;lt;/A&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;/div&amp;amp;gt;Take the poll and/or sound off in the comments. Link| Comments (8)| TrackBacks (0)October 02, 2008, 09:44 AM13 reasons to attend SWOMfest; 10 registrants get a free...By Ben McConnellSWOMfest '08 -- the daylong conference/workshop/party on Oct. 30, 2008, to help you bake word of mouth into the DNA of your product, service or overall organization -- is a month away. It also happens to be the first-annual event for the Society for Word of Mouth, which we founded earlier this year. SWOMfest '08 is teeming... teeming! with an exciting and eclectic group of experts who'll help you focus on developing a word-of-mouth strategy that delivers long-term benefits and results, not half-baked, short-term tactics that cost big bucks. Attendance is limited to 200 at the brand-new Long Center, right along the banks of Town Lake in downtown Austin, so you'd better hustle up, Holmes.Should you go? Here are...13 reasons why you should attend SWOMfest:To meet other Swomies who understand that, except for one company out of a billion (it sells blenders) viral videos do not translate into sales. Big-thinking presenters like Haley Rushing of GSD&M's Purpose Institute and Hollywood screenwriter Yaphet Smith, who bring a unique perspective to word of mouth you won't see anywhere else. (You read that right: a screenwriter.)It won't decimate your training and education budget. At $325, SWOMfest is affordable compared to other word-of-mouth conferences. No boring and self-serving panels.Each attendee gets a hot off-the press book from one of the following authors: Seth Godin, Guy Kawasaki, Dan Roam, Tim Manners or Geoff Colvin. Thanks, Portfolio!An optional Word of Mouth Weekend tour in Austin, Texas, after SWOMfest. Explore the city ranked as the most creative (and weird) in the U.S. It has more word of mouth stuff happening than you can shake a blog at. We have mapped out a tour of places that will spark your word of mouth imagination.If you're part of a non-profit organization, you can attend for half price. Pre-conference '80s party. SWOMfest '08 is during Halloweenweek, so we'll blind ourselves with costume party science on Wednesday,Oct. 29, the night before SWOMfest. The pre-conference party theme is the'80s. Bring your Devo energy dome and leg warmers. We'll have prizesfor best costume. Then we'll adjourn to see the best '80s cover bandever, the Spazmatics.Live DJ. DJ Mel has spun at big-name gigs like Lollapalooza and Austin City Limits music festival. Mel will be spinning all day at SWOMfest. Yup, a DJ at a business conference!Beer all day. The gonzo guys at Flying Dog Brewerywill provide their spectacular craft brews throughout the day.The chance to win a Dell 20-inch widescreen, flat-panel monitor. Thanks, Dell!John Moore, Connie Reece, Richard Binhammer and Sean McDonald from Dell, the crew from Brains on Fire, and Virginia Miracle, will be there as well as all of these people.Bragging rights for being at the first-ever SWOMfest.Here's one more reason: Jackie and I will host a 45-minute conference call for the companies of each of the next 10 people who register. Just you and us. We can discuss your biggest or thorniest marketing challenge, how to create more customer evangelists, how to convince your boss about word of mouth, what color socks go with brown shoes... whatever you'd like. Go register. Link| Comments (5)| TrackBacks (0)September 30, 2008, 01:24 PMSocial media as customer serviceBy Ben McConnellSome stats from a recent survey conducted about Americans who use social media sites and their interaction with business:60% interact with companies using socialmedia93% say a companyshould have a presence in social media85% say a company should not only be present but also interactwith its customers via social media56% say they feel a stronger connection with and better served bycompanies when they can interact with them in a social mediaenvironment43% say companies should use social networks to solve customers' problems41% say companies should use social media to solicit feedback about products and services(Source: 2008 Cone Business in Social Media Study, from an online survey conducted Sept. 11-12, 2008 by Opinion Research Corporation among 1,092 adults comprising 525 men and 567 women 18 years of age and older. Margin of error +/- 3%.)Social media is the new customer service. When social media-driven customer service is combined with the work of citizen marketers, it becomes a force for more credible problem-solving (and less expensive customer service costs). With its inherent market research opportunities, social media has crossed over to the category of obvious strategy.Update: Nathan tracks real-time examples of one company's social media-driven customer support in the U.K. travel industry. If anything, the example company's responses on Twitter and a travel blog help neutralize skepticism and lightly tinged anger. With the right combination of empathy and problem-resolution, a customer vigilante is sometimes just a few degrees away from turning into a customer evangelist. Link| Comments (7)| TrackBacks (0)September 29, 2008, 04:20 PMWhy the bailout package failedBy Ben McConnellHere are the headlines from just two pages in today's Wall Street Journal:"Financial troubles humble U.S.""Tighter terms for car loans promise to deepen troubles for sluggish sales""Jobless report likely to show gloom beyond Wall Street""Rescue may not revive economy""Bailout gives Fed, Bernanke key roles"Those weren't even the front-page headlines. Those headlines are a backdrop everyone can understand in this big and complicated story. Yet, today's historic vote in Congress for a $700 billion bailout of Wall Street failed on a vote of 228-205.Why? One clear reason was the most important backdrop: the story of what the bailout would do. The most important story is always the first one. When we first learned about the bailout, the story we heard was that Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson would have unquestionable, czar-like authority (by a former head of a Wall Street firm, no less). There would be no review process or transparency about the administration of the program. There would be no (initial) curbs against Wall Street CEO pay, which everyone knows is outrageous and symptomatic of the greed that got us into this mess in the first place. Those three story points stoked vast numbers of citizens to call their congressional representatives to reject the bailout, no matter how much the plan matured or was made more sane by Republicans and Democrats working together. (One report said calls to congressmen were averaging 100-1 against the bailout.)Those initial three, easy-to-comprehend points reinforced the existing storyline we've come to know all too well the past eight years: rich, out-of-touch, transparency-unfriendly fat-cats who become bureaucrats, and vice versa, are manipulating the levers of power behind a cloak of secrecy to further enrich themselves. It's a storyline most of the American public has come to find revolting and, frankly, dangerous.Maybe what this financial crisis will finally change about American business and government and the interplay between the two is the unquestionable need for transparency. A Google-friendly form of governance. Let's hope the secret-keepers in charge are finally, and forever, driven from power.Update: Bob McTeer, former president of the Federal Reserve in Dallas, on why the vote failed:Every "ordinary American" I talked to about the plan, including familyand neighbors, misunderstood the plan and hated it. They viewed it asusing their tax dollars to bail out rich corrupt Wall Street types.Despite repetition over and over on TV and in the press that thebailout did not involve ordinary government expenditures but involved apurchase of assets that would be resold, most likely at a profit, thatmessage never sank in. The legislators faced almost unanimous negativefeedback from their constituents.Despite the repetition on TV and in the press (let's call it "the advertising"), the details of the revised bailout never sank in because the first story was the one everyone remembered. The importance of the first story of a new company, product or initiative can never be overestimated. The first story is the benchmark. It's an encapsulation of greatness, evil or indifference. It's the context for word of mouth, which will almost certainly carry the most credibility. Link| Comments (22)| TrackBacks (0)September 24, 2008, 06:33 PMEnergy vs. qualityBy Ben McConnellSinger-songwriter Suzanne Vega, who sold 3 million copies of her album "Solitude Standing," on what it takes to create a hit: Raw energy and great ideas spark the public interest better than attention to 'quality.'So true when it comes to (many) new products and services. Link| Comments (6)| TrackBacks (0)September 19, 2008, 11:36 AMI salute Crispin Porter + BoguskyBy Ben McConnell Talking about ad agencies and their campaigns is not a regular feature of this blog.But I have to hand it to CP+B for its recent work with Microsoft, not for the ads -- for resetting expectations of Microsoft. Now, it seems, that Microsoft can take creative risks. Whoa. That'll stir people up!The first set of ads with Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates were so far out of left field that it was impossible for the big talkers in technology not to: 1. be excited or 2. be sanctimonious. You loved them, hated them, or were baffled by them. That made them polarizing, therefore a strong foundation-builder. (Note: they weren't offensive, the stereotypical route taken by stereotypical agencies to generate buzz.)The next task: Reframe how your competition frames you. With a new series of ads, Microsoft has reframed Apple's "PC is a stereotype" frame. Take a look:Now that Microsoft is sitting atop a big pile of word of mouth, is reframing the persona of what it means to be a PC user -- you're not a schlub anymore, as Apple would have you believe -- what next? After all, Microsoft products are still Microsoft products. New and magical unicorns aren't streaming out of Redmond.Will it reframe conversations inside Microsoft? Will it encourage Microsoft to take more risks, not with security, but with expectations?Will it encourage Microsofties to defy convention and not be pummeled into submission?Will it encourage Microsoft to understand the Apple user, not crucify them (which happened to me and Jackie on the Microsoft campus at the end of a workshop we were conducting!)?I see this as a campaign to change both external and internal expectations.Whatever the outcome, it's fascinating to watch the real-time evolution. Link| Comments (12)| TrackBacks (0)September 17, 2008, 02:05 PMFive years later ...By Ben McConnell In 2003, Al Bartholet took a big risk in launching Folk Alley, a web-based public radio station. Public radio is risk-averse, so Al put his reputation, and perhaps his career as a public radio station general manager, on the line by dedicating significant time and money into launching a new, grassroots-driven, online folk music station."There were plenty of naysayers who gave me dozens of reasons why we should not invest so much time and effort into what some called a distraction," he wrote yesterday, the station's fifth anniversary. "There was a point early on when [I received] a list of reasons why we shouldn't be moving forward."Five years later, Folk Alley is thriving; it has accumulated $1 million in pledges, amassed a database of 90,000 listeners (unheard of in public radio) and has set the standard for web-based public radio in the United States. (Disclosure: I'd worked with Al and his crew to launch Folk Alley.)Building word of mouth into the DNA of your organization involves breeding unconventional thinking, making unpopular decisions and taking more risks than usual. Bypassing the seductive gatekeepers of hierarchy and conformity are often the most difficult tasks. Link| Comments (6)| TrackBacks (0)September 16, 2008, 05:12 PMWhen small is bigBy Ben McConnellI'm sharing this video with you for two reasons:If you don't know the agency Brains on Fire already, you should. Small things can be big ideas without big bucks. Brains on Fire is sending several of its people to SWOMfest '08 next month and decided to buy an extra pass as a giveaway for one of their blog readers. They produced a short video about the giveaway. It could have been a safe and conventional video, but that's not how BoF works, which is why this I'm sharing this video. Link| Comments (2)| TrackBacks (0)Why customer rituals workBy Jackie HubaYou may know I'm something of a Pittsburgh Steelers fan. Every city I've called home, and many I've only visited, has had a bar where Steelers fans gather to watch our beloved team crush its unworthy competitors. (OK, I get a bit rambunctious when it comes to football.) Here in my relatively new home of Austin, I was happy to find a bar nominating itself as the local headquarters for Steelers fans. The reality is, it's an OK place. There's one, lineman-sized difference between the Austin bar and the bar in Chicago where I previously worshiped every Sunday: A lack of rituals.Rituals are the code of ceremonies observed by an organization. They are the shared experiences of a group. They create emotional glue. To an outsider, a ritual can be weird, wacky or just plain stupid. To people inside the organization, they may be metaphors for life, death, or renewal. For never-say-die Steelers fans, rituals can symbolize all of the above.The lack of rituals at the Austin bar makes it simply a place to watch the game. It has low energy. It doesn't do anything to back up the claim of being headquarters -- or a "Stillers" church for the rest of us.But at the Chicago Steelers bar (and others I've visited), the rituals were abundant:A live polka band playing the Steelers' fight song after scoresWiping one's feet on an opponent's jersey at the front entranceA gregarious fan leading the crowd in the "Here We Go Steelers" chant before crucial 3rd downsA ready supply of Terrible Towels to wave when the team makes a great playThe wearing of Steelers jerseys, t-shirts, hats, earrings, etc. Serving Iron City beer (a Pittsburghian brew)Reserved tables for regularsTailgating in the bar parking lot before games, just like at homeAll rituals. All done regularly, no matter what, for it's repetition of rituals combined with emotional subtext that creates meaning. People will tell their friends and family about the rituals they experience when the context is right. That just leaves it up to an organization being open and brave enough to establish and follow rituals that's difficult, as my Austin bar proves every week.For your business, have you devised rituals for your customer evangelists? What shared experiences allow them to build a worshipping foundation? Link| Comments (5)| TrackBacks (0)September 15, 2008, 08:01 AMYour marketing mixBy Ben McConnellMarketing mix sounds like it could be a box item on a store shelf.Yet for some reason, that's the familiar term among marketing veeps and managers when it comes to thinking about the coming year. (And it's about that time.)Here's a great Fishburne cartoon to print out and include in your plan if the boss insists on using the same ol' mix that just doesn't work anymore. Link| Comments (5)| TrackBacks (0)September 12, 2008, 03:36 PMMicrosoft's reframingBy Ben McConnellThere sure are a lot of "I don't get it" comments out there about Microsoft's ad campaign featuring Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates. It's continuing today with the release of "episode two."The comments are everywhere, especially among the tech bloggers, who tend to be driven by instantaneousness, not subtlety. Features are answers. Story is subtlety.Yup, a lot of comments. Which is part of the point.With the help of Crispin Porter + Bogusky, Microsoft is in the process of reframing the discussion about Microsoft. It is building a new persona. A persona isn't established by one commercial. Critics of the Gates/Seinfeld program are missing the point. After all, "Seinfeld" the TV show didn't become a lasting cultural force in the United States after a few episodes.Microsoft is off to a good start with this new persona-building. But here's the real challenge: for Microsoft to have its products, processes and people authentically reflect the smart-ironic nerd concept it has successfully gotten people to talk about this week. Like "Seinfeld," that'll take years, too. Link| Comments (17)| TrackBacks (0)Have an important problem to solveBy Ben McConnell In researching the science of how things replicate and spread, I've spent time time catching up with the work of Dr. James Watson who, with Francis Crick, discovered the structure of DNA in 1955, eventually earning the duo the Nobel Prize.Dr. Watson could easily be a consultant about success. He gave a fascinating talk at Google last year and began with "a few reasons why we became famous." In the interest of replication and spreading his knowledge, here's my summary of Dr. Watson's prescription for work:1. Have an important problem to solve.While in college, Watson saw an x-ray photograph of DNA. It captivated him. What was its physical structure? The two-dimensional structure of DNA had already been solved, but no one knew its three-dimensional structure "probably because it was too complicated." Except for Linus Pauling and "some people in London," no one else was working on the answer. That was the motivation Watson and Crick used. "We worked on something before it's time had come," Watson says.2. Give yourself time, but cap it.The choreographer Twyla Tharp says the paradox of creativity is that it's better when it's restricted. That squares with Watson's teaching, too. "You shouldn't work on a problem if you think it'll take you 10 years, particularly when you're young. You'll be out of a job." Watson recommends giving yourself three years to solve a big or important problem. "People will sort of of trust you and put up with you for three years," he says.3. Talk to your competitors.The x-ray of DNA that inspired Watson was taken by Rosalind Franklin. She was trying to figure out the 3-D structure of DNA, too, but she didn't want to work with Watson and Crick. "She didn't like Francis because he was loud." Plus, Franklin wanted to discover the structure herself. Watson and Crick reached out to their competitors; "you tell them what you think, and they'll tell you what they think and pretty soon, you can get very close to the answer."4. Never be the brightest person in any room. If you are, no one can help you. Neither Watson or Crick knew chemistry, even though it was at the heart of what they were trying to solve. Watson had copied diagrams out of a chemistry textbook, but the textbook was wrong. If he and Crick hadn't made friends with a quantum chemist who helped them with their chemistry equations, they never would have discovered the double helix, Watson says. The lesson is that "It was very useful for me to be brought up thinking I wasn't bright because it was very easy then to ask for help."5. If you need help, ask for it quickly."Don't wait a week to ask for help!" Speed matters. After all, you only have three years. Link| Comments (2)| TrackBacks (0)September 05, 2008, 08:11 AMCustomer vigilantes take it to the streetsBy Jackie Huba Zane shares an example of how far customer vigilantes will go to spread bad word of mouth about a company that refuses to resolve a problem. He took this picture near his home in Iowa. He passes the sign every day, which reminds him to not hire the company in question.Today, what starts as a local issue can blossom into a PR nightmare via Google and its voracious feeder system, social media. Link| Comments (9)| TrackBacks (0)September 02, 2008, 03:03 PMSWOMfest: Live DJ, beer and the '80sBy Ben McConnell Here's some of the stuff we're announcing today for SWOMfest '08 to make our first-annual business conference unlike any other business conference:Pre-conference '80s party. SWOMfest '08 is during Halloween week, so we'll blind ourselves with costume party science on Wednesday, Oct. 29, the night before SWOMfest. The pre-conference party theme? The '80s. Bring your Devo energy dome and leg warmers. We'll have prizes for best costume. Then we'll adjourn to see the best '80s cover band ever, the Spazmatics.Live DJ. DJ Mel is a turntablist in the purest form of the art; the party rocker. Renowned as one of the most prolific djs in the business due to his wildly popular Rock the Casbah 80s parties, DJ Mel recently returned to Austin from a gig at Lollapalooza 2008 in Chicago. DJ Mel will be spinning all day at SWOMfest. Yup, a DJ at a business conference!Beer all day. The gonzo guys at Flying Dog Brewery will provide their spectacular craft brews THROUGHOUT the conference. Inspired by Hunter S. Thompson, with labels by renowned artist Ralph Steadman and a tagline of "Good Beer, No Shit," Flying Dog Brewery is a word-of-mouth case study all its own.WOM Weekend. There's more word of mouth stuff happening in Austin than you can shake a blog at. That's why we'll provide SWOMfest attendees a guide to the many fun and interesting things happening in Austin the weekend that follows SWOMfest, including Halloween on 6th Street, the Cathedral of Junk, Airstream Cuisine (yes, gourmet food out of trailers) and a 2,000-person version of the Thriller Dance.People learn more when they're having fun, which is why SWOMfest will be unlike any other business conference. Register here before it sells out. Link| Comments (3)| TrackBacks (0)August 26, 2008, 05:53 AM10 questions with Tom FishburneBy Ben McConnell Tom Fishburne is the Gary Larson of marketing: He creates cartoons that lampoon the often-ridiculous nature of business processes and marketing. His inspiration is his work as a marketer at companies like General Mills, Nestle and home-product manufacturer Method Products, where he currently resides as senior marketing director of Europe.His new book, "This One Time at Brand Camp," is a collection of his work from 2005-2008 (and features a foreword from CotC blogger Jackie Huba). We sat down with Tom (virtually) and tossed a basketful of questions at him.Q: What's the biggest challenge in being a brand manager today? Remarkable thinking. Then shepherding that thinking through the organizational gates. Too often the edges of a great idea get sanded, eventually launching as a pale shadow of the original idea.I love this quote from Robert Stephens, founder of Geek Squad: "Advertising is a tax you pay for unremarkable thinking." Q: What's the biggest trap most brand managers stupidly fall into? The mass market trap. Chasing market size. Trying to appeal to everyone and avoiding alienating anyone. By trying to appeal to everyone, no one gets excited.In my past brand lives, we joked that our target was "a woman, age 25–39, with a pulse." Instead, if you cater to a passionate and vocal niche, you become more meaningful. Consumer loyalty follows. Niche marketing isn't just for small brands. General Mills does a great job of training marketers to find and truly understand your niche's brand champions. You create your products and marketing just for them. When you do, much of the mass market will follow, too.Q: A central theme among many of your cartoons is the fear of standing out. From your experience at various companies, who typically is the driver in the race to be average -- an internal person/department or a force outside the company, such as Wall Street? The fear of standing out mainly comes from inside the company. When I started at General Mills, a big product launch called Wahoos had just failed. Many people who worked on it had been let go. That created the Wahoos hangover: If someone suggested a risky idea in a meeting, someone else would say "we don't want another Wahoos." Most companies have their own version of a Wahoos hangover. When I was at General Mills and Nestle I tacked this quote over my deskfrom Doug Hall: "Don't be afraid to take risks. Corporations have anamazing array of checks, balances, and safety nets to prevent you fromhitting the wall at ninety miles an hour. Be bold and brash. Develop areputation for it."Q: How serious is the disconnect when brand managers work 12-16 months on product then, because of the nature of the employment game, move on to a new one? How can you build customer loyalty with such a short timeframe? It's like that game of telephone we all played in kindergarten. A departing brand manager whispers their insights and brand plan to the replacement, much of which gets lost in the transition. Often the replacement brand manager starts from scratch with research and navel-gazing. As soon as the replacement brand manager gets a feel for the job, they move on, and the telephone game continues.When I was starting out, I loved the quick transitions because I got exposure to different situations. But it's not great for creating customer loyalty. It sands the edges. It can feel like a different brand incarnation each year. A lot of hard work gets lost in the revolving door.Q: Provide us, if you will, a brief, state of the union report on retailing today. Retailing is in flux with the credit crunch. It will make consumers think hard about their brand choices. If a brand has proven that it is meaningful, it will continue to do well. If not, its true colors will be exposed. This is an acid test for meaningful brands.Q: Who typically has the more insanely inflated ego: marketers or professional wrestlers? Most of the marketers I've worked with have been down-to-earth. That's why I think ego inflation comes from hierarchy. For instance, when I was at General Mills, all of the executives worked in a separate wing that even had its own parking garage we called the Bat Cave (where all the Jaguars went to park). They had a different dress code in the executive wing and there was very little mixing. The hierarchy was reinforced at every turn. As you progressed in marketing, you moved from a cubicle to something called an "officle" to eventually an office. You could tell the seniority of someone with an office by counting the number of ceiling tiles. I remember an official memo that stated that marketers above a certain level were entitled to leather Filofax binders. Everyone else received pleather. I swear I'm not making this up.All of this resulted in a medical condition I call Title-itis, where it was assumed that the more senior the marketer, the better their ideas. It's tempting to start breathing your own exhaust in an environment like that.I love the idea of a "No Holds Barred Title Bout World Marketing Federation Cage Match." Q: Did your cartoon work help or hinder your landing at Method? I joined method thanks to my cartoons (tell that to my high school guidance counselor). I discovered method in 2003 and was inspired by the impact they were making with such a small team. Then, I discovered that Eric Ryan, their co-founder, was getting my cartoon each week. So, I drew a cartoon on method comparing them to Apple and their famous "1984" ad where they took on IBM as Big Brother. That was my cover letter. When I actually joined the company a few years later, I told Eric that my last boss often said that if he ever ended up in a cartoon that I would be fired. Eric responded that if he didn't end up in a cartoon that I would be fired.My cartoons often lampoon the type of business absurdities I try to exploit in my day job working with method as a challenger brand. Many of my cartoons are used around the company, in presentations on our strategy and even in our handbook. Eric often pings me with an idea that he wants to communicate. I'm pretty candid though, so I often cover topics in my cartoons if I think we're making a wrong call, steering in the wrong direction, or becoming too process-driven.  Q: What's your marketing mix for Method? Eric once calculated that our competitors literally spend more on employee toilet paper than we do on advertising. We can't outspend them. So we think about everything we do as a form of marketing and that everyone in the company works in marketing. We believe in marketing from the inside out, so we start with a transparent culture. We tell our story through products that we take pains to ensure are remarkable and worth sharing. The next ingredient is relationship retail, where retailers help tell the story in-store by breaking category rules to shelf all of our products together as a lifestyle statement (think Apple store). Next is how we talk with consumers. We don't outsource anything to a call center, because those who take the time to call or email you are exactly the ones you want to talk with directly. In the UK, the phone number on the bottles literally bounce around the office to everyone in the office, so we're all talking to consumers every week, which is really powerful. We spend a lot of time directly talking with a core group of our consumers we call advocates. We're over-generous with them, giving them lots of samples so they share our story with others.Then, and only then, do we get to traditional awareness and trial tactics. Because we can't compete on advertising spend, we come up with ideas that let us break through the clutter in different ways. One way is to think of our brand as content. Where others focus on "paid media," we think "earned media." We focus heavily on PR; for instance, we just wrote a book called "Squeaky Green," which is a guide to a healthy home. It's not an infomercial (the only time it mentions the method brand is the cover), but it helps show a lifestyle and tell a philosophy. It's marketing that consumers actually pay us to read.We've also started renting our own retail space to help tell our story in 3-D. Our first pop-up shop was in 2005, when we realized it was less expensive to open a temporary store than to run a billboard ad. So, we built a store to reach a few consumers in a deep way. So far, we've reached consumers this way in San Francisco, New York, Boston, London, and soon Chicago. Q: How does Method plan for word of mouth? We start with a story that is worth sharing. I'm amazed how many companies neglect this critical piece, and layer on a social media program as if it's just another FSI or shopping cart ad. The most important filter of everything we do is whether or not it will inspire people to talk about us. We know that it's working when we find consumers like Nathan, who created an entire blog devoted to method. To help get the word out, we have a separate tier of consumers we call advocates that we've hand-picked from their interactions with us. We're overgenerous to these advocates. We send them a welcome kit with a cool t-shirt and a few pass-along kits to share with their friends. And then we keep talking with them to let them know first about what we're doing. Q: Is branding dead and if so, where do we bury the body?Your question inspired this week's cartoon.  I don't think branding is extinct. It's evolved. I used the evolution metaphor to play with a couple stereotypes in the noble profession of marketing.Doctors have Hippocrates. Lawyers have Atticus Finch. Ask most consumers what archetypes there are for marketers and the snakeoil salesman comes to mind. That's because much of the history of marketing and branding has been about concocting a story consumers wanted to hear, even if the story was a wee bit phony. Charles Revson, founder of Revlon, famously quipped: "In our factories, we make cosmetics. In the store, we sell hope."Nowadays, consumers are often in the marketer's seat. Consumers have always been the best source for what your brand means. The power used to be with the marketer to sculpt and shape that message. The question to ask now is no longer how your consumers play back the message you told them. It's what message are they spreading to others.The key is to tell an authentic brand story (but careful that you don't overdo that like the authenticity hawker in the cartoon). Then find ways to help your consumers advocate on your behalf. Tom's book is released next month; if you'd like an early-edition copy of the book, post a comment by 5 p.m. Friday, Aug. 29 in a Society for Word of Mouth forum dedicated to the ideas that Tom discusses in this Q&A and in his book. We'll draw five random winners from those who've posted a comment. In the forum, you can also see more of Tom's work. Link| Comments (1)| TrackBacks (0)August 25, 2008, 12:47 PMIt's the niches, stupidBy Ben McConnellTo sponsor, or not to sponsor. Always a gamble, especially in the emerging media world of bloggers and "influencers," a concept of questionable merit.The gossip blog Valleywag, as is its custom, takes a pretty simplistic view of the idea: "Why Sponsoring Bloggers is a Waste of Money." Its single piece of evidence: Seagate's sponsorship of tech blogger Robert Scoble. Because the hard drive maker's stock price is down 35 percent, its sponsorship of Scoble is deemed a failure. As if stock price is a metric of sponsorship success.These days, sponsorship for most companies is a port into a nicheaudience, of reaching out to the audience of geeks and nerds of anindustry-within-an-industry. It's a multi-level bet based oncredibility at a super-niche level. Scoble's a smart geek but hardly anyone would qualify him as a knowledgeable expert about hard drives. That's an industry-within-an-industry.Today's super-niche sponsorship principle applies to any industry. After spending millions sponsoring Tiger Woods, GM finally realized he can't sell Buicks. He's not a credible car geek. GM kicked Woods upstairs to corporate marketing, which will probably employ him behind the scenes as a draw at events for dealers and suppliers, which is a far better investment.Sponsoring bloggers is a matter of the right company sponsoring the right blogger at the right time. For your product or service, sponsor the super-geek bloggers who've built their credibility around the category and live, breathe and die by it. Link| Comments (4)| TrackBacks (0)August 19, 2008, 03:00 PMeBay and the nuclear optionBy Jackie HubaI decided to sell my iPhone on eBay last week. I just got the new 3G one. Bids were going well and the auction ended today. Just as I was about to invoice the winner, eBay sent me this email:We recently learned that someone was using an account to bid on items without the account owner's permission. For this reason, we have canceled all bids on the following listing: 160271650734 - iPhone 2G 8GB 2.0 great condtionAll associated fees have been credited to your account. Please note that we're working with the account owner to prevent any additional unauthorized activity. Unfortunately, we're not able to automatically relist the above item for you. To relist the item, you'll need to use either the Sell Your Item process on eBay, or another listing service. If you have any concerns or questions, you can contact us by clicking "Help" at the top of any eBay page.We're sorry for any inconvenience, and we thank you for your patience and cooperation.Sincerely,eBay Customer SupportGood that eBay spotted suspicious activity. Bad that it deleted my entire listing. To relist my phone, I must start over. From scratch. Too bad for me, even if I had nothing to do with what went wrong.eBay's reaction -- to cancel all bids, and delete my listing -- is typical among companies that rank cost savings above customer service. Let's call it the Nuclear Option: Protect the company with a companywide onerous rule or process, even if it inconveniences many people. Some companies favor the nuclear option because they've quantified it as cheaper than delivering personalized service or diplomacy. But the long-term costs for the nuclear option are significant. Home Depot CEO Frank Blake has had to spend the majority of his tenure cleaning up the radioactive waste left by former CEO Bob Nardelli and his repeated use of the nuclear option, whether it was trying to save labor costs by converting a big chunk of full-time workers to part-time, removing $1 billion of store inventory or spending billions on catering to professional contractors rather than its core customer base. All of which did nothing for the stock price and yet devastated employee and customer loyalty. Good combo!I'm but one example; have you experienced other uses of the nuclear option at eBay? Link| Comments (16)| TrackBacks (0)August 14, 2008, 10:54 PMBarack and RollBy Jackie HubaYou've heard of "rickrolling," the Internet meme for the 1987 Rick Astley song "Never Gonna Give You Up."Now you can BarackRoll your friends with a mashup of Barack Obama and the infamous Astley song. Even McCain supporters will like it. Link| Comments (2)| TrackBacks (0)August 11, 2008, 02:34 PMPictures and storytellingBy Ben McConnell This remarkable photograph today by Joao Silva of the New York Times is visual storytelling at its best.The eyes of the man in the taupe shirt bore into us. He's protecting another obviously frightened man on the ground, surrounded by concerned beefy men, some of whom are wearing flack jackets, some not.A black automatic weapon points downward to the crouched man, highlighting the obvious danger present.The sprig of a bush in the foreground ironically contrasts against the man-made weaponry nearby.Finally, a camera lens in the lower left-hand corner is cinema-verite, of being there with others, as it's happening.Silva's photo documents the unfolding drama in Georgia, as it and Russia square off in a real battle of life and death. Georgia's president was rushed to the ground by his bodyguards when a jet flew very close overhead. But what Silva's Pulitzer-quality photo really shows is a major fight involving power, fear and determination. It draws us into the story, making it easier for us to understand and talk about.Great photos come from a substantial investment in telling the story, no matter what it is. Link| Comments (7)| TrackBacks (0)Announcing SWOMfestBy Ben McConnellJackie and I are excited to announce SWOMfest '08, an annual event for the members and friends of the Society for Word of Mouth, our lil' ol' social network dedicated to helping companies and brands build word of mouth and customer evangelism into the DNA of their organization.We plan to make SWOMfest about the building blocks of grassroots-driven word of mouth. It'll be about understanding the culture and science of networks. About creating a buzzworthy company purpose. About telling the story of your company or product in a way that makes it easy for others to spread it.Here's a quick Q&A:Where and when is it?SWOMfest '08 will be at the Long Center for the Arts, a beautiful, new facility in the heart of funky-cool Austin, Texas, ranked as the most-creative city in the United States. There's more word of mouth stuff happening here than you can shake a blog at. The date is Oct. 30, 2008, starting at 9 AM and lasts all day. We will get together Wednesday. Oct. 29 a a local Austin watering hole the night before, so book your travel accordingly.Who should attend?People who believe that word of mouth should be built into the DNA of their businessBusy entrepreneurs striving for long-term, organic growthMarketers in small, medium or large businesses who want a deeper understanding of building word of mouth into their product, services, departments and organizations So what am I going to learn, dude?We'll divide SWOMfest into three blocks:Discovering your company's purpose: Are you in business to make money or change the world? You'll get an inside look at how companies and brands with a strong purpose and cause inspire buzz and evangelism.Telling your company's story: How can you tell the story of your company, or product, in a way that makes it easy for others to spread it? We'll venture beyond the realm of traditional PR and give you the tools to think about building and telling a buzzworthy story.Understanding networks and communities: Paying people to secretly spread buzz within networks is unethical. Some say it's evil. It's against the law in some countries. How, then, does your company's purpose and story spread through networks and communities? In this session, we'll jump into the science of information flow among networks and how communities coalesce toward action.Are sponsorships available?Absolutely. Contact Jackie at (512) 495-9707 for more information.How much and how many seats?Attendance is limited to 200. Cost is $325 but a limited number of seats are available for $199 and $229.And I register where?Right here! Link| Comments (5)| TrackBacks (0)August 07, 2008, 01:27 PMWhat should Whole Foods do?By Jackie HubaYesterday, Whole Foods had a bad day. It reported third-quarter profits of $33.9 million, a 31% decline from the previous year. Sales growth at stores open more than one year slowed to 2.6%, down from 6.7%. It plans to reduce the number of new store openings by nearly 50% and suspend its 20-cent quarterly dividend. Yikes. Whole Foods is known for quality products and high prices, so it recently started a "Great Deal" campaign that aims to show people how Whole Foods can be economical. It's hosting "Value Tours" in stores to help customers find the best deals on products. Is that enough? Is it time for Whole Foods to bite the bullet and lower prices? (My co-author says they should, but primarily on the products where Whole Foods competes with the discount stores.)What should Whole Foods do now, if anything?UPDATE: The Austin American-Statesman did a price-comparison with other Austin supermarkets and found that Whole Foods is more competitive on price than expected, with some exceptions. Link| Comments (23)| TrackBacks (0)August 06, 2008, 02:37 PM"See you at the debates, bitches"By Ben McConnellWhen you get called out, as Paris Hilton recently was by a political ad that tried to paint her and Barack Obama in unflattering light, you have three options:Ignore it and hope it goes away. Might happen, but Google never forgets.Profess your outrage. Then you risk stoking the fires of others who like to pile on to drama.Cleverly make fun of yourself and the situation. Bonus: come up with a catchphrase that trumps the trumper. Paris Hilton followed option three with this video, which has now been seen 3 million times. Of course she employed the bonus of option three, which is "See you at the debates, bitches."As Mark Cuban once said, everything he knows about PR he learned from Paris Hilton. Link| Comments (10)| TrackBacks (0)August 04, 2008, 11:23 AMApologize or not?By Jackie Huba Regular readers may know I'm a big fan of J.Crew, the apparel retailer. My affection deepened with this email. I didn't know the company was having problems with the website, but a quick Google search showed people having issues. Bad word of mouth from mistakes spreads quickly when others experience it simultaneously. Mickey Drexler and Tracy Gardner effectively dumped a big load of neutralizer on the spread of bad buzz, and they set expectations for anyone else who might run into the problem. They didn't do it behind a cloak of corporate anonymity or force a spokesperson to absorb the hit.To admit a mistake is to humanize your company.Then, of course, work like crazy to fix the problem. Go overboard in making things right. That can turn the spell of bad word of mouth into good buzz.BONUS LINK: A great discussion on SWOM is about the in's and out's of apologizing to customers for mistakes. Link| Comments (10)| TrackBacks (0)July 28, 2008, 06:57 PMCustomer evangelism case study: TOMS ShoesBy Ben McConnell Here's a customer evangelism case study in the making: TOMS Shoes.TOMS was founded in 2006 by Blake Mycoskie, a former contestant of "The Amazing Race" who was inspired by the low-cost alpargatas (espadrille-type shoes) during a trip to Argentina.His idea was to bring alpargatas to the U.S. and give them a fashion makeover.Blake was also struck by scenes of poverty in Argentina; so he launched TOMS based on the premise of giving away a pair of shoes to shoeless children in third-world countries for each pair he sold.So far, he's sold 200,000 shoes and given away the same number. He's struck licensing deals with Ralph Lauren and distribution deals with all sorts of department stores and retailers like Whole Foods (where I first saw TOMS last month). Blake has also created an evangelistic following; one restaurant chain in New York outfits all of its servers with TOMS because of the cause.TOMS Shoes has buzz for a variety of reasons, which include:An uncommon product amidst of sea of commonality.A simple, yet inspiring story that's easy to tell and therefore spread.An accessible and well-spoken leader who'll tell the story to anyone who'll listen.A strong culture of participation among employees and customers that's ingrained into the DNA of the company.JJ Ramberg of MSNBC has an excellent piece on the magic behind TOMS. Link| Comments (9)| TrackBacks (0)July 18, 2008, 09:36 AMHandling fee, or manhandled?By Jackie HubaLast week I bought a $50 gift certificate for my friend's birthday from her favorite day spa. As the clerk filled out the certificate, I admired the spa's luxury surroundings. Finished, the clerk said the total would be $51.50. "What's the extra $1.50 for?" "The handling fee," she said. "What kind of handling is involved?" "Writing out the certificate," she said. "It's labor-intensive." A long pause. "Sorry, I don't make the rules."Have you ever encountered a "handling fee" on a gift certificate, and what do you think of this spa's use of it?UPDATE: The owner of the spa has responded in the comments. She says that the fee is for the upgraded gift certificate card and the employee didn't explain that there are card options. Link| Comments (63)| TrackBacks (0)July 16, 2008, 03:28 PMSad Erebelle updateBy Jackie HubaReaders of this blog may know that we've been working with Erebelle, a women's apparel business based here in Austin. Eric Simone, Erebelle's founder and CEO, has this update: The last few years have seen Erebelle overcome many challenges to produce the finest in women's active wear. I am very proud at what we have accomplished. Erebelle today is the #1 seller at my wife's boutique, Girl Next Door. However, it is with a heavy heart that I have decided to shut down the Erebelle business. The current state of the economy along with the rising cost of production, partially due to the price of gas, have made it extremely difficult to grow a start-up clothing business. For those of you still interested in (remaining) Erebelle merchandise, we will continue to offer (it) at Girl Next Door. Thanks to all who selflessly gave their time and effort toward making Erebelle something special.We are very sad at this development but understand the economics. We know Eric invested a lot of money in Erebelle and was never able to turn a profit. Just having a remarkable product -- which is how we considered Erebelle's products -- is no guarantee of success. Link| Comments (4)| TrackBacks (0)July 14, 2008, 12:27 PM10 questions with Rob WalkerBy Jackie HubaStudy after study shows growing immunity to advertising, led by the march of DVRs into living rooms. We're shutting the door to the influence of brands, right?Not so, according to New York Times Magazine “Consumed” columnist Rob Walker. He argues in his new book, "Buying In: The Secret Dialogue Between What We Buy and Who We Are," that people are embracing brands like never before. Yes, we're tired of advertising, but we're attaching ourselves to brands in new ways that affect our cultural, political, and community activities.We asked Rob 10 questions about brand-building in today's hyperconnected world:Q: What's your take on why a brand takes off?A: That's a big question to start things off!My short answer is that the brand/consumer relationship is always a dialogue. Nothing takes off without consumers making the decision to embrace something, to believe it has value. The dialogue is frequently subtle and indirect. Thus I call it a "secret" dialogue.This has always been true. It's easy to lose sight of that, and I'll cop to doing so sometimes myself. I describe in the book how my original research on the iPod focused too much on locating some magical property of the device, rather than on the various ways consumers responded to it. As technology changes the dialogue in some ways, the core dialogue remains: buying or not buying. Meaning what? Well, in the case of New Coke, released at the height of mass-advertising power and with the full weight of one of the most potent companies in the world, the dialogue was short: "No." I'm oversimplifying, and the dialogue gets much more complicated in other cases, but I hope you know what I mean. It's never been a one-way process. Let's be honest, too: the right timing and pure luck can affect dialogue, too.Q: Is a brand today, then, the sum total of how a company defines it or how its customers talk about it?A. Maybe it's more basic than that: what consumers think about it. Sometimes those thoughts lead to talk, which can be quite powerful, but sometimes they don't -- they just lead to not-buying X and buying Y instead. Or nothing at all. Brands and products don't exist in a vacuum. The world changes around us, so the tactics that worked for one brand at one time may not work for another brand at another time. Competitors adjust, the broader climate shifts, novelty fades, etc.All of these factors play into your second category, how customers talk about a brand -- the nature of their talk might change for reasons that have nothing to do with the brand. Let's consider Starbucks: How much of the apparent "change" in the meaning of the Starbucks brand in the last year or two has to do with the company, and how much is based on actions of its competitors, and the culture at large?Q: Will we as Americans, the targets of an unstoppable torrent of unrestrained advertising, ever rise to the level of the British and impose more regulation upon it?A: Polls consistently tell us that Americans can't stand advertising, don't trust it, are annoyed by its incursion into and murkier venues -- and yet there appears to be no particular popular interest in regulation. I don't know why. The FCC is looking at ad placement, but it's unlikely that tough regulation will ever occur in the U.S. without serious public demands for it.There's much talk about tech-enabled consumer power these days, but it takes the form of "complain about a product on a blog and get a free replacement," rather than more broad-based and wide-ranging reforms that might benefit everyone. Maybe that will change.Consumers truly do have a lot of power -- movements of the past demonstrate that repeatedly -- so maybe we're just learning how to use the technology more effectively.Q: You talk about the Livestrong bracelet as an example of a niche idea growing into mass appeal. How did that happen?A: It's difficult to isolate any intrinsic property of the Livestrong bracelet that made it a hit. Clearly, the meaning of this rather low-utility object came from us, and it's a good example of the importance of dialogue. That happened many ways: For some people, it was about paying tribute to a loved one. Or supporting a good cause. Or identifying with Lance Armstrong's amazing story. Or participating in a trend by emulating the many celebrities who wore it. All these motivations came together in a thing that was almost arbitrary.The Livestrong bracelet has replaced the "lowest common denominator" idea in a more fragmented culture and become the "murkiest common denominator." Q: In several places in the book, you throw in historical context and precedents for what’s going on in the consumer marketplace today. Are you saying nothing has changed?A: No, but I think it's important to understand that consumers have been complaining about and skeptical of advertising for as long as advertising has existed. Marketers have complained about consumer resistance the whole time, too. None of that's new, and it's important to see what's not new if you want to figure out what is.Media coverage of how technology empowers consumers has tended to gloss over how technology empowers marketers. Marketers see the various threats to traditional modes of persuasion, and have invented new ones, ranging from product placement to online campaigns to word-of-mouth marketing.As for the latter, we've always trusted our friends more than television ads. Only recently have marketers figured out how to tap that directly by signing up tens of thousands of folks who volunteer to get products early and talk them up and so on. This leverages the "endowment effect" (the tendency to overvalue something simply because we own it), and, in effect, converts your friends into a marketing medium. That's new.Q: Is "I buy, therefore I am" just as common today as it was 100 years ago?A: I think it's more true. A century ago, you wouldn't sell deodorant as pop culture. But that's how Axe, to cite one example from the book, is sold today. The ante is upped on what a brand can "mean," and consumers keep buying it. Another example from the book is Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, which took on a meaning as a protest brand -- a brand protesting branding. That's a meaning consumers created.Q: Conventional wisdom tells us that time was all a company had to do was put a 30-second ad on television and bingo-bango, market share. But is advertising really dead?A: I reject the premise of your question!I've always wanted to say that.Seriously, it's easy to exaggerate the past effectiveness of 30-second ads. After all, brands failed and agencies got fired in eras past, as they have in every era. Consumers have never been zombies who would simply buy anything the TV set told them to. Yes, some dubious stuff succeeded along the way -- but dubious stuff is succeeding now, too. Any marketing campaign that relied exclusively on 30-second ads would have a tough time. But there aren't many campaigns like that -- the need to be "media neutral" is universal, as far as I can tell. Is anyone left saying that their brand should be promoted only by 30-second ads?Then again, I'm not sure if the 30-second ad will ever disappear. Apart from shows like "American Idol," and sports events, there's news channels and the proliferation of TV in public places, like the gas pump, where it can't be TiVoed. Let's not forget only a fifth of American homes have DVRs. If TV ads ever disappear, it won't matter because the marketing industry has adjusted far more quickly, and aggressively, than consumers have obtained DVRs.Q: Great products and services don't need to advertise while inferior ones do. Agree or disagree?A: For Apple -- a company that's widely lauded for innovative products -- wouldn't agree. I remember talking to someone at Apple and expecting him to say something about how the iPod "sells itself" or whatever. When I floated that, he laughed at me.So ... draw your own conclusions!Q: Customer collaboration is a hot topic these days, especially for defining the meaning of a brand. You say this isn’t so new, and one of your examples is Timberland. How so?A: Timberland once had a specific and well-defined meaning: functionality. In the 1980s through the early 1990s, it was adopted by a different consumer for different reasons. At first, it was a hip-hop consumer, then a style consumer as the hip-hop aesthetic rippled out into the broader culture. Timberland didn't understand what was happening and was afraid that if they started chasing this consumer, they'd alienate their base and lose the meaning of the brand.Eventually, the company capitulated -- it started making style books and is in search of new style hits to keep up its $1.6 billion revenue. The days of declining to advertise in Vibe are over.This had nothing to do with the Internet, and nothing to do with Timberland "allowing" customers to "collaborate." Consumers determine brand meaning whether anyone "allows" them to or not. And they don't need a special website to do it.Q: You think we're not so immune to branding and logos as some of us think we are. How so, and do you include yourself in that?A: Sure, although I didn't used to. For me, the breakthrough was Nike buying Converse. I'd already been writing about branding and approaching the subject as an above-it-all journalist. I was the outsider, the detached observer, unaffected by things I was documenting. As a business journalist, I have great respect for Nike. As a consumer, I would never, ever, wear the swoosh. I'd always worn Converse sneakers since my teen years. I never said to myself, "I wear Converse sneakers to identify with my rebel rocker heroes." Nobody has those conscious thoughts. But I was bothered that Converse would be owned by Nike. I wasn't sure I could wear Converse anymore because somehow its "meaning" had changed.Then I caught myself: If I'm so immune to "brand meaning," why am I having a crisis over sneakers?It was a reality check. It's something I consider every time someone tells me that brands mean nothing to them. It affected my approach to the book, which is aimed at people who have the mindset I used to have. We're better off if we get over being brandproof and embrace the idea that this stuff does have meaning.Even people who resist brand meaning recognize that material culture and consumer decisions have consequences for the planet and our own sense of satisfaction. If we really want to be in control in a meaningful way, approach the dialogue with eyes open. That's the only way to make decisions we really want to make.Interested in a free copy of Rob's book? Go to the Society forWord of Mouth (registration is free) and add a comment to this forum post about Rob's book.Deadline for the book giveaway is Friday, July 18 at 5 pm CDT. We'llgive 5 copies away (to be drawn randomly from forum participants). Link| Comments (5)| TrackBacks (0)How associations are using social mediaBy Jackie HubaIf you are an association looking for how others like you are using social media, check out the Association Social Media Wiki. The wiki has a comprehensive listing of associations using blogging, wikis, social networking sites, podcasting and other social media tools. A great resource![Via Jeff De Cagna.] Link| Comments (1)| TrackBacks (0)July 11, 2008, 12:46 PMMore on why online WOM mattersBy Ben McConnellHere's why: 61% of respondents to a recent survey said they check review sites, blogs and other customer feedback forums before buying a new product or service. Furthermore, 80% of those people said online word of mouth influenced their purchase. Put into perspective, the 1% Rule holds that only about 1% of the total number of visitors to a community where content be created, like Wikipedia, Yelp or CitySearch, will actually do so.This means 1% of your customers could be influencing 61% of your prospects.For any business that serves at least 100 customers per week, especially content-savvy Millennials, monitoring online word of mouth has graduated from a future to-do, to a must-have. 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