4M

Recently, I had a stellar experience with a local florist. As they were helping me pack my things into my car, they asked me to review them online. They told me they had accidentally discovered several online referral sites and were surprised to see glowing reviews of their business on them and that they’ve noticed a substantial increase in leads and sales from those particular sources. I chuckled to myself to hear my own advice given to me by a small business owner, grabbed their card, made a mental note and went on about my way.

I thought it was such a good idea that I mentioned it to Ulan as a free way that small businesses can quickly and easily generate online advertising - the very best kind - Word of Mouth. It’s not exactly a secret, but I bet you most small biz’s would be surprised that such a small effort could bring such amazing returns.

Then I remembered that my mother had chosen a remodeling contractor based upon reviews in Angie’s list. She told me that their phone had been ringing off the hook since they got listed.

Later, I ran across this study by ClickZ showing how CGM, consumer-generated media like online referral sites, influences purchase decisions. Among other findings:
51 percent of respondents used CGM to help narrow a choice, 23 percent employed consumer-created information to confirm a decision and 15 percent used it to pick their top choice.

What CGM is NOT: CGM is not testimonials. Testimonials are selected and edited. Testimonials are love letters. CGM have at least the appearance of being real. CGM is like the woman next to you while you are in the supermarket fondling the avocadoes. She whispers conspiratorially, “Those are old. The fresh ones are coming in at noon today” and winks, and you wink back and put the avocado down and sidle away. She is a trusted source. Never mind that you don’t know her name and have never seen her before. She’ll tell you if that hair dye is going to turn your hair green or that brand of cake will forgive all your errors and rise perfectly every time, and you will BELIEVE her. Why? She is independent. She doesn’t work for the grocery store. It’s as simple as that.

So, small businesses: tell your customer evangelists (aka biggest fans), “hey, if you really love me, say something nice online about me”.

That’s it. You don’t have to tell them which website to go to. It really doesn’t matter whether your review is on Yelp or local Yahoo or Angie’s list or Berkeley Parents Network or on their personal blog. It’s a cumulative effect, and the end result is, someone searches for “florist in Albany” or “tile installer in Sacramento”, and your name and your glowing reviews show up near the top of that list.

And yes, there is certainly the risk that someone will say something about you or your product that you don’t like. But that’s why it’s called web 2.0, people - it’s a 2-way medium. You don’t like what someone has to say? Challenge it! Respond directly to any legitimate concerns, express remorse if you did something wrong and recruit ten more of your best pals to get on the site and talk you up. People will read all the reviews if there’s one terrible one, hoping to get some more good dirt. They’ll be disappointed that there isn’t anything else to chew on, but it will probably convince them that was a singular case and you are generally very nice to your customers. And then they’ll buy from you.

Be good to your customers. And encourage them to get online and be good to you.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 14th, 2006 at 11:10 pm and is filed under Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.