... and MORE Word of Mouth news

Press release me2umarketing.com:

Word of Mouth Marketing Service Opens in Portland, Oregon: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

Friday January 13, 2006 - 03:59pm (EST)

Editor's update (2/14/2009): me2umarketing.com's site is down.

Any word on their status?

What gets customers talking?

Observations of A.J. Riedel of the Riedel Marketing Group:

"So what is it about these products that evokes passion when so many other products do not? Four characteristics evoke passion in consumers."

Read the article by Michelle Moran at Table Talk: What Consumers Love to Buy and Why

Monday February 13, 2006 - 07:21am (EST)

A generation serves notice: It's a moving target

"The preceding generation may have thought that e-mail, newsgroups, Web forums and even online chats accelerated the word-of-mouth phenomenon. They did. But they are nothing compared with the always-live electronic dialogue among millions of teenagers and 20-somethings."

Full article by Tom Zeller, Jr. of The New York Times as it appeared on Sunday, January 22, 2006 in the International Herald Tribune.

Sunday January 22, 2006 - 01:43pm (EST)

Word of Mouth - To Tell Or Not to Tell?

Extract -

Key conclusions drawn in the study include:

• Participation in an organized word-of-mouth marketing program does not undermine the effectiveness of word-of-mouth communication.
• Disclosure has practical business benefits. It does not interrupt the “natural” flow of conversation.

Key findings include:

• For approximately 75% of the conversational partners it did not matter that they were talking with someone affiliated with a marketing organization. Instead what mattered was that they trusted the agent was providing an honest opinion, felt the agent had their best interests at heart, and were providing relevant and valuable information.
• None of the key outcome metrics were negatively affected by the agent disclosing their affiliation. In fact, the number of people a person told after speaking with a word-of-mouth marketing agent actually increased when the conversational partner was aware they were talking with a participant in an organized word-of-mouth marketing program.

Article by Northeastern University Professor Dr. Walter Carl as published on Newswise (1/18/06).

Wednesday January 18, 2006 - 08:20pm (EST)

... and MORE Word of Mouth news

Press release me2umarketing.com:

Word of Mouth Marketing Service Opens in Portland, Oregon: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

Friday January 13, 2006 - 03:59pm (EST)

Word-of-mouth marketing firm BzzAgent wins second-round funding

Word-of-mouth marketing firm BzzAgent wins second-round funding - 2006-01-13

"Word-of-mouth marketing firm BzzAgent Inc. in Boston has received $13.75 million in a second round of venture capital funding from co-lead investors General Catalyst Partners in Cambridge and IDG Ventures Boston, the company announced Friday."

As article appears in the "Boston Business Journal" Friday, January 13th, 2006

Friday January 13, 2006 - 03:54pm (EST)

Making "Word of Mouth" work on the Internet???

As read on the Austin Business Journal January 11, 2006

Internet marketing company collects $4M - 2006-01-11
Bazaarvoice remains in "stealth" mode, but founder and CEO Brett Hurt says the company competes in an emerging sector known as "word-of-mouth marketing." Hurt, a founder of online-analysis software provider Coremetrics Inc., says Bazaarvoice will give companies the power to tap one of the oldest forms of marketing -- telling friends and family what they like and don't like.

Wednesday January 11, 2006 - 04:13pm (EST)