Letting satisfied customers do the selling

The most attractive alternative to advertising is the mouth of the customer," says marketing communications guru Al Ries.

How many times have you bought a new mobile phone because your friend swears by it? And if you own an iPod, didn’t you buy one because your friends were singing its praises? A lot of women buy the latest beauty product not because of the new ad (which normally is non-existent) but because fellow Philippine STAR columnist Celine Lopez is using it. This is customer evangelism in action, where customers who espouse and recommend a brand passionately become powerful marketers unmatched by millions in media spending.

The Cult Known As MAC Users

This rings true for a lot of brands and products all over the world, and none more so than Apple’s Macintosh computer. When the Mac was launched in 1984, hundreds of Macintosh user groups sprouted all over the world. These passionate believers helped each other become better Mac users and used every opportunity to recommend and defend the Mac against the more popular PC.

In the Philippines, two prime examples of Mac’s cult following are the Philippine Mac Users Group (www.philmug.ph) and sister site Pod Central (www.podcentral.ph). Both sites serve as a virtual haven for Mac users to come together to discuss product feedback, share tips, product reviews (anything and everything like bags, cameras, mobile phones, software, earphones, car audio systems, etc.), and gush about how much they love their Macs. When time permits, the forum posts become real-life interfaces during the occasional meet-ups, where forum members can put faces behind usernames and gush, yet again, about their love for the Mac or iPod. 

From swearing to never use a PC again to making it their life mission to make Mac users out of everyone they know, you’d think they were getting a cut from every sale they influence. But that’s the cult-like phenomenon of Mac and, truth be told, there is no mystery to its success and loyal following. It’s quite simple, actually: give them a product that works great and they will talk and rave about it endlessly.  I myself bought a Mac because my motley crew at the office swears by it.

Oprah And Her Book Club

Now, if the passionate customer is a celebrity, then the word-of-mouth becomes far noisier. Take, for example, Oprah’s Book Club. The books that get on the show are not just books that Oprah’s show executives and staff think would be popular with readers. They have to be read and liked by Oprah herself. And this is the only reason, really, why the people who watch her show troop to the bookstores or log on to Amazon.com to buy the book. They’ll buy the book because "Oprah loves it."

And as any author with a book plugged by Oprah Winfrey can tell you, word of mouth can be a wonderful thing. Inclusion in the Oprah Book Club literally pole-vaults a book into The New York Times’ best-seller list.

When Oprah stopped reviewing contemporary authors, new-fiction sales in the United States plummeted. Panicked authors, over 150 of them (including multiple prize-winners and best-sellers), even had to sign an open letter to Oprah asking her to resume recommending contemporary fiction to her audience.

Word of mouth, whether from a blog, Internet user group, celebrity endorser, or colleague at work cuts through and rises above the noise because it’s coming from a source – a friend, a co-worker, an expert on the subject – who is objective and therefore deemed more trustworthy than a marketing-communication agency.

Olay Total Effects Brand Ambassadors

Recently, Procter and Gamble launched its multi-billion dollar skincare brand Olay in the Philippines, bannered by its anti-aging moisturizer Olay Total Effects. Now, Olay Total Effects is already known all over the world, garnering awards even from top beauty magazines like Vogue, Marie Claire and Cosmo in other markets. It also has the research-and-development muscle of P&G. These two strengths alone could have made a successful blitz.

But P&G, realizing the importance of real and passionate users in making and breaking a brand, went on a search for real users. An arduous but not impossible task since even before it hit the shelves of the beauty shops, the product was being sold in PX stores. I actually know of someone whose relative hoards Olay when she makes a trip to the United States.

They eventually found five of the most passionate users, who were introduced during the launch of Olay recently – beauty queen and TV personality Miriam Quiambao, fashion and beauty guru Daphne Oseña-Paez, theater stalwart Menchu Lauchengco-Yulo, fashion-store owner Ines Delgado and prominent dermatologist Dr. Pie Calayan.

When asked to try Olay Total Effects, they weren’t easily wowed. All were skeptical at first except for Menchu who, I was told, has been an Olay user since her mom – herself an Olay loyalist – asked her to use it when they were still living in Hong Kong years back to counter the harsh effects of winter.

These five now swear by Olay Total Effects, which is why when P&G approached them to be the brand’s ambassadors, they were easily convinced to come out and talk about the product. And now Olay has become one of the most anticipated skincare products to hit the shelves.

Turning Buyers Into Believers

Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba, authors of the book Creating Customer Evangelists, offer six practical tips to turn brand loyalists into a volunteer sales force:

1. Continuously gather customer feedback. Listen to what your customers want.Understanding their satisfaction levels can reveal much about the health of your customer base. It also builds loyal and more profitable customers.

2. Make it a point to share knowledge freely. The more information you provide to your customers, the more they become loyal and ardent brand ambassadors.

3. Build the buzz. Expertly build word-of-mouth networks. Know the movers and shakers for your brand’s category and focus on them.

4. Create community. Encourage communities of customers to meet and share, whether face-to-face or on the Internet.

5. Make bite-size chunks. Break your product and service portfolio into bite-size chunks that are small, easily consumed pieces of what makes your company valuable. For some products, it’s samples. For a whole range of products, it’s the best-seller in other markets.

6. Create a cause. Focus on making the world, or your industry, better.

Indeed, we see a future where marketing is going to be driven more aggressively by consumers. They will determine what they will be exposed to. They can turn into evangelists if their wants and needs are satisfied, and this evangelism can surely accelerate purchase decisions, and help shoot sales and shares to the roof.

A fair warning, though: creating and cultivating customer evangelists will only work for a product that works and has a special meaning to its customers. And if they are happy with it, they will simply say, "Please pass the word" or "Tell a friend."

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E-mail bongo@vasia.com or bongo@campaignsandgrey.net for comments, questions or suggestions. Thank you for communicating.