People talk. They say a happy customer tells one person and an unhappy customer tells 20. I thought it was 10 back in my day but that’s inflation for you. People talk and the Internet has given them a megaphone.
A happy customer tells one person but an unhappy customer tells Twitter, or YouTube. 226,000 people have viewed this particular video:
Where does that leave us?
- If you are marketing your business online, you want people to talk about you. You need people to talk about you. Word of mouth is powerful marketing.
- People have limited time and attention and in one area nothing has changed. They are much more likely to complain and spread negative messages than they are to spread joy and good will.
- If you need people to talk about your company online (and believe me, you do) then you need to give people a reason to say good things about you.
How to Make Your Business Extraordinary
The notion of trying to be so special that people will say good things about you is quite daunting. A few years ago I read something that helped me get my head around it. I have no idea where I picked this up. Just as long as it’s clear that it isn’t mine. The gist of what I read went as follows:
“It is easy to be extraordinary. You simply do the ordinary and then, you do a little bit extra.”
That’s it. It seems almost silly. Just a play on words really but it helped me a great deal. It makes it easy to get your head round the notion of doing something special. Every little bit extra that your company does makes it extraordinary.
Providing excellent product, customer service, etc. is hardly new advice. Word of mouth marketing has been around for years but it can make a difference. In the online world of social media, that difference will be amplified.
A friend of mine had a policy that he used when dealing with customer complaints and problems in work. Often, when he received a call he would be unable to answer the query right away. He was senior management, so these were fairly serious problems. He would take a number, offer to call the customer back and give an estimation of when he would call.
I live in Ireland. When you ring a company and they say they will call back this afternoon, you know damn well that you are never going to hear from this guy again. You’ll be calling back tomorrow.
So my friend’s policy was simple. He always rang back and he always rang half an hour or more before he said he would. He would get back to the customer, on-time, even if he had nothing to say. He kept his promise and it changed the nature of the interaction with the customer.
That is a little thing but a little thing that takes a bad customer experience and turns it into a good one is powerful. You want people talking about you on the Internet, you really do. You want to think about whether there are little things you could do that might change what they say.
Your company might not come up with the next viral to sweep the web. Your blog may not deliver that killer piece of link bait.
But…
If you can do the little things well in everything that you do. If you can do the ordinary and take it that little bit further. You may just have something that someone will be motivated to say good things about.
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How to Make Your Business Extraordinary – Online Word of Mouth…
Online word of mouth can make or break your company. Are there small changes that can make your business extraordinary? – We think so……