In academic marketing jargon, social media is often considered to be a variation on word of mouth marketing.  This view is a flattering portrayal of social media platforms in all their variations, and conforms to the standard approach to what these platforms would have its users believe, that social media posting is like a person-to-person conversation, but done through a digital platform.

While we know social media networks and the postings that are shared have a sort of conversational look and feel, particularly where comments and chat sessions are involved, the sort of mindset that is required of making an effective social media posting is entirely different from that of a personal conversation. 

Consider the following:

Conversation	Social Media
Look them in the eyes and make yourself immediately vulnerable to their opinions (expressed verbally or expressed through gestures)	While the social vulnerability remains, the sense of your listeners’ opinions are delayed, there is no split-second feedback that you get from a conversation
Often spontaneous, with thoughts transferred to communication near instantly	While many social media postings are indeed an instant reaction to a thought (and then regretted later) social media by nature allows people to think about what they write or public in advance, and gives people time to cultivate a well-thought message (not that many people use that opportunity)
Generally unrecorded – the memory of the conversation is reliant on the other person’s ability to internalize messages, which in turn often depends on their emotional reaction to not only the words, but also the tone used to express	Recorded, for all posterity to see – therefore the memory of the message is also influenced by ways external factors can influence and change the meaning through a different context than the one originally intended.
In your face – it is nearly impossible to ignore someone who is speaking directly to you, the listener therefore has nowhere to hide	The audience may or may not regard anything you say

So conversation and social media are totally different.  What of it?

We know the value of word of mouth marketing, or referral-based marketing.  Social media’s greatest strength is in enabling a mass marketing message to be communicated at little cost to those who have spent time (and money) in developing and cultivating their online social networks.  Prioritizing this type of network has brought amazing success to many businesses.

Focusing only on this aspect of social media may doom the businesses which fail to obtain maximum leverage from their social media investment.

How to maximize the investment?

The key here is to remember that everyone who sees your post not only has their own followers, but also has individuals in their network with whom they have actual – real, live – conversations on a daily basis.  Breaking through the digital realm into the organic, analog world is an amazing feat in terms of the value-for-money impact it can have on your marketing campaign.

How can that be done?

There’s no magic to making it happen.  We’re talking about hard-core messaging that is designed to elicit a human reaction that is so strong, that the reader or the viewer wants to walk away from their desktops or smartphones to tell someone else about what they just read.

While that precise scene rarely happens – ie., someone jumping from their desk and talking about what they just read – we know that people like to talk.  What they talk about is highly influenced by what catches their attention and gives them a way to garner attention from others. 

What kind of attention do people seek?

Tools of leadership (otherwise known as manipulation) are a key driver in relaying messaging.  Therefore, social media content which conveys authority and knowledge are those which are most useful to the type of people who influence others. 

Few companies have a plan to develop word of mouth marketing.  Part of the reason for that reticence is that there is no budget for word of mouth marketing.  As said by Jonah Berger in his book Contagious: Why Things Catch On, speaks about difficulty of developing a plan of action.  As he has said, “You can shape it, you can encourage it, you can drive it, but you can’t buy it.” 

That’s why Content Savants is pleased to present what may be your company’s first word of mouth advertising campaign strategy, in these succinct steps:

Step 1 – Shape it:  More than what you want someone to talk about, decide how you want someone to feel when mention of your company, or your product, or service comes up in conversation.  What feelings do you want to associate with your business?

Step 2 – Encourage it:  The key here is to ensure that the messaging is relevant to the viewership.  Implementing this strategy often means that social media campaigns must be more finely targeted.  Rather than mass distributions to a large list of followers, narrowly-defined lists to followers with similar characteristics are often critical to the success of a message or posting.  In this step, relevance is everything.

Step 3 – Drive it:  Make people want to recount the message.  Driving references, or more specifically referrals, requires that the content give the referring person a way to enhance their standing or stature vis-à-vis the ones they are conversing about.  In the world of social media, memes which sound smart are top priority.  Here are general content themes for driving word of mouth discussion:

• Data which offers explanatory insights about which products/services work well and which ones do not
• Information which succinctly explains why designs or works of art are better than others, with a bonus for characterizing admirers of competing works of art (thinking of fashion designs) as being inferior in terms of class and taste
• Anecdotes which explain how things work, in a social or political context especially – and these tend to work better if they are cynical in nature
• Funny messages which have a dual use in explaining human behavior
• Comments which explain the universe and human nature in a way that someone who got in trouble should have known better.

Great ideas, now what?

Remember that investment into social media is not just about frequency, timing and the audience.  It is also about content, and ensuring that the messaging has the intended outcomes. 

This article is about driving word of mouth marketing into your social media marketing strategies.  Will it have the intended outcome?