Why Word of Mouth Marketing Still Matters

More than 90 percent of B2B buyers admit that their purchase decisions are influenced by word of mouth marketing. That means word of mouth has to be on your brand’s radar. If it’s not, you could be missing opportunities to connect with a sizeable share of your target audience.

But despite its effectiveness, WOM marketing feels like an elusive tactic for most B2B brands. Does word of mouth just happen? Or are there steps and strategies you can execute to get the right people talking about your company?

Isn’t word of mouth marketing a little old-fashioned?

Past generations of marketers, retailers and B2B sellers were taught to rely on word of mouth marketing as a reliable strategy for promoting their products and services. The advent of social media and other technologies pushed WOM to the backburner.

But word of mouth continues to be the most effective way to communicate the value of your brand to new audiences and encourage audiences who are already familiar with your brand to take the next step.

The WOM concept hasn’t changed – what has changed is the way that people share information with friends and colleagues. Social media, instant messaging and other technologies are simply vehicles that audiences can use to communicate their brand experiences with others who may also benefit from your company’s offerings.

Influencer marketing gets people talking about your brand.

With influencer marketing, brands can go from hoping for word of mouth marketing to creating it. Influencers are people who are capable of communicating your organization’s key messages to a large portion of your target audience. In many cases, influencers can even stimulate audiences to share information about your brand with their friends and colleagues.

Sounds good, right? But if you’re waiting for influencers to find your brand, you could be in for a long wait. Influencer marketing is built on a two-way relationship. Before influencers will amplify your messages, you need to earn their trust.

One of the best ways to earn the trust of influencers is to provide information that is useful and relevant to their social and online followings. If your messaging is overly promotional or doesn’t contain useful and relevant information, the odds of generating word of mouth through influencer marketing is slim to none.

Word of mouth: Tips for B2B brand and marketers

Influencer relationships are an essential part of successful WOM marketing campaigns. If you’re struggling to generate buzz about your brand and/or products, here are a few things you can do to get the ball rolling on a robust influencer marketing strategy.

• Understand your target audience(s). Influencers have well-defined audiences. So, the first step in leveraging influencers for word of mouth marketing is to identify the specific audience(s) you need to reach.
• Determine which influencers to target. Based on the audience(s) you need to reach and other factors, carefully consider which influencers will be most effective in helping you achieve your goals – keeping in mind that influencers with the largest audiences may not necessarily be the best fit for connecting your audience.
• Provide messaging that’s worth sharing. Useful information fuels word of mouth marketing. By developing messaging that influencers care about, you can increase the shareability of information among audiences.

Want to know more?

Walker Sands specializes in helping B2B technology companies leverage influencer marketing for business success. We have the relationships and expertise to plan and execute word of mouth marketing campaigns across multiple industries and technology categories.

To learn more about influencer marketing, download Walker Sands’ latest white paper, Under the Influence: A B2B Guide to Influencer Marketing.

Or better yet, contact us today and let’s develop a plan to get the right people talking about your brand.