Word of mouth goes online

In its simplest form, an online community is just another example of word ofmouth. Many of your customers will be interested in the experience of other shoppersand will use that information to make decisions in addition to the information providedby you, producers, or advertisements [32]. In fact, consumers view text informationfound online forums, easier to use and more trustworthy than other types of information.Online community participants tend to shop at online stores. People who contribute product reviews or post messages visit community web sites at online stores nine times more often that sites without communities, remain twice as loyal, and buy almost twice as often.The lack of face to face contact in an online community may cause people to be more open and candid with their comments and feedback.There are numerous ways to get an online community up and running, and there arepros and cons of each. We have listed resources for many of these at the end of thischapter. Three popular types are online message boards, blogs and social networkingsites.Is the community safe? Is there some protection of personal information? Werecommend that your community be private, that is, that people have to register toparticipate in the community. Registration can consist simply of an email addressas a login name and a password.A ritual is defined as a ‘stylized and meaningful sequence of actions that binds peoplemore closely together’. Rituals are ‘moments of belonging’ that define who we are andwhere we belong. Communities often have rituals, and you might want to think aboutsome certain events that happen on a weekly or monthly basis that give some structure to the community and generate some type of response from lurkers and non lurkers alike.

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"word of mouth spread offline is more positive and more likely to be interpreted as credible than wom spread online, according to a recent research study from womma member company the keller fay group. fifty-nine percent of those surveyed indicted they found wom transmitted face-to-face and on the phone was "highly" credible, versus 49% for online wom. the study also found that 66% of face-to-face wom communication was "mostly positive" versus 57% of the impressions on blogs and chat rooms. offline wom was also found to be 7% more likely to lead to purchase intent, according to the research." marsha t., advertising agency, baton rouge. la.

“we use newsletters to get information from our customers. have a poll or a survey. it can be short, and even fun: where are you going on vacation? what tv show are you enjoying this summer? then post results in a future newsletter. people love taking polls.of course, always best to use a poll topic that is of interest to your audience.our customers are into new bands, especially hip-hop. we like to poll about "who's hot" in order to let them chime in about their favorites, and it also let's us get a sense of trends.”anson l , natchez, miss clothing store

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