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Marketing Through Word-of-Mouth - 16th March 2009
Enlisting the socio-metric promoter

How do you sell electric coffeemakers to tea drinking Malaysians? The local manager of a reputed brand came up with a brilliant idea. He got an established tea company to give them free sample packets of their tea which he then packed as a free giveaway with the electric coffeemakers put on sale with the tagline, “Who says you can’t make tea with a coffeemaker?” The campaign was a success as housewives bought them and spread the word to their neighbours.

Increasing sales through word-of-mouth marketing requires encouraging satisfied customers to spread the word about a product through their social or professional network. This can increase sales while building a network of new customers based on their trust of the recommendation of the satisfied customer.  

The marketing challenge is in identifying key individuals who will promote the virtues of your product within their circle of influence. Golf is indeed a contact sport. Stories of the benefits of a product narrated to “contacts” over a round a golf can convince prospective customers within such a niche segment.

Beyond recreational clubs; professional, business and social networks can be identified within relevant organizations and cyber business networking sites. The key is to get well-connected individuals sold on the product. They in turn will invariably promote the product to the other individuals they influence.

Marketing campaigns targeting leaders in a group or known experts in a field don’t necessarily create a sequence of recommendations within the target community. This is probably because, too often the individual with the most influence within the group may not necessarily be, the most visible individual in the community. The challenge remains in identifying the individual that links the network together. This is the individual who can create the word of mouth chain reaction of positive recommendations.

The key is in identifying whom members of the community turn to for advice. The individual most often referred to by members of the community as the person to turn to for advice is very often the one with the most influence within the community. This in sociology is often referred to as, "the socio-metric leader". This individual is the one who is well respected and strongly influences members of her or his community. This leader may not choose to stand out and often may not know she or he is the socio-metric leader. However, this individual’s recommendations have a strong influence on members of the community. 

Socio-metric leaders ones sold on a product or idea are more likely to influence those within their network to buy the product too through word-of-mouth recommendations. They are also more networked through the community then leaders with a formal title within the community. 

The case of Cobra an Indian beer targeting tandoory restaurants in Britain as a channel to reach British beer drinkers is another case in point. After all, who is the best person to recommend a beer that goes well with Indian curries if not the restaurant owner who is recommending the curries, right? That was not however, the case. Most of the tandoory restaurant owners in Britain are non drinkers of alcohol. The real promoters of the beer as it turned out were the customers drinking the beer. All the owners did was to leave the beer bottles on the table. As customers saw other customers drinking the beer they too started ordering Cobra. It was the regular customers who acted as the socio-metric leaders. Cobra started by a law graduate with a student loan debt operating out of his London flat is today a multimillion pound brewer distributing in fifty countries.   

Siddha Param
International Business Consultant
E-mail:siddhaparam@worldwidebusinessconnection.com

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