CONTENTS
Why This Book—and Word-of-Mouth Marketing Today—Is Different • Secrets • “Let’s Go Up a Level of Abstraction” • Stupid Questions • Customer = Prospect unless Customer ≠ Prospect • “Buy” = “Buy into” = “Adopt” = “Believe,” Also, “Sell” = “Convince” = “Persuade” • Product = Service = Idea = Methodology • Word-of-Mouth Marketing Is NOT Word-of-Mouth Advertising
CHAPTER 1 The Systematic Approach to Word of Mouth
The Digital-Information-Knowledge-Transportation-Communications-Internet-Marketing-Word-of-Mouth Revolutions • The Dot-Com Super Bowl • The New Media • The New Challenges of Marketing • This Book Has a New Purpose—Our Goals Have Changed • A Trip into a New Way of Thinking
CHAPTER 2 Dominating Your Market by Easifying the Customer Decision Cycle
The Function of Word of Mouth • What Is Marketing? • Decision Speed • Your Decision Easification System • How to Do It • Cut Decision Time in Half
CHAPTER 3 How to Use Word of Mouth to Easify the Decision Process
Property 1. Word of Mouth’s Megapower • Property 2. The Speed of Word of Mouth • Property 3. Independent Credibility • Property 4. The Hidden Advantage of Word of Mouth: Experience Delivery • Property 5. Word of Mouth Is More Relevant and Complete • Property 6. Word of Mouth Feeds on Itself • Property 7. Word of Mouth Itself Becomes One of the Product’s Attributes
CHAPTER 4 The Decision Process
The Decision Process—Overview • The Adopter Types: How Word of Mouth Works for Different Types of Decision Makers • Decision Styles—Putting Together the Adopter Types With the Decision Stages • The Decision Matrix
CHAPTER 5 Six Ms to Live By
The Six Ms • Give Them Something to Talk About • So, the Form Is Stories. What’s the Content?
CHAPTER 6 The 2nd M: The Mavens
Delivering the Message • The Controversy: Influencers Versus Peers • Sources of Word of Mouth • Expert-to-Expert Word of Mouth • Expert-to-Peer and Peer-to-Peer Word of Mouth • The Catch-22 of Marketing • Delivery of Word of Mouth • The Care and Feeding of Champions
CHAPTER 7 The 3rd M: Motivation
Beware of a Trap: Intrinsic Versus Extrinsic Word of Mouth • The Secret Exception • Another Trap
CHAPTER 8 The 4th M: Means or Media
Additional Ideas • Search Engine Optimization • Getting Involved
CHAPTER 9 The 5th M: Measurement
The Problem • The Difference Between Measurement and Research • How to Research Word of Mouth • Other Research Designs
CHAPTER 10 The 6th M: Multiplication
What Is Trust? • Further Secrets of Trust
CHAPTER 11 (Almost) Everything I Learned About Marketing, I Learned in My Father’s Drugstore. Let Me Share It With You.
Key Secrets from My Father’s Example • More Secrets from My Father’s Example
CHAPTER 12 Constructing the Ultimate Word-of-Mouth Campaign
The First Word-of-Mouth Programs • How I First Harnessed Word of Mouth • Success Stories of Word-of-Mouth Sessions • Making Word of Mouth More Valuable • Situations That Benefit from Word-of-Mouth Programs, Events, and Sites • Products With Which You Should Avoid Word-of-Mouth Events
CHAPTER 13 Six Steps to Harnessing Word of Mouth
Constructing Your Word-of-Mouth Campaign • An Example of the Six-Step Process • The Process in Detail • Product Seeding • Very Expensive Products • Internal Word of Mouth • Word-of-Mouth Campaigns With High-Ticket, Professional Products
CHAPTER 14 Which Methods Work Best for What? A Word-of-Mouth Checklist
Sources and Delivery Mechanisms • Word-of-Mouth Checklist
CHAPTER 15 Word-of-Mouth Marketing for Specific Audiences and Circumstances
How to Develop a WOMworthy Differentiation in a Practice or Profession • Secrets of Word-of-Mouth Marketing for Specific, Special, or Narrower Circumstances • Additional Tips, Techniques, and Suggestions
CHAPTER 16 Tips, Techniques, and Suggestions That Will Make It Easier
Who Can Help You Construct Word-of-Mouth Campaigns? • Word-of-Mouth Fraud and Other Shady Practices