1000heads: The Word of Mouth People: 10 amazing WOM thought leaders

This week, our 10th birthday celebrations focus on saying thank you to the industry: that eclectic global community of social innovators, word of mouth practitioners, consumer champions and just downright interesting human beings who push us all to think differently, and do better.

So we’ve decided to profile ten of the WOM thought leaders who have really inspired us as a company, and asked them:

How do you feel WOM has evolved in the past ten years?

These are a tiny selection from a vast number of people we love, but they’re a great start for anyone looking at WOM. So, in no particular order…

1. Emanuel Rosen
Emanuel wrote his bible of WOM, The Anatomy of Buzz, back in 2000 to international acclaim, and we love his down to earth, challenging style. His emphasis on offline as well as online triggers and the accessibility of his explanations and case studies make him a must-read. In fact, come listen; he’s speaking at WOM UK in a couple of weeks.

“As consumers, we not only have more opportunities to hear and read what our friends have to say, but also to observe what they do. This will become even more important in the future. Marketers can no longer ignore word of mouth because so much of it is visible online (although most of it still happens offline).”

2. John Bell
We first met John, Managing Director of Ogilvy’s 360° Digital Influence team, as President of WOMMA. We were quickly impressed with his ability to link WOM to the realities of business, talking about how companies can harness this brave new world in a way that practically works with their processes and capabilities.

“While any communications expert will quickly acknowledge that “word of mouth” – peer recommendations of one sort or another – has been around since the dawn of man & woman, the power of WOM to build or level brands has been amplified exponentially by digital communications over the past ten years. Ask any true social media expert with experience why marketers are so fascinated by the strength and potential to use social media and the answer is always “to activate word of mouth.” Simply put, word of mouth marketing is the answer why any brand would want to use social media at all.

Looking forward? Big brands will launch large, multi-million-dollar marketing programs this year with word of mouth marketing firmly at the center. Their purpose will be to authentically activate word of mouth towards the goal of selling product and sustaining the health of their brand.”

3. Joe Pine and Jim Gilmore
Joe Pine and Jim Gilmore made a huge splash in 1999 with their fantastically original book ‘The Experience Economy’ and now ‘Authenticity: What Consumers Want’ brings us fresh perspective yet again. Packed full of case studies and practical models, it gives a fresh perspective on thinking how to connect with consumers in broad and deep ways - by thinking about how they want to feel. A must-read.

“There are two huge changes in word-of-mouth over the past decade. One, the recognition that the best way to create WOM is not through advertising and traditional marketing. Instead, more and more companies recognize that the experience IS the marketing — the best way to generate demand is through engaging experiences that generate word-of-mouth (and spend-of-wallet). Two, with authenticity becoming the new consumer sensibility, consumers increasingly purchase based on conformance to self-image; they will not spread the word on offerings that do not match their own identity.”

4. Joanne Jacobs
Unforgettable to anyone who has seen her present, consultant and educator Jo has unerring ability to cut through the crap and challenge assumptions, always finding the human perspective in any discussion about technology and tools. She believes in people, and it shows.

“This was, and continues to be, the revolution in marketing. Ironically, it’s the embodiment of the original emergence of marketing as a discipline - effective communication of authentic information about products, be these goods or services.

WOM is a shift in the way marketers and business generally need to engage the socially connected citizen.

The past decade has seen the rise of opportunities for mass adoption of platforms for social communication, and WOM as a subset of those social connections. It has seen the emergence of rich media capture - images, sound and video - via mobile devices, and the opportunity to publish and share these media at the touch of a button. But most of all, it has seen a shift in power over the reputation of brands from the domain of marketers to the experience of user/consumers. WOM hasn’t just been the instrument of that change; it has been the weapon of user/consumers against marketing spin. For me, this is such an exciting development. The rise in the power of the user/consumer, not just as an informed citizen, but also as a producer of content and resources, is partly a realisation of a long-promised global village. And at the end the past decade of social media development, I see ahead an even richer landscape of user-led advocacy and filters for timely, geolocated and compelling information and experiences. But understanding WOM is going to be utterly crucial to competitive advantage in that environment. And firms that fail to engage in the age and stage of WOM will soon find themselves shunned.”

5. Barak Libai
Barak is Marketing Professor at Recanati Graduate School of Business, Tel Aviv University, and an award-winning researcher on the economics of WOM, and his multi-discipline approach looks at WOM from every angle possible. Using biological models to simulate social networks, and harnessing vast data pools, Barak is helming the development of WOM ROI and social CRM.

6. Chris Brogan
President and founder of New Marketing Labs, Chris Brogan’s work is a must read for anyone trying to find their way in WOM, Social and New Media. Author of two books, Trust Agents and Social Media 101, Chris is constantly looking for new ways to humanise business communications through improving what he calls ‘The Guest Experience‘. Add him to your RSS.

7. Scott Gould
We first heard about Scott through a chance meeting with his Like Minds co-founder Drew Ellis (at the Finnish Ambassadorial Residence no less!). Since then he (and his cohorts) have wowed us with their Like Minded thinking, their ambition and their vision; to educate, discover and ultimately give something back through social learning, media and charity. Like Minds is a great event. You should go.

“Word of Mouth, as every marketeer knows, is the holy grail. And despite Social Media (digital word of mouth) growing exponentially, Word of Mouth still stands as the strongest - by far - way that ideas are shared and brands are recommended.

You’d think that every brand and organisation out there would be doing their upmost to generate word of mouth, but the understanding and relational ability that is required to create this is rare - not to mention the risk that many are just unwilling to take in creating campaigns and engagement that are so innovative.

What impresses me about 1000heads and their approach is not only the creativity, the deep relational building that is carried out every day, and their well executed plans, but their measurement and reporting on their activities. It isn’t all just fun and play - 1000heads *really* know what is going on and put most agencies to shame when it comes to measurement and analysis.

They are celebrating their tenth birthday, so as we watched them innovate through Web 1, Web 2 and now through Social Media, I’m confidently watching what they do next to see how I can learn from them, and follow.”

8. Darryl Ohrt
Brandflakes for Breakfast is one of our favourite blogs. It’s the official blog presence of Humongo, a Connecticut-based agency who specialise in creating digital wonderness (and then making it huge).

As you can tell, there’s a fair amount of synergy. Darryl is the curator of said blog is at the centre of all the news, ideas, design, branding and gossip that comes their way. Sounds easy, right? Wrong. Every day, without fail, we find something inspiring in his Brandflakes. Be it awesome innovation, or just plain every day awesomes. If it’s a one-stop shop place for new thinking you’re after, Darryl is your man. He gives good quotes too.

9. Griffin Farley
We ask a lot of questions here at 1000heads; how do we do this offline? What’s the human story? How do we make it better, work harder? How do we create true opportunities to experience? It’s this last element that first got us thinking about Griffin Farley. Anjali Ramachandran from Made by Many wrote about Propagation Planning, one of Griffin’s ideals that really speaks to our hearts: “Plan not for the people that you reach, but the people that they reach”. Griffin is Strategy Director at BBH New York and we like his thinking. A lot.

“40 years ago account planning was developed to inspire consumer-centric creative. 10 years ago connection planning was developed to inspire better media engagement. Today propagation planning is being developed to think about a new target audience: those that hear or see your message through word of mouth. Word of Mouth builds credibility while Advertising builds mass awareness.” On Brands: “I’m excited for the day that brand managers are replaced by community managers. Brands that are not inherently social will not be trusted.” Griffin on innovation: “What I love about social media behavior is at some point people will complain about something. If you listen closely that complaint creates the most fertile ground for innovation when you fix the problem.”

10. Mark Earls
The Herdmeister, Mark Earls, is an anthropologist of the highest calibre. The power of herd thinking, the merit of social objects, the pointlessness of (marketing to) social networks and alike are all opinions that Mark willingly projects out into the industry and, in doing so, constantly un-picks and questions the traditional marketing and advertising practices that have kept the industry from moving forward for so long. For that, we salute you.

“From the moment we are born til the day we die, we are shaped by our interaction with others; for good or ill, we are made who we are by other people - happy or sad, intelligent or otherwise, rich or not. We seem designed specifically to interact with others - our bodies and our brains are those of the ultimate social primate, the Super Social Ape.

Social networks are not channels for advertisers or for the adverts/memes you, your clients or any of your so-called “influentials” create, social networks are for all of the people who participate in the network. “

That’s who we love, what about you? Who inspires you, and why? 1000heads: The Word of Mouth People

Ogilvy Public Relations: Asia Digital Map: Asia Social Media Stats: The Video!

This video on Social Media in APAC created for a recent internal meeting of our regional Digital Influence team. Enjoy!
Please view here: Ogilvy Public Relations: Asia Digital Map

BrandDigital | BrandSimple: The Blog: TV advertising is still hot, if it follows the right recipe

Come on, admit it. Every once in a while you see a television advertising spot that makes you chuckle. Maybe you even spend a few moments chatting about it with colleagues at the water cooler. Perhaps you’ve even been known to send an ad link to friends and family in order to share the laughs. The fact of the matter is that good television advertising still exists, and people still pay attention to it, despite the cluttered digital environment. Notice I said “good television advertising.” While lots of it deserves to be Tivo-ed out of the picture, the spots that succeed do so as a result of following an age-old advertising recipe: Great insight about the category, a simple and compelling idea, and brilliant storytelling. In my recent column in Forbes Online I write about the winners of the 57th International Advertising Festival in Cannes and, specifically, what made them winners – with the judges and consumers. While the digital age has certainly created challenges for television branding, those who follow the tried and always true recipe for success, still keep us tuned in.
BrandDigital | BrandSimple: The Blog

AllFacebook.com: Why Facebook Killed A $100 Million Baby

This evening Facebook announced that they will officially kill the company’s gift shop on August 1st of this year. Currently generating tens of millions of dollars for the company a year, one has to wonder why the company would take such dramatic steps. Facebook regularly touts how few developers run each segment of their business, but even if the company was generating tens of millions on a couple of developers, apparently more can be generated with the small gifts team working on other projects. So what does this really mean?
A $100 Million Business, Gone

We are to assume that Facebook’s gift shop has been growing since they were projected to have a $35 million annual run rate back in 2008, there’s no doubt that the company could easily be selling tens of millions of dollars in gifts each year, at a minimum. However the rise of FarmVille and the social gaming ecosystem on Facebook has driven virtual goods transactions away from Facebook’s core gift shop. The result is that Facebook’s virtual goods business may have been somewhat damaged.

If you had been offered to purchase all the revenue of Facebook’s gift shop going forward in 2008, you may have been willing to pay a pretty penny, if the company was really generating $35 million a year from the shop. While $100 million may be pushing the limits on the value of future virtual goods cash flows, it’s not an unreasonable number. However now the gift shop has become filled with damaged goods that no longer stand out from the numerous other gifts.
A Virtual Goods Ecosystem Rises

As Facebook prepares to wind down the company’s virtual goods store front, the company is also pushing full-force into the Credits business. While the distribution of those goods are currently taking place within games, one has to wonder what future integration points Facebook has planned. The gift shop as it exists today is not a robust platform. While multiple developers had access to the gift shop as a distribution channel, it was still limited in scope.
A Bigger Marketplace

Regardless of the growth or decline of Facebook’s gift-shop, the marketplace for virtual goods is expanding. Projected to reach $10 billion globally, this year, Facebook is aiming to take a big chunk of the marketplace through their Credits service. Additionally, one has to wonder if Facebook is planning on opening up a broader virtual goods marketplace. Given that Facebook believes the future resides off-site, there’s no guarantee that there will be any new distribution points of virtual goods within Facebook aside from the stream and profile tabs.

While we believe Facebook could open up a massive marketplace, there is a greater opportunity in play and Facebook doesn’t want to miss the momentum they are building as the virtual goods market explodes.
HTML5 Presents New Opportunities

One of the largest competitors to Facebook in the Credits space is Apple. Apple is selling applications across their platforms and now offer in-app purchases as well. These in-app purchases account for the majority of virtual goods transactions and while Apple has a monopoly on apps distributed through iTunes, the web will once reign again as the leading Platform. With this in mind, Facebook is ramping up their efforts to provide integration with mobile applications.

We recently saw the beginning of these efforts with the MyTown app promotion, however we would only expect that to continue. Facebook’s acquisition today of nextstop highlights not only Facebook’s interest in location, but also an investment in the future of HTML 5 on mobile devices (as effectively articulated in this interview with Robert Scoble). If all goes well, the $10 billion global virtual goods market, could grow 1,000% and Facebook could be standing as the primary intermediary in the market.

If Facebook can capture only 10 percent of a $100 billion virtual goods market, with the current revenue share of 70/30 with developers (70 percent going to developers, 30 percent to Facebook), Facebook could end up with a cool $3 billion per year. Granted, these are optimistic projections, however Facebook is well positioned to capture a large portion of this marketplace and become the virtual currency standard. Looking at things from this perspective however illustrates why it may make sense to kill the gift shop, even if tens of millions of dollars a year was providing great margins...AllFacebook.com

Business Insider: 10 Things You Need To Know This Morning

Good morning, here's the news. No LeBron mentions!

* Google says China has renewed Google's web page license.

* Google founder Sergey Brin still uses Friendster.

* Facebook is shuttering its virtual goods store, which generated tens of millions in sales.

* Facebook acquired travel startup Nextstop to gain access to two former Google engineers.

* Apple wants to be able to push $0.99 rentals through the next version of Apple TV.

* Gerson Lehrman Group says, "It is highly likely that after the KIN fiasco, Microsoft will exit the mobile OS space within the next year." We don't think that happens, but this is a pretty harsh assessment of Microsoft's mobile prospects.

* Social gaming company Playdom bought Metaplace, a smaller, different sort of social gaming company.

* Yahoo farmed out its real estate listings to Zillow.

* Apple is an underdog in China says the NYT.

* MobiTV has streamed 88 million minutes worth of World Cup footage on mobile phones
. That's impressive since most people haven't historically watched TV on their phones.


Read more: Business Insider

Media Decoder: MDC Again Combines Two Agencies

MDC Partners, the Toronto-based agency holding company, has made a name for itself with several spates of acquisitions. Such buying sprees are often followed by phases of digestion, absorption and consolidation, and that is what is now taking place with MDC — and, as is typically the case, not without some bumpy patches.

MDC said on Thursday that it would combine Zig, an agency based in Toronto, with Crispin Porter & Bogusky, the MDC powerhouse that has offices in Miami and Boulder, Colo. Zig will become the Toronto office of Crispin Porter & Bogusky, which will be known as Crispin Porter & Bogusky Canada — perhaps in case the agency opens an office in Moose Jaw.

However, a second office of Zig, in Chicago, is not going to be absorbed by its larger sibling and will be closed in the coming months. The office has eight employees and, according to Katie Kempner, a spokeswoman for MDC, efforts are being made “to find places where we can for them at CPB or somewhere else within MDC.”

The Chicago office is being closed, because it is “geographically redundant” with the operations of Crispin Porter & Bogusky in the United States, MDC said in a statement. In addition to its dual headquarters in this country, Crispin Porter & Bogusky has an office in Los Angeles; overseas, it has offices in London and Gothenburg, Sweden.

Zig began operations in 1999 and MDC bought a stake in the agency in 2004. Zig and Crispin Porter & Bogusky share a client, Best Buy, and the consolidation adds to the client roster of Crispin Porter & Bogusky companies like Clorox, Molson Coors, Pfizer and Unilever.

Zig has also been the agency for the Canadian operations of Ikea, and Crispin Porter & Bogusky will take over that assignment, too, but there is a bit of back story there.

Crispin Porter & Bogusky had created campaigns for the Ikea operations in the United States from early 2002 until late 2004, when Ikea and the agency parted ways. Not long before that, Crispin Porter & Bogusky lost the assignment to create Ikea campaigns in Canada to — yes, Zig.

How Ikea will feel about having Crispin Porter & Bogusky back on its agency roster remains to be seen.

The combination of the agencies is the second made by MDC this year. In March, an agency in Atlanta, Fletcher Martin, became the Atlanta office of an MDC agency based in New York, Kirshenbaum Bond Senecal & Partners.

Some similar moves made by MDC in the past have not worked. In 2005, MDC merged a New York boutique agency named Powell with a larger New York agency, Margeotes Fertitta & Partners to create Margeotes Fertitta Powell.

But less than two years later, after the merged agency lost significant accounts, it was closed. Some remaining clients were transferred to Kirshenbaum Bond and others were moved to a new agency, called We Are Gigantic, which was subsequently shut.

Other clients of Crispin Porter & Bogusky include Burger King, the Coca-Cola Company, Domino’s Pizza and Kraft.

Crispin Porter & Bogusky Canada will be run by Shelley Brown, who had been president of Zig. Andy Macaulay, chairman of Zig, is becoming chairman for Crispin Porter & Bogusky Canada, where he will serve in what is being called an advisory capacity.

And Aaron Starkman, chief creative office at Zig, is becoming executive creative director of Crispin Porter & Bogusky Canada.

The news involving the expansion of Crispin Porter & Bogusky to Canada is coming a week after a former senior leader of the agency, Alex Bogusky, who joined MDC early this year, said he would leave MDC effective immediately.

The Canadian trade publication Marketing Magazine reported on Thursday that the merger of Zig into Crispin Porter & Bogusky had been “discussed seriously” a few months ago. There had been rumors for some time that the larger agency was interested in opening a Canadian office, according to Marketing Magazine...Media Decoder

Richard Edelman - 6 A.M: Media Strikes Back

At Edelman’s fourth Annual New Media Academic Summit, we convened a superb group of senior media executives who offered insights into the future of the sector. They included Raju Narisetti, managing editor of the Washington Post; Greg Coleman, president of Huffington Post; Gerard Baker, deputy editor in chief of the Wall Street Journal; Jonah Bloom, CEO and editor in chief of Breaking Media; Mark Lukasiewicz, VP of NBC Digital Media; Mike Oreskes, senior managing editor of the Associated Press; David Carey who has just joined Hearst as President of the Magazine Unit; and Jon Miller, CEO of Digital Media at News Corp.

These media leaders are addressing challenges head-on, and are optimistic about their future. Here are a few of the most important insights:

1. New Readers & Channels—David Carey, Conde Nast group president cited the incremental revenue and readers for its relaunched Gourmet food magazine and Wired’s completely reimaged iPad app. (they sold 95,000 digital copies at $4.99 each in June)., as only the beginning as people are willing to pay for mobility and engagement. Baker described the iPad as a potential game changer, noting that the WSJ has sold many subscriptions at $208 per year for this platform, and the Washington Post charges $1.99 for iPhone application for a year.

# New Revenue Options—Bloom believes Media will integrate eCommerce directly into content so “media will sell stuff directly.” So, right beside a book review will be the option to buy the book. Access to the archives, conferences and direct access to journalists via email are also being considered viable premium paid options.

# The Pay Wall—Narisetti offered a strong defense of the Washington Post policy on free access to content. “Subscription revenue has always been a tiny part of the newspaper business model. We have 30 million unique visitors each month to our site.” Baker went the other direction describing the Wall Street Journal pay model, “In the beginning of the web, there was optimism that we could focus advertising so ad revenues would suffice. Now it is clear that we need other revenue streams.” News Corporation is bringing in paywalls for its British newspapers and Miller emphasized that will keep investing in quality content to get people to pay.

# Trust in Content—Baker noted that the decline in trust in establishment institutions (business, government) extends to mainstream media. “We often fail to properly represent the views of the majority of our readers.” He quoted Oscar Wilde, “The parts that were original were not true and that which was true was not original.” Jonah Bloom noted that “there is not enough originality in stories being tackled.” Lukasiewicz said that “transparency is the new objectivity. We will have a point of view in stories.” Oreskes took a strong position on “Journalism being distinguished by its higher standards for quality, not by ownership of the printing press.”

# Narrow-casting—Narisetti wants to get away from the single “front page approach” so that a reader can focus only on specific more narrow interest (politics or sports). “We need multiple front doors to the house, such as PostLocal.com, PostSports.com, PostPolitics.com.” He said that “we link to other sites on stories they break (Politico as example)—we need to offer everything that is relevant.”

# Value from Conversation—Coleman said that the Huffington Post gets three million comments from its users each month. “Our content model envisages 1/3 from each of bloggers, original reporting and aggregation.” Narisetti added, “Comments may reflect the market’s view but those who comment represent a narrow slice of readers—but we keep comments as open as possible because these are the most engaged readers.”

# New Measurement for Reporters—Narisetti said, “Newsrooms have never wanted to measure how they are performing—specifically how many readers look at each article. We now do a daily report to 120 editors, with page views, time spent, unique visitors, which photos are preferred—metrics that are key to the business.” He said that his reporters must use meta-data to be sure they use words that “help readers to find your story…people search for Republican Party, not GOP, so use that term in stories.” Bloom added that reporters must be able to market their stories via Twitter and Facebook.

# Power of Visuals—Oreskes noted that while the AP may have 50 reporters on the coverage of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the most powerful content has been visual. “People remember the pelican photo or the AP photographer donning scuba gear to get unique video.” He quoted Walter Lippmann, media pundit, “The world outside, the pictures in our head.” At our dinner, key note speaker, Tom Cibrowski, Good Morning America Executive Producer, ABC, also mentioned they are rapidly adopted new hi-def video cameras to reporters to report more quickly and cheaply with video.

# Importance of Local Market Dominance—The Washington Post reaches 45% of Washington area households. You need 30 ads on local TV or 60 ads on cable TV to achieve the same reach as one ad in the Washington Post. Of the 18-34 year olds in the area, 62% use the Washington Post on-line. This is group most easily monetized in advertising. Note that 86% of the Washington Post web traffic comes from outside of the DC area.


Those of us in PR would be wise to adapt our business model to reflect the new demands of immediacy, visualization, conversation and localization.

You can watch the discussion by going here.

Richard Edelman - 6 A.M.