It's unfortunate that the practice of stealth marketing hasn't been thoroughly discredited yet -- although Ben McConnell and Jackie Huba did a good job of differentiating good from evil if you care to read into it.
Word of Mouth marketing is confusing to some traditional PR folks, because creating conversations is so different from the "messaging" many are used to. WOM Marketers can neither "stay out of the way" nor try to "control" public conversations after product launch. The first is merely ineffective and the second, disastrous.
I propose the metaphor of the "Invisible Hand". To get good WOM, companies must make products and deliver services such that people can say good things about them honestly. Evangelists cannot be faked, but they can be converted. So WOM marketing is about introducing great products and services to a select group in interesting and cool ways -- but it won't work if the product or service is not valuable in and of itself.
The blogger, the constant IM-er, and the surburban gossip want to tell others about their tastes and opinions. None of them is endeavoring to be a flack or spinmaster for your company. And yet, that is exactly what they become - through no express will of their own - if you set the wheels in motion through that magic combination of a chatworthy product and a creative WOM campaign.
Whether the Invisible Hand metaphor works for the economy is not the subject of today's blog, but I'm sure Russ Nelson would be happy to discuss it with you.
