Word-of-Mouth. We’ve all heard the phrase before. Advertisers love it – it’s the Holy Grail of marketing. They long for “good” word-of-mouth: people referring other people they know, to a product or service, a new TV show, a great hamburger joint down the street. “You’ve got to try this new mouth wash!”

But how do Advertisers get people talking about their product? More and more are turning to Social Media and online forums. And these aren’t working.

At least according to the author of an upcoming book by Wharton professor Johan Berger, called “Contagious: Why Things Catch On“. Berger found that only about 7 percent of word-of-mouth discussions are happening online – or less than 1 in 13 conversations. Berger also maintains that people are spending about eight times more time offline than online. While it may seem that Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are always with us, the vast majority of time is spent away from a computer screen, perhaps walking down the street (seeing a Windowposter™ in your neighborhood storefront, for example *).

So what do expert marketers recommend? To quote your Grandma, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.”

Sounds trite? It makes sense. Use multiple platforms. Online, social, print, outdoor. We said the same thing in our blog post last July. And so does Kent Lewis of iMedia Connection in a recent article about media and marketing strategy: “In today’s world, marketing teams should be media agnostic and develop integrated marketing campaigns …”

What do you think? Drop us a line and let us know!

(* Another shameless plug for Windowposter™ Displays. What did you expect?  ???? *)