Negative word of mouth is a WMD -- a weapon of mass disaffection

Thanks to a link from The Consumerist, I found this note over at the Church of the Customer Blog noting the velocity of bad word of mouth marketing. Some of their findings:

• Almost half of shoppers say they avoid a particular store because of someone else's negative experience.


• 31% of customers tell one or more friends about a problem they experienced with a store. But on average, shoppers tell four people about their negative shopping experience.


• Negative word of mouth influences future patronage up to five times more than the person who experienced the problem first-hand due to the Telephone Game Effect, meaning that the orginal problem description is continually embellished as it passes from person to person.

Given that Blackfriars found in our latest research that companies plan to spend nine percent on non-traditional marketing budgets this year, we think this data is important. It says to us that embracing word of mouth marketing as a way to avoid serious marketing spending can be like using dynamite to clear a path instead of an ax, pick, shovel. It's faster and cheaper, but if you aren't careful, you can do a lot of damage you didn't intend.

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