According to Anita Cambell and her blog about “85% of small businesses get customers through word of mouth.” It is clear that word of mouth really does have an impact on small businesses. Now, keep in mind of the key-word “small”, during a recent survey in may of 2014 it was conducted that word of mouth was leading this small business when being discovered.
However, this may not be the case for larger companies, as we may know there is this search engine called “google”. Word of mouth and google complement each other in the line of research. If I am told to visit “that restaurant” or to buy “those new shoes”, I will be researching them after I am told the given information. Word of mouth has a substantial impact on my views and what my friends inform me about a product or service I will often just accept their views and opinions and do no further research.
With my (customer) opinion aside, I would like to discuss business owner’s views. In Cambell’s blog. Cambell suggests owners to: 1.) Check your businesses in google at least once a month. 2.) Conduct a regular customer survey. 3.) Communicate and reinforce to employees the value of raving fans. 4.) Create easy ways for customers to share word of mouth.
Cambell’s four “to-do list” recommendations, gives small business owners guidance in order for word of mouth to increase. More so, customers are more likely to talk about your small business. Any feedback is strong feedback; negative comments will help improve the small business and positive remarks will tell the business what they are doing correctly. According to Cambell, “word of mouth is number one method of attracting new customers.” I completely agree upon this statement. In my own personal experience with products and services I most likely will hear about it from someone else prior to advertisement or other marketing concepts.
Furthermore, I strongly recommend small business owners to encourage word of mouth upon their customers and to try Cambell’s 4 suggestions. If its just a survey attached to a receipt, or a simple question to your customer “Did you find what you were looking for? How did you enjoy our service? Any recommendations you may have?” All these questions can easily be answered, and any answer is a good answer for business owners.
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