What is the best kind of adverts for any product or service? Despite years of advertisers telling us that the best products are the ones endorsed by celebrities, we all know that when a friend of family member gives a recommendation for something, that means more than any advertising.
This need to know what other people think has created an enormous wave of content that is entirely about products. Think about Amazon as one of the most mature examples – every product has reviews from customers who have bought it and they can be both good and bad.
Tripadvisor allows guests to review the hotels and restaurants they have just visited and if you want to buy some music from iTunes then the listener comments will pop up before you make a decision.
This feature in The Next Web argues that brands should be more aware of this customer feedback loop. Customers want to talk about products as well as actually buy them. Brands should be ready to engage and talk to customers – even if they are still just potential customers looking for information.
And when customers have complaints, good open engagement using these review platforms can turn complainers into supporters and supporters into evangelists. If you can make your customer service so good that people recommend your products because of the just service then that is a whole new area of product marketing – and probably the future for many brands.
Photo by Lollyknit licensed under Creative Commons
Teleperformance UK 