This week the School of WOM is underway in Chicago. This event prompted me to reflect on a recent instance of word of mouth (WOM) in action.
At Ant’s Eye View, we believe the purpose of business is to create customers who create customers. What better way to create customers than to celebrate your current customers – give your current customers something to talk about – WOM 101.
So how do you celebrate a customer? The typical way is to thank them for conducting a transaction with your company and then sending a holiday card at the end of every year – nice, but easily ignored. To celebrate a customer you should make them feel special, give them props and support beyond the business transaction.
I had the opportunity to make a public display of celebrating a customer-Rod Brooks, CMO of PEMCO Insurance and School of WOM instructor. Rod is an early customer of AEV and we are big fans of Rod. Rod was traveling to Austin for the Bazaarvoice Social Commerce Summit last month. Typically if a customer is traveling to your zip code you arrange to share a meal – nice and expected. Well, Rod was only in Austin for 36 hours and not a lot of time. Instead we wanted to give Rod something to talk about while in Austin and after he left. At first we (@jakemckee, @jackiehuba and I) said why don’t we pick Rod up at the airport, give him a ride to his hotel. @jackiehuba got us one step further, “lets make Rod a celebrity.” So we used the service Celeb 4 a Day that consists of four paparazzi photographers to surround Rod and capture both Rod’s reaction, but also the crowd at the airport (pointing and whispering “who is that guy?”, “he must be somebody famous because of all the photographers shouting questions at him”).
The outcome was spectacular because Rod is such a great sport and enjoys people (even at 11:15 pm in the Austin airport). During the Bazaarvoice summit, I heard Rod retell his memorable experience of his celebrity reception in Austin. Rod got a ride to his hotel after answering all the paparazzi questions and being photographed over 100 times in 15 minutes. AEV got the opportunity to not only thank a customer, but to celebrate a customer with some fun memories, pictures, and a story that gets retold over and over again.
If you are attending School of WOM be sure to ask Rod about his 15 minutes of fame from his one late night in the Austin airport.
Hey, is that Terry Bradshaw!! Just kidding.
Sean
Comment by sean odriscoll — May 24, 2010 @ 10:14 pm
Hey, is that Terry Bradshaw!! Just kidding.
Sean
Comment by sean odriscoll — May 25, 2010 @ 4:14 am