One of the most common mistakes young businessmen make when jumping into their chosenfields is making the assumption that word of mouth advertising is something that happens bychance. Rest assured, it is not. While providing great customer service, competitive prices, andexcellent products will give people something to talk about, it only takes one dissatisfied customerto equal a hundred satisfied ones. Word of mouth works both ways, after all, and angry peopletalk a lot louder than those who had a pleasant experience. If you want the word of mouthadvertising that will bring in the business, you’ll need to generate it yourself. In this article, we’lltake a look at some of the ways to get people talking (in a good way) about your company. As stated, it’s harder to get people who are satisfied and pleased with your business to go out andtell one friend than it is to get one dissatisfied customer to tell the world. This is an inherent traitin most of the human population and it is a roadblock nearly every company most overcome.People love to deliver bad news. They feel they are doing people a great service by telling them toavoid a certain business. In addition, this gives the customer an illusion of power. If they haveenough friends and enough scope of influence, it’s more than an illusion; it’s a fact. Just one angrycustomer can create enough bad publicity to undue the goodwill garnered by a thousand happycustomers. If you want to counteract this truism, you have to go above and beyond to make surethe people who had a good experience with your company go and tell their friends about it. Since the first days of business, when word of mouth advertising was all there was, nothing hasdone more for companies than to have people saying good things about them. People believeword of mouth advertising in a way they will never believe paid ads. Even if this word of mouthadvertising has to be generated by you in the beginning, it can turn friends, neighbors, coworkers,and their network of acquiantances into new customers. From there, it should be smooth sailingfor you and your small business. Just make certain that once you have the customers, you don’tdissapoint. After all, that one angry customer. . .she makes all the difference.
