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WOM book practises what it preaches

Over in DC, global Ogilvy PR Digital Influence gaffer John Bell, who works on the WOMMA board with Nielsen’s BzzAgent guru Dave Balter drew my attention on his blog this week when his aforementioned blog was one of the 20 odd chosen by Dave to host his new book The Word of Mouth Manual Vol II which people can download for free. Dave is publishing his book himself having been a little exasperated with his publishers previous efforts on Vol I so it will be really interesting to see how the book takes off, essentially “seeding” the book on 20 of the most influential blogs in marketing right now. I’ve got high hopes for the strategy, considering Dave is pursuing what we are increasinlgy recommending to clients ourselves- go after the influencers!

An interesting point to note on that though is a conversation I had recently about this influencer strategy with Simon Rogers over at Market Sentinel. Sometimes, the influencers are not necessarily the right people to make something go ‘viral’, or reach critical mass, because the reason why these guys and girls are indeed influential is that they are very critical when receiving messages and will often repurpose that message for their own means, so as a PR professional, your message you want to deliver, may get lost. The real people who we should be engaging if we are wanting to ampligy reach are, who Malcolm Gladwell calls in his book the Tipping Point, ‘the mavens’. These are the guys who people rely on to connect them with new information and not necessarily add an editorial opinion caveated with that info. The message is unfiltered but then I guess you have to ask, well is it as trusted? Food for thought, but looking forward to delving into Dave’s book to find out more.