Promo Power: Buzzing past the busy consumer

At the ‘Promo Power’ conference held in New Delhi yesterday, media experts dared to discuss media innovations beyond on-ground events and in-film branding. What perhaps made the most noise were the words, ‘Buzz Marketing’

The words ‘Buzz Marketing’ almost became a buzzword for those gathered at the Promo Power conference held in New Delhi yesterday. Benett Porter, senior director, Buzz Marketing, Yahoo Inc USA, enlightened the audience about the efficiency of this innovative means of marketing called ‘Buzz Marketing’ and also presented a few case studies to substantiate his point.

For the uninitiated, buzz marketing is a way of making noise about a product or service in a manner different from conventional media such as television or press. For Yahoo, the reason for opting for Buzz Marketing was the ignorance about marketing on the internet medium. Hence the idea of marketing it in a cheap and untraditional way emerged, that is, buzz marketing.

Yahoo decided upon ‘Yahoo Purple Cow Marketing’ which followed the five Ps of marketing- Product, Price, Place, Promotion, Package, in addition to a sixth one called ‘Purple Cow’. Through this, Yahoo projected the unexpected to the consumers, both online and offline.

“Buzz marketing is a great way of attracting the consumers’ attention towards the campaign,” Porter said. “It addresses a very important issue that every marketer strives to tackle, that of the changing consumer, be it with respect to media consumption or changing mindset and preferences.”

“Consumers are not just consuming data but also creating content today,” Porter continued. He is of the belief that the days of mass media are passé and ‘my media’ is the in-thing. It has become important for marketing methods to be suited to reach consumers the way they want to be reached.

Porter also pointed out that many marketers aim at creating ‘viral campaigns’, which is, according to her, not the right approach to viral marketing. “One must create a campaign that’s so good that it becomes viral” she says.

Porter presented a classical instance of viral marketing when Yahoo tied up with a music company and invited videos from consumers. An insurance agent sponsored the whole contest where in users could upload videos featuring themselves in the ‘Hips Don’t Lie’ number by popular singer Shakira. The winning user-generated video, Porter said became so popular that it outperformed the original one.

Another example of buzz marketing employed by Yahoo for Yahoo Personals was an outdoor campaign. The idea was to shatter the myths people held about Yahoo Personal (includes dating) having fake people featured in it and to show that only real people were on Yahoo Personal. For this, Yahoo had a billboard, with a photograph of a girl named Julie, which suggested that Julie wouldn’t move from there until she found 3 blind dates. Underneath the billboard the girl was actually present and she stayed there for the next 3 days just as the billboard indicated. Yahoo, then, run the telecast of the whole video on the website.

Another example of buzz marketing was the campaign by Yahoo on the occasion of its 10th anniversary. ‘Yahoo turns 10’ is what the ad on the site said. It further said that on this special day, Yahoo was giving away free ice-cream coupons to its users. That day, Porter says, they got about 90 clicks per second on the site and a download of 1.8 million coupons.

Porter concluded her talk by cautioning marketers that buzz marketing needed remarkable execution and that a poor execution could lead to a poor user experience. She also revealed the top ten rules of buzz. Marketing, some of which include ‘Promote’, ‘Ideas are king’, ‘Do’, don’t discuss’, ‘God is in the details’, ‘Connect the unconnected’, ‘capture the imagination and ‘Do the unexpected’.

In her concluding address, she asserted that buzz marketing should only be undertaken if it is strategic to the brand and not because it is fashionable or cool.

© 2006 agencyfaqs!