MarketingNPV Journal: Is There a Reliable Way to Measure Word-of-Mouth Marketing?
PRINCETON, N.J., December 5, 2006 – Word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing: It’s one of the fastest-growing areas of marketing, and one of the most difficult to measure. It’s even difficult to define. Nevertheless, WOM case studies are overwhelmingly positive and the WOM measurement cup runneth over with metrics. But what’s real and what’s snake oil?
The latest issue of MarketingNPV® Journal focuses on the wild, wild world of WOM – the evolving technology landscape, and suggests a few ways you might determine the economic value of it on product sales and/or the company’s reputation.
“Rather than regale you with tales of WOM success and brilliantly complex geometric charts, we decided to take a more practical view,” notes Pat LaPointe, managing partner and editor in chief of MarketingNPV Journal, a publication focused on helping marketers make smarter decisions and stronger cases to secure, allocate, or defend resources.
“When we asked ourselves ‘How do you measure WOM?’ the answer sometimes seemed crystal clear. Yet the broad diversity of deployment methods and channels often confounds the search for the elusive closed loop of stimulus/impact. It’s the perfect condition for evangelists and hucksters to breed software-driven solutions, so let the buyer beware,” concludes LaPointe. This issue of MarketingNPV Journal focuses on untangling the fact from fiction about WOM and offers a prescription for WOM measurement.
The issue also features an interview with Tom O’Toole, Hyatt’s dually talented CMO and CIO. Mr. O’Toole offers advice on how marketers should be approaching IT for help, particularly in the area of enabling credible measurement. Also included is MarketingNPV’s own Rick Watrall’s Four Predictions on Predictive Analysis in which he dissects the key trends he foresees shaping the marketing analytics space over the next few years, and how the tools, skills, and processes will make accountability efforts more efficient and cost-effective.
Copies of the new issue can be viewed and downloaded from www.MarketingNPV.com.
MarketingNPV® is a highly specialized consulting firm that builds marketing dashboards, marketing ROI and analytical frameworks, and brand scorecards to determine the financial return from marketing investments. The company designs and implements the marketing measurement processes, tools, and skills that measure the creation of economic and strategic value for both the short and long term.
