Chris Perry’s passage on Ad Age’s article about BzzAgent as well as his entire post about WOM is simply erroneous. And, as I write this post, I still can’t believe that someone who just attended the Word of Mouth Marketing Association’s Basic Training Conference and who happens to be a Senior Vice President at PR giant Weber Shandwick would use the word “pimp” to describe word-of-mouth marketing.
But there it was the word PIMP on Chris Perry’s GoingSocial blog in a post titled People to Become Paid Media that lists what he believes as potential benefits that may result from BzzAgent’s new word-of-mouth media offering. Here’s is his third benefit:
3. Putting the creative power within agencies that embrace conversational marketing could result in really interesting offers to consumers to pimp products. It will be interesting to see how creative word-of-mouth can get and how ethical standards will evolve with more $$ behind these programs.
Chris Perry’s passage as well as his entire post about WOM is simply erroneous. Erroneous in that he is totally wrong. What possibly leads Chris to the conclusion that WOM is simply the buying and selling of people or personal networks? I have no idea. So I decided to call Chris and asked him why he used the word “pimp” to describe word-of-mouth relationships. He responded by saying, “I don’t have a straight answer for you.”
I have a straight response for you Chris: You’re ignorant about word-of-mouth.
Word-of-mouth marketing is not about buying people nor is it about potentially deceptive marketing practices to artificially engineer awareness to “get the job done.” And, don’t think for a second Chris that developing personal networks means we incentivize people to go out and make friends with strangers so that campaigns reach more prospects. In fact, having a community that is managed and owned by a third-party vendor is not the answer. We did that in 1998 and 1999 and it looked like The Globe, Tribal Voice, Orientation.com, Multicity and many, many others.
Word-of-mouth is about change. It’s about changing marketing relationships and recognizing the power of participation when advertisers and advocates work together. Word-of-mouth is about delivering brand promises in the form of information and benefits to more individuals that are looking for products and services to enhance their lives.
Word-of-mouth has nothing to do with pimping whatsoever.
TAGS: Chris Perry, Marketing, Weber Shandwick, Word-of-Mouth Marketing, Word-of-Mouth, PR, buzz, Pimp
1 response so far ↓
Chris Perry // Feb 15, 2006 at 1:39 pm
First, I agree that using the language of “pimping products” in retrospect was a poor choice of words, especially given the work WOMMA and others are doing to develop ethical standards in place. It wasn’t the intent of this post to shine the light on any lack of ethics involved or faith marketers should put behind WOM. Clearly ethics are a centerpiece within the movement. Aside from that gaffe, I don’t fully agree with your stance or my perceived ignorance. I was simply playing back the contents of the Ad Age piece and musing how people networks may fit into media buyer agendas, and the implications to agencies of all sorts.
The idea agencies of doing more creative things to engage consumers is very real. It’s been a part of the marketing business and always will be. The idea of engaging consumers more directly in the marketing process is an important development and will benefit from creativity and exploration within agencies of all kinds. Not just yours.
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