1. Social Marketing and Online Consumer Reviews Joel Vergun The power of Social Marketing The latest twist in social marketing: Consumer Review sites Tips for consumers and business owners

2. What is Social Marketing? The use of social pressures to influence the buying decision or other behavior.

More powerful than reason

3. Old as humankind 4. Automatic and self-imposed (What do others do?What will others think of me?) 5. Social marketing in the 21 stcentury

Same animal, more choices

6. More sources of information 7. The Internet 8. Transfer of old paradigms to the online space leads to unexpected problems and bad decisions 9. The power of social influences

Baggy pants

10. Social factors in the buying decision

The expectations of others: conformity or rebellion?

11. Internal biases 12. Doing good: Reciprocity; supporting good causes 13. What others say: opinions and experiences of other buyers, a.k.a Consumer Reviews 14. I need a good ...

...plumber, car, restaurant, movie, whatever

Know one

15. Ask someone you trust (w.o.m.) 16. Remember an ad, a sign or an example 17. Look up in a directory (printed or online) 18. Consult an expert 19. Consumer Reviews(written w.o.m.) 20. Consumer Reviews

Third-party advice not the seller or an advertiser

21. Presumed unbiased 22. Problems with online reviews:

Unknown people with unknown motivations

23. Too few reviews, too many sites 24. Contaminated by marketing tricks 25. How does it say what it says?

Consider: Is it Truth or Truthiness?

26. Expected or unexpected (confirmation bias)? 27. Facts (quality, price) or opinion? 28. Who is the reviewer?

Anonymous, pseudonymous, familiar

29. People you think you know 30. Friends and acquaintances 31. Experts, pseudo-experts and actor-experts 32. People like you (demographics, beliefs) 33. People you trust (authority figures) 34. People youthink you know

When you joined Twitter, were you following Ashton Kutcher?

35. Experts and pseudo-experts

Real experts and expert organizations (Consumer Reports, J.D. Power)

36. Actors: I'm not a doctor, but I play one on TV 37. Messengers: Newscasters and talk show hosts 38. Expert advice an example

J.D. Power and Associates

39. JDpower.com 40. Annual Vehicle Dependibility Study

Relied-upon, fact-based methodology

41. Surveys of owners 42.

Example: German imports vs. American cars

43. J.D. Power Initial Quality Ratings

Entry-level luxury cars

Mid-size sedans

44. Highest ranked large car 2009 Mercury Sable 45. Facts, or Social Factors?

Did you experience confirmation bias?

46. Which is the more rational purchase (price, quality, support for the local economy...)? 47. Which would you rather be seen in?The Mercedes or the Cadillac?The Malibu or the Passat? 48. Which has more influence, facts or social factors?Experts or neighbors? 49. A sampling of Consumer Review Sites

Services

50. Products 51. Places 52. Mashups 53. Special-purpose sites

Angie's List

54. Power Reviews 55. Yelp 56. Google maps 57. For Services

Angie's List /ServiceMagic

58. Specialty sites: 59. Sitters.com (but would you?) 60. Google ratings of 61. Most niches are covered (you'd be surprised what you can find) 62. Services: Angie's List

You pay to read or write

63. No anonymous reviews 64. Unbiased 65. Requires businesses to join to use conflict resolution 66. For Products

Google the product type

67. Epinions.com 68. Look for reviews on the merchant's web site 69. Power Reviews offers cross-site consumer ratings 70. For Places

Yelp

71. NextStop 72. Windows Live(now Bing), etc. 73. Google Maps 74. For places: Yelp!

Free to consumers

75. Pseudonymous 76. Social, flexible 77. Yelpmailing lawsuits 78. 79. 80. 81. Google Maps 82. Google Mobile Reviews 83. Local: Too few reviews, too many review sites

One star five star problem

84. Find a specialty site: Google reviews 85. Use an aggregator (e.g. Google Maps) 86. What do you do if you're a business owner and this happens.... 87. Local business worst nightmare 88. Nightmare fix

Find out if you're a victim, and where

89. Find out how to write a review (Link) 90. Email the link to good customers, ask for a review, explain why. 91. Don't offer to compensate them!Just thank them. 92. Other Online Resources

Advocacy groups(e.g. HRC, AFL-CIO)

93. Online Groups and email lists 94. Social networks 95. Business groups 96. Expert and hobbyist sites (woodworking) 97. Youtube - (United broke my guitar) 98. sucks sites 99. Local Entrepreneurs 100.