As an international marketing major i was intrigued by the case we talked about in class about the tiny little South African wine company that got its start by starting a blog and supplying the wine for a few friendly dinner parties. I think this was absolutely ingenius! As a small new company they dont have much to lose, and they have everything to gain. for anyone who missed class, the case tells that the customers just had to host a dinner party, and fill out a quick survey after, and the company sent them a crate of wine for the get together.
After the part people could get online and blog about the experience and the product! How smart is this?! People dont even feel as if they're doing a lame survey, while they provide quality information to that wine company. People rely on the internet for info more and more, so why not let other people boradcast your good name for you?! Thats the best PR i've ever heard of.
From the view point of the large firm it can be a little trickier. They may already have a good household name and they may not want to ruin that image, however this form of consumer input may be innovative enough to help the firm to keep their competitive edge longer. One example i was thinking of was Clorox Green Works. Its an all natural line of household cleaners, that are said to do the job of the original without all the harmful ingriedients. Many housewives are reluctant to change their tried and true cleaners especially to some "expensive all-natural cleaner." This is where blogging would come in really handy, because Clorox could offer to send out GreenWorks cleaning supplies to customers who're remodeling, redecorating, or moving and have them blog about it! I think this would be a great way to get the GreenWorks product line growing!
Yeah, it's amazing how effective blogging can be in product promotion. It almost seems like the target market is doing localized marketing for you. One thing I thought about though, is that blogging might not be so effective for different demographics. Take a developing country without computers as an example.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea that you had for green cleaning supplies. I know that I would be more likely to use an unknown product if I had the opportunity to try it out, or a trustworthy source of information on what real people think of the product. Blogging would certainly feel more trustworthy to me than say reading customer testimonials that have likely been handpicked by the company to put themselves in the best possible light.
ReplyDeleteI do think that Clorox Green Works would benefit from this type of marketing. People love to hear others' testimonials before investing in a product. However, I'm pretty sure "housewives" aren't the only people who use cleaning products.
ReplyDelete