[INFOGRAPHIC] Recommendation: The Holy Grail of Marketing

According to statistics, between 20% and 50% of all purchasing decisions are a result of word-of-mouth marketing. Unfortunately, not many marketers have mastered this ancient art.

Word-of-mouth encompasses a number of subcategories – blog, viral, referral, influencer and blog marketing, which integrate with offline marketing tactics as well. It is a crucial component of organic growth, since a customer talking about their positive experience with your products or services is worth 10 times more than anything you wrote or said yourself.

Note that customers acquired this way spend two times more and make two times as many referrals themselves and add two times the lifetime value than customers acquired through traditional marketing tactics.

[su_quote cite=”Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook CEO” class=”right”]

People influence people. Nothing influences people more than a recommendation from a trusted friend. A trusted referral influences people more than the best broadcast message. A trusted referral is the Holy Grail of advertising.[/su_quote]

As 92% of people claim a positive recommendation from a friend is the biggest influence on whether to make a purchase or not, it is safe to say that it is one of the top three biggest consumer influencers at every step of their buying journey.

Namely, 92% of Millennials trust WOM when making purchasing decisions regarding clothes, electronics and packaged goods. However, what one might less expect to hear is that Baby Boomers, too, rank recommendations as a number one influence when it comes to purchasing big ticket items, such as real-estate or cars.

Naturally, as we live in the Digital Age, word-of-mouth happens everywhere, at all times. People are not only limited to face to face interactions and (mobile) phones, but they also exchange opinions via email, blogs, forums and many more.

Social media platforms, in particular, allow word-of-mouth to travel fast, and as such represent incredibly rich sources of information, both for potential customers and businesses; you can monitor what is being said for marketing purposes, engage in product-related discussions, generate buzz, and so on.

What’s interesting when it comes to the 21st century recommendation is the fact that consumers trust online customer reviews and personal contact equally.

Want to know more about how recommendation influences your marketing tactics? Check out our infographics below to find out just how powerful WOM is and what to focus on if you want to be one of the 6% of marketers who know how to utilize word-of-mouth.