Ask a Las Vegas cab driver, 'What's the best show in town?' He will probably reply with something like this, "Oh, Jay Leno! My wife and I just went to see him. He gives a special show for taxi drivers at two in the morning. Otherwise, we could never afford to go. Kenny Rogers does the same thing when he's in town."
You wouldn't think that anyone as big in the entertainment field as Jay Leno and Kenny Rogers needs to give away their performances, but they do. Both realize that some of the best word of mouth advertising they could have would be taxi drivers raving about their shows.
If you could do just one thing to help your customer and your business, what would that be? The short answer is to give more of what you have away.
Old-School Business + New-School Technologies = Success
Word-of-mouth was always the most reliable way to build a business and it still is: Studies show it positively influences a purchase at roughly 82%, compared with paid advertising at about 10% to 14%. It makes perfect sense. If you're looking for a great restaurant, who will you trust--a close friend, or a newspaper ad?
Social media has such an impact because it moves word-of-mouth marketing orders-of-magnitude faster than ever before. People who like you and your business products or services will market your business for you. For free. Moreover, one person can now reach a lot of people who trust them on social networking sites. In seconds.
People are "trust filters" for each other. The difference now is that they're using simple yet sophisticated tools that allow conversations to spread farther, faster and wider. When you start engaging in social media, you can get on people's radar relatively quickly. Then, if they want to learn more about you, people will "Google" you. They will scour your Facebook page. They'll watch YouTube videos of you.