Expertiza internationala

Dr. Dan Herman About 95% of what executives in competing companies do is pretty much the same all around. This is good management. If you are CEOing a wireless communication services provider, you strive to have an advanced technological infrastructure with a promising future, cool end-user phones, other devices and accessories, a great service system, attractive added-value services, and competitive prices. Well, this is precisely where your competitors put their efforts as well. The 5%, give or take, that you do differently constitutes your strategy (remember that the genetic difference between humans and chimpanzees is no more than 1.2%). The CEO of Southwest Airlines, the revolutionary domestic American airline, most of the time does exactly what her colleagues do. But her firm offers...

The Ethical Debate For some, buzz marketing raises not just strategy questions, but serious ethical issues as well. In most cases when marketers talk about buzz marketing 'agents' they mean regular citizens who have volunteered to be product guinea pigs -- people who receive no financial compensation, but do get products in advance of their release to the general public in exchange for a promise to talk them up if they like them, and to provide feedback to companies about what they and others think. Sometimes, however, marketers blur these lines in their effort to create buzz, hiring actors to pose as Average Joes, similar to what Sony Ericsson did to promote one of its digital cameras. Actions like these raise the question of whether there is something inherently unethical about buzz mar...

But Does It Work? Buzz marketing stands in direct contrast to traditional television or radio advertising -- the classic 'mass marketing' approach that is based on the premise of broadcasting a message as widely as possible, assuming that this is the best way to reach the largest possible number of interested consumers. Buzzing, which might also be described as 'micro-marketing,' assumes that a person-to-person marketing message is much more powerful because it is so personal -- and that it could potentially reach more people than a broadcast message, if only it is buzzed about in great quantity by people who have very long contact lists and no qualms about promoting products to anyone who will listen. Wind points to a survey performed by CNW Marketing Research on the 15 largest U.S. tele...

There's a new marketing catchphrase that's getting rave word-of-mouth reviews. From articles in the popular press to conversations in the classroom, huge companies to boutique marketing firms, suddenly it seems you can't talk about new products without addressing 'buzz marketing.' "People are buzzing about buzzing," says Wharton marketing professor Barbara Kahn. "People think it's cool. There is something almost empowering about the idea of being able to 'buzz' your way into the products people buy." Buzzing: What Is It?  Put simply, buzz marketing is the practice of gathering volunteers to try products, then sending them out into the world to talk up their experiences with the people they meet in their daily lives. The idea is that the more people see a product be...