Water Cooler or GOOY Word of Mouth.

It seems to me, that Word of Mouth could be placed into two categories. The first is Water Cooler Word of Mouth, and the second, and far more powerful, is GOOY Word of Mouth.

Let's start with Water Cooler Word of Mouth. Just like it sounds, this is the casual kind you would share around the proverbial "Water Cooler. It could be one subject or many but it involves sharing some kind of information. The challenge becomes, what kind of information is being shared?

Many times the information is just opinion or worse yet gossip and you can usually tell the difference by the volume of the person's voice that's sharing it.

Now opions are fine, we all have them, but in the end they are just opinions. I like the definition of Opinion from Dictionary.com - "a belief or judgment that rests on grounds insufficient to produce complete certainty."

Why "insufficient to produce complete certainty"? Well, because of two important things:

1. What kind of credibiltiy do we give the person sharing the opinion?
2. Is the opinion based on experience? (I'll talk more about "experience" in my next post.)

I believe it is those two primary considerations that make opinion, "insufficient to produce complete certainty" for most people with Water Cooler Word of Mouth.

However, problems with "opinion" do not just stop with a person's credibility or experience.

All of us have had experiences with the kind of person that has an opinion on everything and relentlessly wants to share it with everyone rarely when it's asked for.

At first it seems cute because someone has taken the role of livening up the conversation. But at some point, usually sooner than later, it just becomes annoying. Sometimes, to the point that you avoid the "Water Cooler" altogether.

"Asked for" is the important point here because regardless of how much credibility or experience you have, unless someone asks for your opinion, you're safest keeping it to yourself.

And guess what...in the end, the more you share your opinion only when asked, the more you'll be asked to share your opinion.

As a side note, if you want to find out if you're a know-it-all opinioneer that hangs out at the Water Cooler, take count of how many questions you ask someone in a conversation. If you ask less questions that you answer, then lookout, you may be an "Opinioneer". (By the way that's not a good thing!)

So, with all of that, what is GOOY Word of Mouth?

GOOY Word of Mouth is...Go Out Of Your way Word of Mouth. (I had to leave the "W" off because how would you pronounce GOOYW anyway?)

GOOY is the kind of Word of Mouth that is based on experience not just opinion. Not just any experience but the kind that causes you to go out of your way to share with others.

Now, I'm sure you're thinking that going out of your way sounds just like the description I gave for opinioneers.

Actually, they're not like opinioneers at all and here's the difference. Opinioneers share their opinion when they are not asked. If you're a GOOY, you share only when asked directly or even indirectly, with convincing enthusiasm.

Let me give you an example: you're in a line at the grocery store and you overhear someone behind you ask the person they're with "Who do you know...that's a great mechanic?". You politely turn around and say something like "I'm sorry I didn't mean to evesdrop, but I know the most trusted mechanic in town. If you would like, I'd be happy to give you his name and number".

That's GOOY Word of Mouth. What's the difference? It has two parts; first, someone was asking, second, your answer is not opinion, it's personal experience. In fact, it's a GOOY experience.

That "GOOY experience" is exactly what you want people to have when they interact with you whether personally or more importantly your business.

So in the end, the most powerful way to market your business is to do all you can to enlist the most GOOY's and do all you can to avoid the opinioneers that hang out around the Water Cooler.

Rob