In this podcast, I present an academic paper that I have co-authored with three Canadian colleagues about word of mouth marketing in online communities. The paper presents a qualitative study of a product seeding campaign among bloggers. We show how bloggers adapt the word of mouth expression to fit their character type, narrative, and community norms. The second part of this section addresses ethics in word of mouth marketing drawing from the excellent sources provided by the Word of Mouth...

In this fifth part about word of mouth marketing, we discuss what marketers can do in case of negative buzz. The lecture is illustrated with a lot of marketplace examples. Finally, I turn attention to the importance of matching your marketing message with the venue in which it appears. We end the lecture with an illustration of a winning web campaign (WOMMIE awards 2008) developed by MacDonalds, that cleverly mixed messages, audiences, and venues (web and traditional media) to launch a new...

Continuing with the lecture about the stickiness factor of messages, I show several videos with viral marketing best practices. Then, a student team presentation about Sony PSP offers an alternative scenario in which a marketing communications campaign resulted in negative buzz.

In this third part about word of mouth marketing, I present the segment -women- as an important category of influentials. Following Malcolm Gladwell's book The Tipping Point', I continue with discussing the stickiness factor of messages. As an illustration of sticky messages, a student team presents the Whopper Sacrifice campaign developed by Burger King.

This podcast continues with the presentation of an academic paper that shows which types of customers are more likely to generate word of mouth that has an effect in terms of sales. Students ask a lot of questions about the paper and we have a discussion about the process and effects of word of mouth marketing.

In this first part about word of mouth marketing, I build upon the podcast with fundamental information about word of mouth. I offer some examples of how marketers have capitalized on the different types of word of mouth that we can distinguish. Then, I address the mechanisms that generate buzz or viral spread of information. In this part of the session, I address the influentials theory, i.e., the idea that some consumers are more likely to ignite buzz, and to influence people's behaviors...

In this introductory session, I address how the marketplace for marketing communications has changed due to the rise of social media. I point out the problems that marketers face if they rely on traditional media, and I show what are the marketing opportunities and challenges that social media present. Then, I explain the organisation of the course, including the planning, content of each session, course materials, and the assignments.

This introduction explains the content of the course how it is given to HEC students and what you'll get in the related podcasts