Ryan MacMillan

Word of Mouth has arrived in the UK. Well, not word of mouth per se, obviously - even the notoriously reticent English have been known on occasion to talk to other people - but Word of Mouth Marketing, in which talkative shills people are sent free products by companies who then hope they will talk about them in glowing terms to their childishly gullible ummm…insulted and annoyed interested and grateful friends. According to the Beeb,

“One of the leading US companies, BzzAgent, is joining forces with a UK ad agency, GroupM. It is believed to be the first WOM agency in Britain and a handful of the UK’s biggest companies have already signed up, including one FTSE 100 firm”

Eagle-eyed readers will have noticed by the capitalisation that Word of Mouth is an Actual Thing (c) and, like all Actual Things (c) it comes with its own self-referential professional society, the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA), an organisation of such mind-blowing cutting-edgeness that its logo is (sigh) two speech bubbles:

(Apparently they were going to go for two silhouetted heads talking, but rejected the idea as “too abstract”). The Beeb article mentions how WOMMA have drawn up a “Word of Mouth Code of Ethics” to guard against the “abuse” of WOM. I read the Code a couple of weeks ago and it’s about as well-meaning and meaningless a document as is humanly possible. Well-meaning (kinda) in that they’re clearly wise to the problems inherent in effectively buying the trust built up between friends, and meaningless in that they’re self-regulated so what the hell happens if someone violates the Code? They get kicked out of WOMMA? Scary.

The only way to guard against WOM abuse is to accept that all your friends are now paid hacks and are lying to you. You will have to translate everything they say, thus:

They say: “This is a great movie” - They mean: “Harvey Weinstein owns me”

They say: “I love this new moisturiser” - They mean: “I have a L’oreal-brand Mercedes in my garage”

They say: “Have you heard this new band?” - They mean: “Fool. Buy this CD and I’ll get free stuff again”

They say: “This candy is great” - They mean: “This candy is putting my kids through college”

Trust no-one!