How Organizations Can Take Advantage of the Groundswell

If you're still watching television, you probably see an abundance of advertisements for various brands and products. However, if you're like me, you probably choose to mute your TV when your show goes on a commercial break and don't pay attention to the advertisements being played. Commercials have come a long way since their origin in the mid-twentieth century, with corporations such as Apple and Netflix shifting to a storytelling approach of marketing their brands (see below). However, with the increasing relevance of the internet, and the decreasing relevance of traditional television viewership, organizations have been forced to evolve their marketing strategy even more to appeal to a larger audience. 

Netflix: One Story Away Advertisement

The internet has changed marketing drastically, as people can now draw strength from each other based on their thoughts and opinions regarding brands. The groundswell is defined by Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff in their book, Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies as "a social trend in which people use technologies to get the things they need from each other, rather than from traditional institutions like corporations" (p. 9). The collision of people, technology, and economics facilitates this trend, forcing brands to engage with the groundswell in order to thrive. 

Photo: GooglePlay

Through examining the effects of the groundswell, it is safe to say that a company's brand reputation is now highly dependent on the comments and opinions of the public. While marketers spend millions of dollars on creating content used to entice consumers, the groundswell gives those consumers the power to influence the public's perception of any brand. This means that marketers now have to pay special attention to what their customers are thinking and saying about their company's products and services. Companies try to accomplish this through various market research tactics such as surveys or focus groups. While these strategies can effectively answer brand questions, they fail to gain insight into issues that marketers may not have thought of before. 

"Your brand is whatever your customers say it is. And in the groundswell where they communicate with each other, they decide" (Li & Bernoff, 2011).

Companies must learn how their customers think, as they cannot prevent their thoughts from being vocalized online. So, how can they accomplish this? What can organizations do to find out what is going on inside of their consumers' heads? Li and Bernoff provide two distinct strategies used by companies to effectively listen and make these discoveries. First, organizations can set up their own private communities composed of their customers. Cancer centers around the United States are accomplishing this by hiring companies to recruit and manage private communities of cancer patients who are revealing how they feel about their treatment centers each day. Corporations can also conduct brand monitoring, as people are constantly blogging and discussing the brands they engage with online. 

Photo: Grape5

Okay, so now a company has listened to its consumers and gained a great deal of insight. How can it use that insight to successfully market its brand? As stated previously, traditional advertisements and commercials are still present in today's society, but their effectiveness is being diminished and challenged by social media, particularly among the millennial generation in the United States. Since the millennial and younger populations are becoming the largest and most active consumer base, companies must engage them using the media that entices them the most.

Photo: Clutch

According to Clutch, While TV advertisements have a 65% likelihood of influencing millennials to purchase products, social media is on the rise as an engaging alternative to reach millennials at a 58% likelihood to influence consumers to purchase. Meanwhile, traditional public relations media such as press releases are not as effective as they used to be as people tend to rely on what they hear from others about a brand or product more than from the company itself. Because of this trend, organizations must take advantage of the groundswell to speak with their consumers. They can post viral videos (see below) to generate brand awareness. They can engage in social networks to spread "word-of-mouth" information about their business. They can even join the blogosphere to communicate complex messages in fun and engaging ways. Stimulating conversation is a major step in marketing a brand, and utilizing the groundswell is a great way for organizations to start this process for themselves. 

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What brands do you see taking advantage of the groundswell and how are they doing so? Please leave your thoughts in the comments below!