Online advertising in India: Word of Mouth works better than search engine advertising!
A must read for online advertisers!
In India, 87% of those who use the Internet trust others’ advice rather than any kind of advertising, proving that word-of-mouth is the most powerful advertising tool
As per the research by Nielson:
Online advertising in India: the trust factors
- WoM (i.e. Word of mouth) is the most trusted source: 87% users believe so.
- Newspapers come second in the ‘most trusted list’, with 77 % saying so.
- Opinions expressed online : 73% trust them
- Opnions expressed on brands’ Web sites : 72%,
- TV is the least trusted: 65 %
What’s more interesting is that users are waking up to reality of hard selling (i.e. all intrusive marketing!):
The least trusted forms of advertising in India are:
- Search engine advertisements (41 per cent),
- ads that precede movie screening (41 per cent),
- online banner ads (38 per cent), and
- text ads on mobile phones (24 per cent)
“As a consumer one is exposed to advertising in various media but what touches a chord is either a very innovative message or a product, which is good value for money. Word of mouth brings with it a big “trust” factor, which is quite often missing in other forms of advertising. Indians by nature tend to believe a friend or an associate while evaluating a product”
[via Hindu]
So what are the major takeaways for online advertisers?
- Exploit one’s social network.
- Pay attention to intention economy. Plain advertising doesn’t work anymore.
- Explore recommendation engines and user rating
- And of course, target blogs who express opinions.
What do you think?
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Related posts:
- Online advertising in India: Microsoft launches digital ad platform
- Internet advertising to beat magazine advertising?
- Advertising Market in India: TV and Radio to grow faster than the Print
- Whom do you trust? Friends the most, Bloggers the least?
- Online advertisements – even VCs wanna fund startups who rely on online advertising (and not premium service)
About the author - Ashish Sinha is a Startup Mentor/Product Strategy Coach, and the founder/chief editor of pluGGd.in.
He has launched/managed couple of products (consumer as well as enterprise) in US and India, and now consults with startups/small businesses on their product/media strategy. He can be reached at: ashish (at) pluGGd.in [+91 98452 06443]
Great Title.
Indian People Trust one another whom they know.
Indian People are conservative so is price sensitive mkt.
Only 18% of TV Ads GENERATE POSITIVE ROI. Why?
Because REMOTE CONTROL in every persons hand who CHANGES Frequently,when Serial/Program/News leaves us for short commercial break [2min], to ANOTHER Channel.
91% Likely to BUY on RECOMMENDATION
BUZZ = INFECTIOUS CHATTER WHAT’S HOT WHAT’S ATTRACTIVE.
Word of Mouth, primarily becuz it provides a timely & credible exchangeable experience, SPEEDS up the decision to purchase.
i have small portal,i had to pay rs 20 per click to advertise using adwords but used to get only rs 2 when some on clicked on google ad words in my site-so i said f-off google and started reaching out to people in a diff.way and now i have increased web site traffic 4 time with 1/4 of expenditure.
Search Engine marketing and Word of mouth are two different kind of apparatus for two different kind of requirements . if the purpose of your campaign is just discovery and transaction [ e commerce , B2B , Auction or content discovery etc ] than SEM or SEO is the tool for you .
but if you campaign aims to generate continuous user engagement than its more useful to resort to word of mouth publicity . much of the value in slashdot is via user comment and engagement but in NYTimes.com and new yorker its the underlying content .
reason why these two are often confused / overlapped is becauase SEM/SEO is more structured than word of mouth [WOM] .In most of the cases WOM happen by accident . Tricks like signature footer text in Hotmail can work but its a one trick pony . there are some structured methods of starting a viral wom but you need to alter /fine tune it for your venture thats where most venture fails .
both have their own sphere of relevance and their own pros and cons .
@Prashant: Agree with you to a certain extent, but more advertisers are looking for RoI on their ads – and believe me, I have spoken to tons of SMBs who have been fooled by SEM/SEO campaigns.
Dont’ compare slashdot/NYTimes..further level deep and you will see SEM/SEO/WoM all coverging to a basic point – do I know my user? do I know his usage habits?
And nobody knows the answer better than your network of friends! All this reminds me of ‘tipping point’ – and the entities needed for the tipping point, i..e. finding ‘connectors’ and using the ‘power of context’!
Let me know what do you think!
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Its not about trusting the information , its more about acquiring it.There is only one way to get correct information, that is from the source , every medium publishes content with a motive.
Never trust an advertisement!
Armanparvar co,
we produce food product mechines and natural covering colour for inside and out side of the builldings.so we want tofind buyers and agency for our products .please contact us as soon as possible.
thank you
[...] expressed on brands’ Web sites : 72%, [More.. [...]