(* Source: Jeff Zabin *)

Jeff says...

By now, most companies recognize that blogs, discussion forums and other Web 2.0 social media can provide a highly effective platform for any consumer who wishes to share their recommendations, experiences or opinions about any given brand. Their voices can wield an enormous amount of influence in shaping other consumers' opinions -- and, ultimately, their purchase decisions.

Pay Attention to Web 2.0

Lately, I've been thinking about the concept of trust in the context of consumer marketing and the fact that control over a brand's marketing messages -- and indeed it's very image -- is continuing to shift from traditional media to online communities. Of course, what underlies this shift is the fact that consumers place far more trust on the opinions of other consumers than they do on a company's traditional marketing messages.

By now, most companies recognize that blogs, discussion forums and other Web 2.0 social media can provide a highly effective platform for any consumer who wishes to share their recommendations, experiences or opinions about any given brand. Their voices can wield an enormous amount of influence in shaping other consumers' opinions -- and, ultimately, their purchase decisions.

While it may be true that companies can't control consumer dialog, they can certainly pay close attention to it. Moreover, if appropriate, they can modify their own messages and/or strategies accordingly. 

Monitoring Brand Loyalty

With the advent of a new breed of solutions designed to monitor, analyze and measure the impact of consumer-generated media, companies are becoming increasing adept at keeping a proverbial ear to the ground -- but how adept? That's what I intend to find out through my current market research efforts.

In particular, my upcoming benchmark report will seek to understand the extent to which brand monitoring tools are already being deployed and what percentage of companies plan to adopt the tools over the next 12 months.

It will also seek to identify what metrics are being used to measure success as well as what lies ahead as companies strive to keep even closer tabs on consumer perception as part of their product marketing, brand intelligence and consumer insight activities.

In the context of product recommendations, trust is indeed the common glue. Consumers trust the opinions of other consumers, plain and simple, and what marketers have to say about their own brands is becoming increasingly less important than the chatter of consumers participating in online social media. However, that's not to say marketers can't use brand monitoring solutions to listen in on the conversations.

More here