Great Advertising Won’t Save Your Crummy Product

Sriracha; A company that’s created an enormously viral product without ANY marketing.

“How’d they do that?,” you ask? Simple. They built an amazing product.

Word of Mouth Advertising

Today, social media is the plumbing to the word of mouth in our society, creating word of mouth advertising for products that actually provide real value. If you make a great product and you can get people to taste it, both literally and metaphorically, then there’s a tremendous opportunity for your name to spread on its own. There are tons of brands, not just Sriracha, that don’t spend a dime on marketing and win simply by making a great product that people can’t help but talk about.

Word of Mouth Influence

In that regard, social media has put us in a very interesting space. You can use word of mouth influence to build up your consumer base. So, what is “word of mouth influence?” Simple: leverage the social “influence” of one individual who’s had a great experience with what your business offers, and you can be well on your way to surpassing the attention that any paid budget would get you. But: you need to make sure you actually have a good product. For instance, if you’re a small time restaurant that happens to have great food, all you need is that one person on Instagram or Twitter to talk you up because they love what you have to offer.

The Takeaway

The key to all of this is actually building a product that provides real value for the end user. You can have all the money in the world, but if you have a crummy product, in the long term, it won’t make a difference. Companies like Sriracha are certainly anomalies in many ways but the core to their success is a simple one; They built a product that people actually want and for that, those people have spoken, and will continue to speak as long as the product continues to provide them value.

Featured photo credit: Gary Vaynerchuk via garyvaynerchuk.com

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