Immediately after the opening keynote, Jeffrey Graham from the New York Times presented a case study on how the NYTimes is researching how word of mouth impacts advertising.

Jeffrey disagreed with Joesph, he thinks that WOM and traditional marketing can co-exist, that is that traditional advertising is not going away.

Jeffrey has a new title for his presentation: WOM: Marketing's Butt Crack. Good laugh.

Next up was a quick game to get things started.

First question: What are the more commonly used marketing objectives? A: Branding/Awareness B: Direct Response C: Trial Response

Second question: What variables are used most commonly in planning marketing? A: Demographics B: Contextual Relevance C: Cost

Third question: What are the most common measures of marketing effectiveness? A: Direct B: Response Branding

Fourth question: What is the most influential contact point? A: Word of Mouth

There is a big disconnect, marketers know that WOM is important, but the investment, planning and measurement still skews toward traditional media.

What are the myths around WOM?
- You can't influence it.
- You can't buy it in scale.
- You can't integrate it.
- You can't measure it.

All this results in WOM getting a very small portion of the marketing budget, hence the butt crack:

All marketing should be word of mouth, but mass communications can still influence/start. Advertising can drive brand advocacy.

Start thinking about putting word of mouth at the center of media planning.

Media planning for dummies:
- Determine the objectives and targets
- Select media channels
- Develop a short list
- Measure results

Old Way: Demographics, Psychographics, Buying Behavior. New Way: Looking at the level of conversations about brands. Why are people talking? Why not?

Old Way: Channels. New Way: Conversations by technology category.

Old Way: The Short List. New Way: Think about quality and influence of content, what is starting conversation?

The NYTimes tracks what brands their readers are talking about....wouldn't a brand want to be in front of an audience that is talking about them?

Old Way: Measurement, Clicks, Impressions. New Way: WOM.

The Holy Grail has always been directly linking marketing to sales. It's called a Holy Grail for a reason, it's difficult to find. Marketers come up with proxies to link sales to marketing.

WOM also forces us to redefine our markets, since it can easily go global via the technology channels available.

Since WOM is a key motivator, shouldn't we link WOM with marketing? That is, what level of conversation is generated by advertising? Should WOM be the ROI measure for advertising?