When Buzz Marketing took a life of its own….

I bet many of you received the sms about closing pet shop in Joo Chiat. It was offering free dogs for adoption otherwise they will be put down within 24 hours. For those who were wondering if it was a hoax, well it was a half-truth blown out of proportion. No dogs were being put down nor were they free.

When you forward that type of sms or email to your friends for a clause or a great discount, you are part this marketing movement called buzz marketing. It is a cheap and effective way of informing your target market which doesn’t require visual cues.

This is intriguing to a marketing student how buzz marketing works in Singapore. Alot of Singaporeans have handphones and email accounts, hence there is an installed network for buzz marketing. With regards to this Joo Chiat petstore sms, I believe that Mariam would have sent out about fifty smses to pass the message. However that measly amount of 50 smses forwarded resulted in thousands knowing the matter.

However the problem of buzz marketing is the lack of control over the content of the message. The content can deviate from the original intent and causing the situation to grow ugly. As seen in this case when the message got distorted and the reputation of the store and the sender, Mariam, is being questioned.

Another problem is whether the message can motivate the receiver to forward the message. The message must be inlined with our culture, demographic or just be emotionally swaying. If unsuccessful, the message will stop circulating.

I also believe that the message have to have a personal touch to it. Singaporeans are quite tuned to turn off or delete anything sms or email which seems like an advertisement.

Seeing this situation, I have recognized how powerful buzz marketing is, however I think it is not viable as a long-term form of marketing in Singapore. After a few more rounds of this type of unfavorable buzz marketing, eventually we will grow tired of it and not be part of this long rapid chain of forwarding.

Comments anyone?

Love,

Dom