“Word of mouth advertising”: You may have heard this buzz-word thrown around but do you really know what it means and what it entails for your daycare?
Word of mouth advertising can mean a lot of things and it isn’t found in the dictionary so there isn’t one universal definition. However, a blogger by the name of Jacob Mcmillen sums it up perfectly as: the process of actively influencing and encouraging organic word of mouth discussion about a brand, organization, resource, or event. Long story short, when you have a good experience with a company, you are more likely to speak highly of them in front of peers and vice versa if you have a bad experience. Some believe that word of mouth advertising is the most effective form of advertising as you’re not hearing praises of a company from some flashy ad but someone you know and trust. This brings me to the topic of reviews.
Reviews have streamlined word-of mouth advertising allowing customers to leave candid experiences with companies they’ve dealt with. Research shows that 91 percent of people regularly or occasionally read online reviews, and 84 percent trust online reviews as much as a personal recommendation. And they make that decision quickly: 68 percent form an opinion after reading between one and six online reviews (Murphy, 2020).
Now you may be thinking, “Yeah, I know what reviews are and I read them all the time, why should I care?”. Let’s bring this back to daycares. As a blogger working for Kinderdrop, I have access to a large database of daycares. I have recently noticed that a lot of daycares have considerably low ratings and all daycares have a low number of reviews. We all know how low ratings can be a problem but many don’t see the problem with having a low number of reviews.
From my experience, people are usually more weary of pages with a low number of reviews as it gives off a “sketchy” vibe. Daycares are usually packed with long waiting lists so there is no reason why there should be a low number of ratings. Thus, I recommend making incentives to leaving reviews, such as amenities or discounts. This tends to make people leave more positive reviews.
Word-of-mouth advertising has been a main source of credible information gathering for decades and it’s not going anywhere. Being able to leverage the benefits of it will allow daycares or any companies for that matter adapt to any future trends.
Bio, A. R., About the authorRosie MurphyRosie manages BrightLocal’s delivery of research and survey pieces. She heads up data-driven content such as regular polls, Murphy, A. T., See all of Rosie’s articles (60), & 9th, R. M. (2021, January 14). Local Consumer Review Survey: How Customer Reviews Affect Behavior. Retrieved from https://www.brightlocal.com/research/local-consumer-review-survey/?SSAID=314743&SSCID=11k5_q9bze