Word of Mouth Marketing: much fuss about buzz

A few days  ago I found this post on http://brandautopsy.typepad.com/.

InfluxInsights http://www.influxinsights.com/?id=904
succinctly breaks down five reasons why YouTube and Flickr are
resonating with folks. Each of these five reasons played a major role
in not just the success of high-tech businesses like YouTube and
Flickr, but also in two high-touch businesses Whole Foods and
Starbucks.

5 Reasons Why YouTube and Flickr are Successful

1| Do Something Better: Find a way or a better way …

2 |Believe in What You Do: Success is a by-product of doing good.

3 | Community is Everything: Listen to your community.

4 | Be Soulful: Even if you sell, like Flickr, don’t sell your soul.

5 | Be Authentic: The lack of corporate polish adds to the feeling that there are real people behind the idea.

There is a lot of serious debate, superfluous gossip and sneaky copycats around these topics »out there«. The success of Flickr, YouTube or Starbucks etc. is alluring, and therefore produces many a blooper like the »Coca Cola Mentos bubbles« controversy.
This cannot be avoided if one thinks Word of Mouth Marketing, buzz or viral marketing can be construed on a desktop and controlled from a desktop. It needs the courage to venture out into the unknown. Let the ideas, contents, products, one name it, float away that they may eventually get captured by this heterogeneic gigantic organism called the public, a public that does not not exist … but this remark leads into another debate.

»Some of these values could have applied to Google a few years ago, but money, size and shareholders do force companies to change.« But I think that these values definitely apply to our biestmilch . Or are we a group of megalomaniacs?

And at the end I want to quote influxinsights again: »It’s essential for the venture capitalists that invest in these young companies to think about them early on as brands and encourage them to remain true to themselves despite the external pressures, because ultimately it’s really the only thing that makes them unique.«