I’m Alex Berman and you’re watching SELLING BREAKDOWNS.
There is this movie The Room, that became incredibly popular because it was terrible.
But not regular terrible, it was strangely appealing because it was just so bizarre.
Plots just appeared and disappeared at random, new characters walk on with no introduction,
there’s awful green screen of a cityscape, and many many other weird elements.
And the lead actor, Tommy Wiseau is also the director, producer and writer.
James Franco is playing Tommy in a new film called The Disaster Artist, that’s coming
out this year and today, we’re going to look at how this strange outsider managed
to create an audience against all the odds, by generating the kind of word of mouth buzz
that marketers dream of.
We’ll also look at some other successful word of mouth campaigns and see what we can learn.
It’s estimated that the budget for The Room was about $6 million.
And it’s believed that it’s all Tommy Wiseau’s money.
He’s been incredibly cagey about his past so it's incredibly hard to fact check this.
He also claims to be born in America despite a bizarre Eastern European accent.
We also don’t know how he made his money, although in the book it’s been said it was
from selling fake clothing that he parlayed into a real estate play.
Since no mainstream players would help him promote the film, Tommy put up billboards
across L.A, with his face on and a web address and a phone number, that led to some very
low quality site.
And if you called in it went straight to voicemail.
One billboard, on Highland Avenue in Hollywood, stayed up for 5 years, at a cost of $300,000
and it’s this long game that gave The Room time to generate a cult following.
Celebrity fans like Paul Rudd and Kristen Bell also helped get the word out that the
awfulness somehow made it incredibly watchable, even rewatchable.
Late night screenings popped up and the audience would respond to moments in the film, like
throwing plastic spoons whenever they saw a spoon on a screen.
It's this inability to quit spending money on promotion that eventually led The Room
to find its audience and make its budget back.
So, how does word of mouth work and why is it so successful?
Do you need a certain critical mass of people or an early momentum?
Well, the obvious reason why word of mouth works is that the people who end up selling
a product or a brand or, in our case, a terrible movie, to you, are your friends and family;
the people who you trust the most and who likely have a similar life and tastes to your
own.
No ad campaign or review site could top the power of your best friend telling you “Dude,
you have to watch this movie!” because who’s going to say no to that?
It’s the essence of viral marketing, although there are now algorithms at work there too,
promoting content that builds momentum.
But you can still see word of mouth at work in it’s purest form on social media.
Just a few weeks back, after the Harvey Weinstein story broke, the #MeToo hashtag was spread
person to person across facebook and twitter, with each woman responding to her friends’
posts about their experience with sexual assault and harassment.
It’s powerful, it makes you sit up and listen, much more than a shared article ever would
because of the personal connection.
You might think; “okay, but I can’t generate word of mouth, that would just be advertising”,
but that isn’t true.
You can really push for word of mouth by focussing on customer satisfaction.
Online clothing store, Zappos grew to $2 billion in revenue by sacrificing advertising in favour
of better customer service because you don’t need the perfect product to have word of mouth
recommendations, you just need happy customers.
When it comes to digital, it’s often the brands that promote themselves as a lifestyle
product that get the best success in word of mouth.
Dairy alternative, Coconut Bliss, is a great example.
They use their social media presence to promote other ethical businesses and products as well
as environmental projects.
They are now aligned as a key brand for the ethical consumer, who are happy to recommend
the dessert because it fits with who they are.
So for businesses, try to get to grips with the social implication of your product.
Think about what positive experiences would cause people to recommend you, and to who.
Only then will you be able to see how to guide your word of mouth strategy.
And if all else fails you can still spend $300k on a Los Angeles billboard.
Wanna learn more about business theory and history?
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