Influence of online word of mouth

Social Media refers to interactive web-based applications. These applications allow the users to share content efficiently and in real time. The content of “apps” includes, comments, likes, shares, photos and videos. In todays world, these tools are very powerful in voicing opinions. This power to share experiences and opinions has highly influenced the market of goods and services. Almost 462 million of India’s 1.3 billion people are online. This proportion may seem less but it makes India the second largest in the number of internet users. The retailers, in India, who are using these tools to be aware of the external environment are truly winning the race. The main focus of this paper is to analyze how sharing experiences and reviews about a product or service changes the buying decision of other prospective customers. The research will be carried out through a survey and questionnaire, with a sample size of 250 respondents, and on the basis of the responses the analysis will be done. The survey will question the target audience to gauge whether they make an informed decision after carefully reading the reviews and recommendations of other users. Furthermore, this paper will also analyse the various steps the company should take to ensure that a marketing strategy is prepared if there is a negative word of mouth. Another aspect of focus will be what steps the company will take to promote the good word of mouth and use it as a tool to promote sales of the product. Sharing experiences through rating/reviews/recommendations has become an integral part of todays external marketing environment. More and more people are drawn to make an informed decision.