They give you their word

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: I did not find Google through a search engine. I first found out about Google through word of mouth. And it was through word of mouth that I first heard about Craigslist (www.craigslist.org), digital camera review (www.dpreview.com), Techcrunch (www.techcrunch.com), Gigaom (www.gigaom.com) and other interesting technology and Web 2.0 sites. It is quite intriguing, if not ironic; when you consider that in this digital age we still rely on this very human way of sharing useful or relevant information.

Savvy marketers call folks that transmit this word of mouth information as transmitters or ambassadors, recognising the importance of such ambassadors for brand building and creating a buzz around their products and services. Many tech savvy companies and entrepreneurs are busy trying to harness the power of word of mouth marketing in the online world. In India there are quite a few online sites like Burrp (www.burrp.com) and MouthShut (www.mouthshut.com) that have an army of volunteer reviewers who share their opinions and views about various services and products. The information they share ranges from restaurants, nightclubs, tech gadgets to services.

Mumbai-based Burrp bills itself as a “fun way to find and share your views on local stuff” like restaurants, points of interests and so on. MouthShut, another Mumbai-based company is focused on products and services. “MouthShut is India’s first and largest user generated content company,” points out Faisal Farooqui, founder and CEO of MouthShut. MouthShut started off with plain old text reviews and recommendations, but has now expanded to include video and social networking tools.

Both these sites do a good job of aggregating and sharing information on a whole range of services, places and products.  Burrp has gone one step forward and added an SMS feature that lets you receive updates on your mobile phone after you register for their service. MouthShut offers video reviews on its online site. While both sites provide excellent information there is no immediacy, that is, I can’t experience the information right away but have to go search for it online. That got me thinking if there are ways in which this online experience can be enhanced and improved.