Why do we call it ‘word’ of mouth? I can’t remember the last time somebody recommended a product or service to me with one single word; there’s almost always a story – and it’s this story (and it’s authentic delivery) that sells.

Think about the last time a friend suggested something to you… there was a story, wasn’t there? Maybe they didn’t tuck you up in bed and read it to you, but it was conversational and it contained hooks that resonated with you and convinced you they were a good company for you too.

"Please miss, tell us a story and we'll tweet it, promise."

The same is true of social media. If you expect people to be online brand advocates you need to arm them with your brand stories. The kinds of story that get told every day inside your business, but for some reason never make it onto the company website. You know the stuff that hasn’t been smoothed within an inch of its life, the real stories you tell new employees about the business, the reasons that make your people proud to work for you. These words of mouth start from within but quickly spread through social networks, become embellished along the way and ultimately become your brand proposition. Remember, your brand is only what people say it is.

Google is a great company because it delivers an excellent search product but so does Bing.  Google, however, is a brand we want to associate with because they have a great story, one that we love telling and embellishing. You know those stories, the one about the Google chefs that cook staff gourmet meals, the one about the allowance given to Google engineers to work on a project of fancy for one day a week, whether it’s commercially viable or not. The story that Google really does try to be fair, that they aren’t really into placing cookies on our machines and tracking the shit out of our web behaviours.

These stories, in turn, give us a story to tell – and oh how we love telling them. Sharing such stories now comes at the click of a retweet and boy do these words travel fast. So start thinking about the stories you have to share, just the process of thinking like this will open up your business, make you more authentic and give your advocates something worth talking about.