How to guarantee positive word of mouth buzz

Expo CEO Daphne Kwon has shared on her blog, NYC Founder, a three ingredient recipe on how to guarantee positive word of mouth buzz.

These three key ingredients are:

1. Start with a great product from a reputable brand.
2. Know your community and target the social network appropriately (aka, don’t ask the bald guy about shampoo).
3. Reward an honest relationship (disclosure, disclosure, disclosure!)

To get the full scoop from Daphne on guaranteeing positive word of mouth buzz, click here.

Stick to these guidelines and you’ll keep the FTC off your back.

Trackback this post Add comment June 30th, 2009 Sarah

Expo Integrates Facebook Connect

I’m pleased to announce the beta launch of Facebook Connect on ExpoTV.com. It’s an important step in allowing our members to share their Expo activities with their Facebook friends, while offering an easy way for Facebook users to interact with our site.

This new site functionality gives us the opportunity to spread Expo awareness to a large and active audience. When someone comes to Expo through SEO - say they are searching for GPS reviews - and they find a GPS review they really like, they can log in via Facebook and leave a comment on the video. With Facebook Connect, they can then broadcast their comment on the video they liked to all of their Facebook friends. Like this:

And those friends will hopefully then click on the story in the news feed and visit Expo to see what the site is all about.

By connecting with Facebook, we’ve made it much easier for people doing product research on our site to interact with our content, whether it’s a rating or commenting on a video review, asking an owner a question about a product, or talking about shopping on our Consumer Boards. No registration on Expo is necessary for this type of site visitor, so it’s an ideal way to allow them to easily interact and in turn provide our brand with more exposure.

This is an exciting step forward and we’ll be making enhancements to our Facebook Connect integration in the future. So stay tuned for more news on this to come!

Trackback this post Add comment June 25th, 2009 Sarah

ExpoTV.com - A Top Innovator

YoungStartup Ventures held the 2009 New York Venture Summit here in Manhattan last week to connect entrepreneurs with investors - venture capitalists, angel investors, and more. The summit featured the following:

- over 25 Venture Capital Speakers

- 3 Venture Capital Panels

- 50 of the Hottest Emerging Companies Seeking Funding

- Emerging Company Presentations

- High Level Networking Opportunities

Expo attended the conference — we are pleased to share that we have been honored with a YoungStartup Ventures Top Innovator Award.

It’s always exciting to be recognized and we sincerely thank the organization for our award.

Trackback this post Add comment June 23rd, 2009 Sarah

Expo and JWT uncover how consumers are coping with the recession

We partnered with ad agency JWT to gather some information for the AnxietyIndex on how consumer behavior has been affected by the downturn in the economy. Members of our community uploaded videos where they discussed what they are doing to help protect themselves and their families from the effects of the recession.

This direct quote from the AnxietyIndex best sums up what the videos uncovered about real American consumers:

We explored strategies people are using to cope with the recession, its direct impact on their lives, and the fear and uncertainty it has instilled. We created a video compilation of what was uploaded to us by real consumers sharing their personal stories. What we heard is that many Americans are coping not with the recession’s direct effects but rather with their fears of what it might bring.

To watch the video compilation of Expo members discussing their fears surrounding the economy, click the image below.

See all the videos where consumers discussed their fears about the economy.

We look forward to bringing you more authentic consumer insights from our community.

Trackback this post Add comment May 13th, 2009 Sarah

A Very Helpful Consumer Video Review of Rubbermaid

We’re all familiar with Rubbermaid’s products for home storage and organization. Rubbermaid is yet another brand that Expo members have shared their opinion about in video - and Rubbermaid finds that these unbiased consumer videos can be quite helpful.

Visit the Rubbermaid blog to read about a consumer video review the brand really liked of of their Produce Saver, by Expo member jar7519.

To watch this video, click the image below.

Rubbermaid’s final word on the video review?

This video was found on ExpoTV. It was not created by Rubbermaid. We would like to thank jar7519 for his endorsement of Produce Saver!

To see more consumer video reviews on Rubbermaid products, click here.

Trackback this post Add comment March 26th, 2009 Sarah

Expo CEO Daphne Kwon on New Info Shoppers

Sean P. Egan of iMedia Connection wrote an article titled Reach consumers who friend before they spend, about “New Info Shoppers” who seek out opinions from other consumers online before making a purchase - even for smaller-ticket items like toothpaste.

Expo CEO Daphne Kwon shared her thoughts on the New Info Shopper:

“To us, the New Info Shopper is not really new, but they were super-enabled by a lot of the tools the internet provided,” says Daphne Kwon, CEO of ExpoTV, a social-networking site featuring thousands of consumer-generated video product reviews.

Consumers are not only looking for information from advertisers, but also from people who have spent their own money on a product and can share their experience with it. Another excerpt from the article is here:

“Advertisers are trying to tell you what they consider the most important, salient facts about what you should know, and that’s not necessarily what I want to know,” Kwon says, wearing her consumer hat. “It’s a piece of it, but not all of it.” She believes both expert- and user-generated information about a product are necessary for a shopper to make a truly informed purchase decision, citing the example of a keyboard: A shopper might locate lots of information from a manufacturer on why its keyboard is designed a certain way, but she also needs input from people who’ve actually used the thing — and spent their hard-earned money on it.

To read the full article, click here.

Trackback this post Add comment March 20th, 2009 Sarah

Retailers can benefit from listening to consumers

Yesterday we wrote about the press release that the NRF put out about our partnership with them as well as Shop.org. SmartBrief has published a story about the partnership, which aims to help retailers gain insight into how consumers are feeling and behaving.

Additionally, the National Jeweler Network shared excerpts from the press release on their website to help spread the word about this exciting new partnership.

Our quarterly videos with these organizations are a powerful, visual way to show retailers exactly what the everyday American is thinking when it comes to spending their money. Find out more about our partnership by reading the full press release.

Trackback this post Add comment March 19th, 2009 Sarah

New Press Release: NRF and Shop.org Partner with Expo

Today, the National Retail Foundation put out a press release announcing a partnership between the NRF, Shop.org, and Expo. We are tapping into our community of passionate consumers to provide the NRF and Shop.org with insights into what real people think about a variety of shopping related topics.

Here’s an excerpt from the press release:

“Listening to what customers are saying allows retailers to make faster, more educated decisions about merchandise, marketing and shoppers’ experiences,” said Tracy Mullin, NRF President and CEO. “NRF’s partnership with ExpoTV will provide the retail community with a firsthand look at what’s behind the decisions made by American shoppers.”

As we mentioned last week, our first video for the NRF revealed Americans’ perceptions of chain restaurants. To view the video, click the image below:

To read the full press release about our partnership with the NRF and Shop.org, click here.

Trackback this post Add comment March 18th, 2009 Sarah

True Brand Advocates at Expo

Jim Nichols from iMedia Connection wrote a great blog post yesterday about Expo members’ readiness and passion for talking about everyday products on video. Not only do Expo members review big ticket items like flat screen TVs or cars, they also review things you can buy at the grocery or drugstore like cereal, feminine hygiene products, or hair care products.

Here’s a brief excerpt from Jim Nichols’ post:

People’s willingness to talk about every day things — every day personal things in particular — seems a marvelous trend to me. Since word of mouth is the single most important driver of choice, its natural that a forum like this would attract many eyeballs….Are they talking about your brand? I bet they are. Head over and take a few moments to listen.

To read the full blog post, click here.

Thanks to Jim for helping spread the word about our community of brand advocates!

Trackback this post Add comment March 13th, 2009 Sarah

Real people offer their thoughts about chain restaurants

Chain restaurants - everyone has an opinion on them. We recently partnered with the National Retail Foundation (NRF) to ask the Expo community what three things come to mind when they think of chain restaurants. Our members’ unbiased opinions revealed three main thoughts about chain restaurants:

1. Experience is consistent from restaurant to restaurant
2. Food is safe
3. Prices are reasonable

For a brief overview of this video project, see this SmartBrief post.

The full video compilation reel and more details can be found on the NRF’s website when you click here.

Thank you to all Expo members who shared their authentic opinions with us!

Trackback this post Add comment March 12th, 2009 Sarah