The Swift Spread of Negativity.

Today's Marketing Cookie asks about the "speed of dark." I can tell you that darkness spreads rapidly and is the number one reason why it is important to maintain happy, smiling, and satisfied customers. Depending on how unhappy customers become, the darkness will extend to their friends, family, and neighbors. For some reason, bad news spreads faster in our society than good news. When a movie gets good reviews, they usually sell maybe 10% or even 20% more tickets. However, if a film gets a negative review and the word spreads like wildfire, the movie dies. If you think movies die quickly, what about presidential candidates or actors? I cannot imagine what Facebook would become if there were a "dislike" button, especially in an election year.

Last night my wife and I were invited to join a group of their friends on a beer and chocolate tasting tour of Boston. My favorite part of the tour was going to the various chocolate shops and tasting the most amazing chocolates I have ever seen. Whenever we made a stop, our tour guide encouraged us to check in and buy something from each shop in an effort to spread some goodness about each chocolatier.

As our tour guide was telling us where we would be going next, a few people in our group guessed that we would be headed over to one of the largest chocolate shops in the city. Our tour guide smirked, shook his head, and said, "No. Unfortunately, 'XYZ Company' would prefer NOT to have our business." People in our group were booing in disgust and saying, "That stinks. Should we tweet it?"

Do you see what happened there?

Darkness just spread about a company that is well-known to be the largest and best chocolate company in the city, and we were ready to bash-mob them... and we hadn't even been there. Who knows why they decided not to participate in a chocolate tour of Boston, but the result was "darkness." If chocolate lovers on several tours per day, seven days a week, ask the same question about them, the darkness will only spread further. Meanwhile, we went to the shops of all of their competitors, to learn how to appreciate the distinct differences in many different types of chocolates.

This whole time, you have been reading about a grouchy Willy Wonka, and I'm guessing that you may have been trying to figure out what chocolate company I'm talking about. If you wondered what company it might be, you've already proven my point about how powerful negativity can be. I may never know the actual "speed of dark," but I can tell you that it is very fast!