Two years ago, my fiancee and I went up to Vermont to go Snowboarding instead of going out west. Somewhere along the way, someplace in New York, we stopped at a gas station. While there I decided to pick up one of my favorite snacks for the remainder of the drive, beef jerky. The convenience store at this gas station was all of 6' x 6' but I came upon an amazing discovery in this tiny space. I saw a display of several different flavors of beef jerky. This store had Gatorade and beef jerky. The name of the jerky was "Damn Good Jerky." I looked at the gentlemen behind the counter and said:
"Hey man…is this jerky any good?"
Without missing a beat he calmly replied, "I believe it's Damn Good"
I bought 3 bags. I must say, it was outstanding, simply outstanding, probably the best jerky I've ever had.
Now since then I've ordered jerky but it had been a while until tonight. I ordered about $75 worth of beef jerky tonight. Yeah, it's really that good. Immediately after placing the order, I jumped right on Twitter and posted the following:
Within several minutes I got a reply from a connection of mine who informed me that he just placed an order.
The thing that stood out to me is that I don't think the people who make "Damn Good Jerky" have any sort of Social Media strategy in place…at least I haven't stumbled across it. But that doesn't matter. Brands can benefit from or become victims of Social Media because Social Media has given us all a voice. What's really outstanding is that I didn't even give a second thought to posting my recommendation, and most of us probably don't. We just put our opinions, both positive and negative out into the ether for all to see.
This isn't marketing, or advertising. It's not push or pull. It's just people being people, telling it how they see it. Even though there is a big push to figure out Social Media and how to leverage it, or "game" it, I think that it is the word of mouth recommendation that will ultimately prove to be Twitter and Facebook's greatest strengths and biggest value-offered.
Social Media may not only be good for business, it could be "damn good!"