A Wake Up Call for Early Adopters

Take a wild guess when the following was published:

10% of new (consumer package goods) CPG products account for 85% of buzz.

Among the products we studied, advertising budget has the strongest relationship with levels of buzz.

The number of consumers who can post content about a product on a blog or message board is confined to a subset of those consumers who are aware of that product.

The findings from this research suggest that buzz is something CPG marketers should consider in developing new product communication plans, and that the role of buzz in generating product sales merits further study.

Given the rapid proliferation of CGM, even marketers who work in traditionally low-buzz categories should pay attention to what consumers are saying.

This is from a current Nielsen Buzz Metrics White Paper. Sounds pedantic to me as someone who's been immersed in new media for 10 years.

But it brings home the fact that - like people who live in Manhattan and think New York is the center of the universe - early adopters of new media need to realize that corporations are just starting to learn what a blog is.

And it's corporate marketing budgets that let pundits pay the bills so they can keep exploring the territory ahead.

So please allow me to extend a warm welcome to all the CMOs who are just joining the social media revolution. Feel free to call me. :>)

hat tip to Chris Abraham and Steve Rubel

Thanks for the love, BL.