Word of Mouth Tip #74: Create something amazing and give it away

Word of mouth needs a trigger — something to spark the conversation.

Triggers come in all shapes and sizes. Buttons, badges, handouts, cards, T-shirts, artwork, research, lists, or ideas can all ignite word of mouth.

And like anything, the more useful, unique, sticky, funky, bubbly, or brilliant the trigger, the more conversation it creates.

How a word of mouth supergenius does it:

Tokyo’s iA design agency creates amazing data maps and makes them free for downloading, printing, and re-posting. If you want a fancy poster version, they’re happy to print and mail you one for a small fee.

Their latest map, Cosmic 140, is a solar system-like look at the most influential people on Twitter. It’s a fantastic trigger because it not only showcases their skills as an agency, but it also targets so many talkers and influencers.

And it works. Folks like The Guardian, Mashable, Swissmiss, Zeldman, Flowing Data, Fontblog, El Mundo, Huffington Post, Newsweek, Fast Company, ReadWriteWeb, Laughing Squid, Gizmodo, the BBC and The New York Times all blogged it, reported on it, reposted it, and shared it with their networks.

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