The New Advertising:

The fortress of one-way communications from a non-trusted source (aka advertising) is crumbling!

Some telling findings from the latest twice-yearly Nielsen Global Online Consumer Survey of over 25,000 online consumers from 50 countries:

"Recommendations by personal acquaintances and opinions posted by consumers online are the most trusted forms of advertising globally. The Nielsen survey shows that 90% of online consumers worldwide trust recommendations from people they know, while 70% trust consumer opinions posted online."

There are many more research studies, findings, dissertations, and so on that confirm the same fact: reviewing is the new advertising. This shouldn’t come as a surprise: just as with other trends, what’s unfolding now is a ‘forever need’ among consumers, one that's now being satisfied in a superior and previously unattainable fashion. In this case, the need is for trusted advice and recommendations—for feeling in control, for knowing the facts, for avoiding mistakes and disappointments—in order to make that perfect purchase. Which has become even more pressing as choice-overload continues: never before was there so much to choose from, in mature consumer societies, and thus such a need for reviews.

It's a need that is met online by having access to millions of other consumers and their experiences and opinions, from giant review portals to real-time channels such as Twitter.

In short, businesses have to understand and accept that consumers’ decision making processes, which ultimately come down to whether they will buy from you or from someone else, have truly shifted to a new, powerful peer-to-peer arena

Read more: http://trendwatching.com/briefing/