Around here, word of mouth can be worth more than any advertising money can buy.
Someone tells you where to get a good hamburger, who can fix your lawn mower,
which plumber calls you back. That’s how small towns have operated since long before Facebook figured out how to put a “share” button on it.
Word of mouth also has an ugly cousin, Rumor.
“I heard…” becomes “somebody told me…” which becomes “everybody knows…” and before long, something that may not have had a lick of truth in it has traveled halfway across Columbus County wearing its Sunday clothes and introducing itself as fact.
I learned quickly just how powerful words can be when we first opened Nieman Market. Not long after opening, when we were less than a month old, we received a public review from a customer that said they went to cook their purchase and found it “rotten”. They were angry and disappointed.
Now imagine being a brand-new small business and seeing that word attached to your name: Rotten.
That’s a powerful word when you’re in the business of selling food. Was there a problem with the product, an issue after it left the store, a misunderstanding? Those were questions that needed to be answered. Customers have every right to complain when something isn’t right. Businesses need to hear those complaints. Mistakes can happen, and businesses need the opportunity to fix them.
There is a difference between saying “I had a problem with something I purchased” and leaving everyone who reads your words with the impression that a business sells rotten meat. One describes an experience, the other can become a reputation. And that is the problem with words. The accusation can get an audience long before the facts ever put their shoes on.
And it certainly isn’t limited to my business. I have heard the same thing happens with other local businesses.
“Somebody said they went out of business.”
“I heard they retired.
“I heard they shut down.”
Those may sound like harmless little rumors, think about what happens when they get repeated. If someone hears
that a restaurant, store or service business has closed, they don’t stop by, call or place an order. They take their
money somewhere else.
For a small business, misinformation doesn’t have to be malicious to do damage. Not everyone who repeats
something that isn’t true is lying. Most of the time, somebody heard something, misunderstood something,
assumed or repeated information they genuinely believed was accurate. Somewhere along the way, “I wonder if…” becomes “I heard…” and eventually becomes “I know…”
That is where word of mouth stops being helpful and businesses are not the only ones on the receiving end. It
happens to people, employees, organizations, and local government.
A comment gets repeated, screen shots lose their context, somebody shares what somebody else said somebody
told them. Ten people repeat it, and suddenly repetition is treated as evidence. Social media didn’t invent gossip;
it just gave the old grapevine a turbocharger. That’s why there is one question I think we should ask ourselves before repeating something about another person,
business or organization. Do I know if this is true?
There is absolutely nothing wrong with asking questions, in fact, I think we should ask more of them. Ask the business owner, the person involved, read the actual document, or go to the source. And here’s a truly revolutionary concept for 2026: Ask before you share. You might discover what you heard was true, and discover a whole another side to the story. And sometimes, after running through ten people, the truth just packed a suitcase and left town.
Word of mouth can build a small business. It can introduce neighbors to neighbors. It can bring attention to a good cause: recognizing someone doing good work and strengthening a community.
It can also tear down every one one of those things. Maybe we need to resurrect an old-fashioned rule for our very modern world: If you know it, say it. Don’t know, ask. If you’re wrong, correct it, and if you can’t verify it, think twice
before you repeat it.
Thankfully, that one bad review didn’t define us, and in the end, good word of mouth traveled farther than the bad.
Not everyone is so fortunate. A rumor that a business has closed, someone has retired, or a person has done
something they haven’t can take only seconds to repeat. Correcting misinformation after it made three laps
around Columbus County can take considerably longer.
Because once words leave your mouth or your keyboard, you don’t get to decide where they travel next. And around a small town, they can travel mighty fast.
That’s my quarter’s worth. See you on the flip side.
Patty Nieman is a business and property owner in Columbus County.
