We live in an age where strong opinions are formed quickly with very little information. A company with a pristine reputation can be brought low if a piece of information casts a shadow of doubt about that reputation. If you are looking to make a favorable impression on your marketplace, you need to be aware that little things can have big implications in the thinking of your would-be customers. What you say or don’t say can turn public sentiment for or against you. To complicate things, people in market segments may view things in very different ways based on their own beliefs and social more leanings. Here is a little absurd story to illustrate what I mean.

An environmentally conscientious metro couple are driving through the countryside in their eco-sensitive electric car. They proudly display a bumper sticker that states their belief: "Save the earth: CO2 is the enemy.” They take a wrong turn and end up driving on a twisted maze of back roads, surrounded by cornfields that are infrequently punctuated with a farmhouse. Running low on electrical power to keep the car running, they decide to turn into the next farmhouse they see to get directions and plug the car into an outlet to recharge the battery. However, the farm is home to an Amish family who neither use electricity nor have their house wired. The metro couple ask if they could use the Amish family’s cell phone to make a call for roadside assistance since their phones have not been able to be recharged in their electric car with a dying battery. Again, the Amish family explains that they don’t have cell phones or regular landline phones for that matter. They also don’t have a computer or any other electronic device that would enable the metro couple to find help for their troubled e-car. The best that the Amish family can do to get the metro couple back on the right road is to let them borrow their horse. Without any other options, they hitch a horse to the front of the electric car and send the metro couple on their way. The horse knows the way back to the interstate and, before long, the metro couple are back on their intended route. However, another problem occurs. The horse is used to commands that are given through its reigns. The metro couple only know how to turn the steering wheel and apply the brake. And no matter how hard they push the brakes, the horse simply pulls harder. Without a command to do differently, the horse trots down the entry ramp and onto the interstate.

Three cars are trailing the metro couple down the interstate. The first car contains a group of PETA members. When they pass the electric car, they are appalled by what they see. They assume the couple have put this poor horse to task simply because they think burning fossil fuels is killing the earth. They videotape the horse pulling the electric car and upload it to YouTube.

The second car is driven by a local auto dealer. He has been contemplating whether or not he should get into electric car sales, but does not seem convinced there is a strong market in the surrounding farming community with its pickup trucks and heavy machinery. When he spots the e-car ahead, he speeds up to take a look. As he passes it, he sees the Amish horse pulling it down the road and gets excited. He assumes the two riders are Amish as well. He sees an opportunity to sell the cars to the Amish to replace their buggies. He immediately calls the car manufacturer and sets up an appointment to sign a contract with them.

The third car is driven by the president of a corporation. He has just come back from a conference on marketing your green business and has been pondering if there is any upside to replacing all of his company’s fleet vehicles with electric cars to reduce their carbon footprint. He remembers one thing the conference speaker said: "If you want to be sustainable as a company, you have to make radical green choices.” He sees the metro couple up ahead of him. As he passes them, he reads the bumper sticker and then sees the horse pulling the car. "This is the radical idea I need!” he says to himself. The next day he pulls his sales team together and, to their disbelief, informs them that the new company car is a horse drawn carriage to save the environment.

In the meantime, the PETA YouTube video goes viral and millions of people view it. Horse lovers stage a sit-in at the car manufacturers headquarters to protest unusual cruelty to animals in the name of saving the earth. The company announces it has discontinued production of the e-car.

The car salesman hires a marketing firm to promote his new line of Eco/Equine-friendly cars. He takes orders for the e-cars customized with horse harnesses, but when the manufacturer stops production, he can no longer meet the demand and is charged with false advertising by the FTC. He files bankruptcy.

The president of the corporation watches his market share evaporate as his sales force becomes the laughingstock of the industry. He is forced to resign under pressure from his board. However, the car manufacturer hires him as a consultant to repair their public image among horse lovers. He writes a best selling book on the experience. He joins the national business speakers’ circuit where he makes millions as the green horse-whisperer.

Down the road, the horse finally wears out and stops. The metro couple see an opportunity and get out of the car. They swear they will never own another electric car as long as they live. In fact, they are so traumatized by the experience, they decide they will never have anything to do with electricity. They get rid of their cell phones, their computers, move to the country and become Amish. They drive a buggy with a bumper sticker: "Save the earth, turn out the lights.”

Now this story is quite ridiculous, but it closely resembles how the public reacts to tidbits of information and jumps to conclusions. Ask any company that has had to defend a rumor that had no basis. In 1978 McDonalds Corporation had to refute rumors that they used ground earthworms as filler in their hamburgers. Proctor and Gamble became a target when it was claimed that Frebreze, the deodorizing spray, was toxic to pets. P&G refuted this, but changed the formula in 1998, eliminating the claimed lethal ingredient (zinc chloride) even though it made up less than 1% of the ingredients and had the backing of independent veterinarian research groups. In 1969 the artificial sweetener saccharin was targeted by a rumor that gained more traction than most. There were all kinds of stories that circulated about the evils of saccharin. It had the same properties as embalming fluid. It caused lab rats to have bladder cancer. The outcry went all the way to federal government as the USDA attempted to ban it in 1972. California required cancer warning labels to be put on the packaging of any consumable product that had saccharin in it. However, in 2000 it was discovered that saccharin did not cause cancer. In fact, it was pretty harmless. Yet, to this day, you can still find the viral stories circulating on emails about the evils of saccharin.