Opinion leadership (or word-of-mouth communications) is the process by which one person
(the opinion leader) informally influences the actions or attitudes of others, who may be opinion seekers or merely opinion recipients. The key characteristic of the infl uence is that it is interpersonal and informal and takes place between two or more people, none of whom represents a
commercial selling source that would gain directly from the sale of something. Word-of-mouth
implies personal, or face-to-face, communication, although it may also take place in a telephone
conversation or within the context of email or a chat group on the Internet. This communication process is likely, at times, to be reinforced by non-verbal observations of the appearance
and behaviour of others