When you hear about someone’s recent amazing experience with a company, do you give it a lot of trust? What about when you hear about a train wreck of an experience? Which influences you more?

According to a recent article on eMarketer, positive word of mouth is both more rampant and impactful than negative word of mouth. So why would a positive experience be something you want to share more? And why are people more likely to recommend a company than recommend against a company?

1) Companies Finally Get It: The importance of word of mouth in today’s social media-laden culture has caused companies to truly improve their customer service. The risks of any other course are just too great.

2) Negativity Fatigue: Everybody has that Facebook friend that just complains. All. Day. Long. Maybe people are just tired of it, and as a result they are less likely to complain themselves. Instead, they just don’t become a repeat customer.

3) The Sour Grapes Effect: People just don’t put that much credence in the negative opinions of one person. Every company has hiccups, as does every person. Just because you had a bad experience doesn’t mean that I will.

Conventional marketing wisdom used to be that the average person with a bad experience told many more people than someone who had a good experience. However, long gone is the fact that you need tell people one at a time. Whether via a tweet or a Facebook update, the reach of the comment is the same. It’s just that the impact is not.

So what do you think? Do you rave more than you rant while putting more trust in positive opinions?