October 25th, 2009 at 11:16 am
With advertisers constantly on the lookout for new ways to spread their message, the new social networking phenomena of the late 1990′s became a perfect venue. Viral marketing is a form of advertising that relies on the enthusiasm of the end user to actually pass on the message to others.
Using easily self replicated processes like individualized affiliate squeeze pages and interactive games or flash movies, the viral marketing ad can spread from the original ad to the friends of people who liked the ad or program. It is through this beyond-the-advertisement spread of interest in a product or service that gives it the name “viral”, like a virus spreading a disease.
Viral marketing techniques include researching who among the social networking websites has a high user potential. Then advertisements are formulated to appeal to this particular segment of the population.
It is hoped that with targeted marketing, the message will garner enough interest for the user to pass it on to his friends who might also be interested in it. While sample giveaways can be useful, one must make sure their viral marketing campaign is not in fact viewed as merely a publicity stunt.
There is a dark side to viral marketing that needs to be avoided. “Undercover” or “stealth” marketing involves having someone in the guise of a regular user promote and recommend the product or service to everyone he can.
If this tactic is discovered then the backlash from people feeling they have been unfairly manipulated can have lasting ill effects on future advertisements from the company.
As an added benefit beyond just creating good search engine optimization, the social potential on the Web2.0 makes it easier to target a specific niche and customize more precise and effective ad campaigns.
People are readily affected by sound and pictures so Viral Video Optimization has come into being used with the quantitative marketing algorithms to determine who has the highest Social Networking Potential, ads that entertain as well as inform stand the greatest chance of being passed on to others.
On a smaller scale viral marketing can be used in even simple places like the signature lines in forum posts. Provided you can add helpful information when you post, you will give the appearance of being savvy about the topic at hand and thus make your recommendations seem to be of greater value.
An effective e-mail signature line can also help keep the potential word-of-mouth advertising information passing around the web.
Whichever approach you take to fitting your advertising to a specific market, be careful not to disenfranchise other potential customers. Even though one niche may accept the risqu
September 25th, 2009 at 5:28 pm
In the b.i. days (before the internet), the success of a mom and pop store depended, among other things, on the big boys of industry. Once they came to town and set up shop, there was no more mom and pop. They were driven out of business by the sheer volume of the mega companies’ advertising and capital. Not a pretty site.
The internet has gone a long way to reviving the mom and pop industry. It affords many small businesses the opportunity to compete by using simple cost effective techniques repeated on a continuous basis. One of the techniques is viral marketing commonly referred to as word of mouth.
In the old days viral marketing for small business owners had limited appeal. Yes they could be successful in that particular city, town or even region but it’s still nothing compared to the global word of mouth that business owners can tap into right now thanks to the internet. Once you launch your viral marketing campaign, it requires very little follow up on your part and even this has been taken a step further with the emergence of Web 2.0.
Here are some new ways to get the best out of your viral marketing:
1. The Small Report.
There have been some excellent ebooks on the internet chock full of good information but let’s face it: many people are not going to read them due to the length. Enter the small report. Putting together a five to ten page report can be done in no time. The same goes for reading it. We suffer from information overload in this day and age so giving people useful information in smaller quantities makes sense.
Find a hot topic and write several articles on it. Place the articles in a pdf file with your name and contact information branded on the report. Tell readers they are free to distribute your report as long as they do not alter it in any way. Then advertise your report in forums on your website and anywhere else you can think of. People want information fast and utilizing small reports is a good way to give them exactly that. It’s also a good start to making money from your viral campaign.
2. Video
In 2005, Kevin McCarthy one of the pioneers of online marketing predicted that within a year there would be an explosion of online video. Prediction accomplished. The internet is at the dawning of the video revolution. It is becoming easier and easier to make a video and upload it to places like You Tube or Google Video. In fact Google bought You Tube late last year for 1.65 billion dollars. That’s a good indicator of how things are going.
Like the small report, try to keep your video brief and to the point. While people would rather watch than read, you still don’t want to overload them. The point of a using a viral video (like reports) for your business is to give visitors useful information but just enough. In the end you want them to get more information by going to your website
3. Folksonomies
Wikipedia defines folksonomy as “a user-generated taxonomy used to categorize and retrieve web content such as Web pages, photographs and Web links”. In plain english what they are referring to is tagging; a way to not only retrieve information you want but more importantly to share that information with others. Tagging is nothing more than keywords specifically related to bookmarking social sites like Digg, Technorati or Delicious.
As an example let’s say you join Technorati. You then make a video, tag it with the keyword phrase “funny online video” and upload it to your account. Now all individuals within the Technorati community will be able to access your video when they type in that particular keyword. This is very powerful. Tag viral and bookmarking social can put you in front of a large audience immediately.
No matter how new the strategies keep in mind if you want your viral marketing to truly take off then make sure its free. Charging money for your report or video will guarantee you a limited appeal. Free is a powerful psychological trigger for many of us so use it. Also make sure you are providing quality. No one is going to be in a hurry to pass around below average information.
The internet has in many ways leveled the playing field. Just stay alert to any new innovations and be ready to incorporate them into your internet web site marketing strategy. A smart viral marketing campaign can make any small business successful.
