What Is Viral Marketing?

What Is Viral Marketing? What Are The Good Sites For Viral Marketing?

 

Normally i would sit here for 10 minutes and type some really long winded answer but i've just put the kettle on so...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viral_marketing

 

So I'll be longwinded on his behalf...

While I've seen several definitions of viral marketing, IMHO I believe that viral marketing can only be accomplished by utilizing email or the social networking site "myspace". Invoking the word "viral" connotes the spreading of a cold or flu which is caused by one ill person coming into contact with many and spreading the germs. When an individual receives something in their inbox (email or myspace) that is very funny, or very interesting, they tend to pass it on to their list of friends via their email..and they send it to ten people who send it to ten people who send it to ten people...and so on a so forth. I can't think of any internet tool besides email and myspace that have such a viral footprint. Other internet marketing methods I would tend to refer to more as guerilla marketing (such as Digg, del.icio.us and YouTube--which help foster the spread of the viral marketing info). So to answer your second question, I would answer that there are no good sites (other than myspace and a couple of its copycats) to virally market what you want to market. You have to set up your own site, and then use social networking sites to create the buzz that will begin the viral effect. I hope this helps.

 

Viral marketing can come in more forms than just email and myspace, a really obvious example would be all the free ipod websites that started poping up a little while ago. Example.

Edit: For those of you that don't know how these free ipod websites work i'll write up a quick run-down.

-> User registers for free.
-> User buys something using that websites referral link.
-> User then needs to refer 15* of their friends to the website using a referral link that is given to them.
-> After those 15 friends have signed up to the website and completed one of the referal offers the original user is then sent their new ipod.

Those 15 people who have just been referred to the website are all trying to get their hands on a free ipod as well so they all refer 15 more friends, and so the process continues.

If that isn't viral i don't know what is.

* This number depends on the website and what item you're actually getting for free.

 

I'd categorize that as popunder spam, which to be fair does indeed have some viral qualities (otherwise we wouldn't find it so irritating). But we tend to take precautions against those "viruses" which inhibits the viral effect somewhat, whereas with email and myspace, we take none and in fact encourage the spread.

 

Viral marketing (Noun)
A blatant attempt to sell a virus to an unsuspecting prospect in dark alleys.

 

Jumping back to the wiki article:

All of those are methods that viral marketing campaigns can be passed along. Don't limit your thinking to just email and myspace.

Just because you've seen a few of these free ipod websites in popunder windows doesn't make their main marketing model any less viral.

 

Good point--in that case you might as well add affiliate programs to the list.

 

lol--perhaps not always so blatant though...sometimes it's quite subtle.

 

I'd hate to see Viral Marketing being limited to the web. Just because someone claims they "came up with the definition" doesn't mean it wasn't invented LONG, LONG before the Web or someone who wanted to get his limelight.

Some may recall something called The Bible, The Qua ran, Chain Letters, etc.

Just thought I'd throw that in for more "reference".

 

viral marketing does not have to only be onine. viral marketing is any marketing that travels by word of mouth, from person to person. Why the internet is a big part of this is that word travels faster and with greater reach on the internet.

 

One other way to view VIRAL MARKETING is that it takes advantage of how people communicate and hitches a ride on their message to inform others in their social network. Email comes to mind but so does Instant Messaging, bookmarking/links, but these are just the tip of the iceberg. ANYTHING that people use to communicate can be VIRALIZED.

The part that people DO NOT GET is that there's 2 types of viral messages: PARASITIC and COMPLEMENTARY. The former can be spammy/trivial/worthless (imagine barnacles at the bottom of a ship). The latter is actually welcomed--quick and easy useful tools or helpful content are two of the most obvious forms.

 

I’ve seen the term used many times but didn’t really know what it meant. Thanks for the enlightenment

 

Where is the revenue

 

Each time someone completes an offer the website gets commission. They work it out so if an ipod costs $100 they make people complete say, $200 worth of referrals.

 

This is a GREAT example of viral marketing. The author pays you $1 for every visitor you send him that downloads his report. He pays out on 2 levels so if you send him 10 visitors and they each send him 10 visitors, you earn a cool $100. In just 2 days, he has had more than 20,000 people download his report.

Footnote: The site takes a while to load because of servers being stretched to the max!

 

So if he pays $1 for each download what he will get

 

He builds his own list. I have a feeling he underestimated the power of his viral marketing campaign. He had originally planned to keep it open for 2 weeks to get about 40,000 names. Knowing how fast such things spread, I wonder how many he will get. Anyway,with profits of $200,000+/month from his online business, he should have no problems paying out.

 

But how, if he pays $4,0000 for 4,000 useres, what he will get

 

He will only pay $8000 for 4000 users. $1 for the person who directly referred and $1 for the person who referred the person who referred....

Depending on your industry, $2/lead could be reasonable in direct marketing.