Viral Marketing

Viral marketing is a very common buzzword in the marketing industry that is often thought of as a sort of golden bullet that will solve all of a business’s marketing woes with the least amount of budget possible. Sadly, the concept of viral marketing is neither easy, cheap, nor a golden bullet to fix your problems. Instead, viral marketing is a difficult and nebulous concept that is part science, part marketing and part alchemy that if done well can be a boon to your business. 

In the early days of the internet and YouTube, it was often easier to have a piece of content go viral. This was in part due to the lack of content as well as the learning curve required for the internet. The learning curve made it so that there was a reduced amount of content available, as well made good viral content appear significantly better to the viewer though lack of understanding. This has rapidly changed over time as the internet became faster and more accessible to people around the world. With this accessibility came an insane amount of content with witch to compete. For perspective, every minute, 300 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube.

The other challenge that successfully viral marketing often faces is the ability to capitalize on their viral marketing sensation with a distinct and effective call to action. A great example of this is the Old Spice viral sensation, The Man Your Man Could Smell Like. It is a fantastic advertisement with great production value and an extensive viral penetration. However, the return on investment and viral nature of the commercial do not reflect a good conversion. The reasoning for this was there was a mixed call to action, addressing a female throughout the commercial while attempting to sell to a man. At the same time as the commercial was going viral, Old Spice missed out on the opportunity to engage on social media only tweeting a dozen or so times. Had they capitalized on this opportunity then they would have been able to put out a call to action straight to digital purchase, increasing their sales.

Now are we saying that you should never attempt viral marketing? No, not at all. Instead we are advising that you be smart about how you attempt viral marketing with some pointers.

One of the first things you are going to want to do is examine not only your demographic for you objective, but also the demographic that will make your content go viral. This will help to make sure that viral content is right for this endeavor, as well as indicate what platform to use to reach the sharers. If the two demographics are too dissimilar, then that is a good indication that that you should revamp your platform or approach.

Once you have identified both demographic and platform, it is then very important to learn the proper voice for both. Different communities and social platforms have different societal norms and manners in which they interact. If you do not participate and speak their language, then there is a very good probability that will identify you as an outsider attempting to use them to your advantage. Additionally, if you are participating in the right tone, the likelihood that your content will be shared goes up incredibly.

The second biggest thing you can do to increase the chances of something going viral is to make good content. Often, viral marketing campaigns are thought to be something thrown together over the course of week. This would be the exception to the rule. Work and re-work your piece until it is a finely crafted piece of content. Some viral campaigns take over a year to perfect their piece, call to action, and roll out. Again, make sure that your call to action is apparent and good or else your viral marketing simply becomes viral brand awareness, or even worse, some funny thing on the internet.

The final pointer has to do with the promotion of your viral content. One of the biggest mistakes we see in viral marketing and content marketing itself is a lack of promotion. There is an old adage that 20% of your effort should be making the content while 80% of your effort should be in the promotion of said content. Whether it is blogs, Facebook pages, aggregate websites, etc., you need to contact as many relevant platforms as possible to try and display your content. By opening up your content to multiple logistical through lines, you are increasing the odds of going viral.

Now viral marketing is again no guarantee, and anyone that promises you a guaranteed viral piece is being dishonest. However, if you apply these pointers, the odds of your content going viral will be much more significant!