Viral Marketing is Buzz Marketing

sugeng — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 01:00:14 +0000

Viral marketing is also known as buzz marketing. It is very similar to social network marketing. It means marketing technique using social network to produce increased awareness of brand or to achieve other marketing objectives. The only differentiator here is the use of self-replicating viral processes to produce buzz. It is spreading marketing messages using ways very similar to the spread of viruses (both actual viruses and computer viruses). Viral or buzz marketing is also known as centrifugal marketing, grassroots marketing, guerrilla marketing, referral marketing or wildfire marketing.

How is the viral process achieved? The most obvious is through the word-of-mouth enhanced by social networks. The viral promotions are spread by the people through forwarding the marketing messages through various media like emails, text messages, ebooks, images and even interactive flash games. For word-of-mouth method to work the main objective is to identify individuals or methods with high social networking connections to pass the marketing messages around the influence circles. These individuals are supposedly the centre of influence (COI) to be effective. Buzz marketing is basically the practice of creating talk around a product, service, company or brand.

The most notorious examples of viral marketing are those related to pyramid schemes and multi-level marketing (network marketing). Looking at it positively, this is how human beings naturally would do if they are happy with certain products or services. We would automatically want to talk about the benefits we are getting.

The classic example of successful viral marketing is hotmail free email service. It started as the first free webmail service with following strategies: provide free email address and service and attach a simple tag at the bottom of every email sent out to invite people to create free email account. The effect is viral as people who receive the email will read the invitation and start creating email account to send even more emails to other who will then start creating email addresses. The process will go on and on and getting bigger and bigger. This is the power of viral marketing.

To conduct successful viral marketing, here are some important elements: give away valuable products or services, provide effortless transfer to others, scales easily from small to very large, exploit common motivations and behaviors, utilizes existing communication networks and take advantage of others’ resources as outline by Dr. Ralph F. Wilson in The Six Simple Principles of Viral Marketing.

More information on Buzz Marketing is available at Buzzmarketing managed by Mark Hughes. There is also an association dedicated to this topic called Word of Mouth Marketing Association.

For reference, here is a list of The Top 10 Viral Marketing Campaigns Of All Timecompiled by Patrick Altoft. I hope you enjoy those and you may want to let me know which one you clik and share with your friends. :-)

Social Media Marketing

sugeng — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 05:37:46 +0000

Social Media Marketing refers to marketing using social media. And, what is social media? Watch this video that explains social media in plain English.

Social media is a form of interactions among the people. It allows the people to have conversation, to comment, to be involved in community, to have collaboration, to contribute and to share among themselves. The possibility is almost endless. This is the basis of Web 2.0 that makes all those things possible. It is not really something new, but the new technology has made it simpler for people to interact with each other.

Social media marketing is marketing by utilizing social media. How do we do that? Traditional marketing is normally a one-way communication. The marketer provides information for the people to see, look, hear, feel and taste. Social media and social marketing are two or more ways of communication. There is interactivity involved here. It means there must be participation among the parties and when necessary also conversation, collaboration, contribution and sharing.

Community is another very powerful form of social media. It is formed from conversation among people. Communities may span across various social networks. We just need to know where our existing and target markets are located and get ourselves blended into the community by talking and engaging meaningfully with the people. You can even create a community based around your products or services. Example of existing social networks are Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc.

From the outlook, social media looks simple. Anyone can setup a blog, create accounts at the social networking sites and start your activities in the network. However, to be effective you need to have commitment and understanding how the things work. Social media is not only about list building and having many friends. It is about meaningful connections with the people.

I would like to end this post with a video on 7 Secrets of Social Media by Perry Belcher. He talks about being remarkable, fun, helpful, supportive, controversial, resourceful and don’t be an “asshole”. I hope you get a good idea or two of how to utilize social media effectively.Social Media Marketing refers to marketing using social media. And, what is social media? Watch this video that explains social media in plain English.

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Viral Marketing is Buzz Marketing

Social Media Marketing