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Viral Marketing Buzz: How to Capture Your Market Online

By Adam Bauthues in Featured

Viral marketing is still one of the most prolific marketing tools you can use to grow your business. If you employ it in the correct manner, it has the power to take you from obscurity to the “talk of the town” in a matter of days. If you are not sure what viral marketing means, it is a real simple concept.

Viral means that it is something that gets passed from person to person and that spreads very quickly, much like a cold virus. Instead of making everyone sick though, you get your product or service spreading out everywhere instead. One perfect example of this concept is YouTube. How many times have you shared a funny video with someone? Videos can become extremely viral very quickly, but other
types of information can go viral as well.

Here are a few different viral marketing tools I have used to grow my business:

* Viral Video and Audio * Viral eBooks * Viral Workshops, seminars or online courses * Viral Reports

In fact, you can make just about anything viral in nature, as long as the tools you create are made to accomplish a few things. Since viral means passed from person to person, you need to think about the reasons why people share information with their friends and colleagues. Think about why you shared a video or an article with someone recently. It was likely that the information you chose had one or all of the characteristics below:

It Was Valuable…

Even though people have the whole world at their fingertips these days with the Internet, they still look for and hold on to valuable content and well written pieces of information. If information is informative and is created with the end user in mind it will get passed around due to it’s high value.

It Was Entertaining…

We all know laughter is the best medicine. If you can make people laugh they will want others to laugh and feel good too. Humor is an excellent way to capture a market. Think of all the commercials you have seen that have made you laugh. Don’t you remember the funny ones? I have seen commercials on television that I later went on YouTube to find so I could watch them again, and then I shared the
videos with friends and business associates. If you can make people laugh, you make them feel good. If you can do that while marketing your product, they will start to feel good about your product too. This is the power of association, and if you do it right, it will go viral as
well.

It Was Controversial…

Shocking or thought-provoking material gets people talking. You have to be careful with this method though, as it is very powerful. Controversial subjects will always draw a lot of attention, but it brings both good and bad attention at the same time. This method can easily backfire on you too, and there are ample examples of companies having controversial ad campaigns backfiring on them. You
need to walk a fine line with this one.

Those are just 3 examples of the kind of content that you want to produce so that people will be more apt to share it with others. Still, this is only the first stage of a viral marketing buzz campaign. How do you use this viral product to promote your business?

Every ad medium is different, but the end result you are looking for is the same. For instance, with audio or video you will be able to market your product or service directly in your content. This can be your website, your company name or your logo. With print media it is the same story. With an ebook or report you will want to include a link to your website, and some information about you or your company. You could also include a separate or full page ad for a product or service in your content, as well as a resources page. The possibilities are endless and it is really up to you how you wish to promote yourself or your company. Just make sure you make it very clear where people can go to get more information should they wish too.

Capturing your markets attention via viral marketing buzz can be a very powerful method of building your business and brand. If you can get your viral information into the hands of your target market, amazing things can happen. Just make sure that your content is placed where your target market hangs out! With the social networking revolution going on you should have no trouble getting your viral content into the correct hands, and having it spread far and wide across the Internet. As long as your content is valuable and entertaining (with maybe a little controversy thrown in) and engages your readers, your content will work hard for you.

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Article by Adam Bauthues. And now I would like to invite you to receive Free Instant Access to my viral marketing and niche marketing and advertising blog, The Project Marketer. It is your complete resource for absolute victory in marketing and advertising online: http://www.ProjectMarketer.com

7 Highly Effective Viral Marketing Techniques You Should be Using

By David Jackson in Featured

I was watching the TV show Biography recently, and the celebrity being profiled was none other than Ted Williams. No, not Ted Williams the famous hall of fame baseball player and arguably the greatest hitter of all time. Biography, (which has profiled famous celebrities from Barack Obama to Michael Jackson to the Beatles) was profiling the story of Ted Williams, the homeless “man with the golden voice” who was discovered on a street corner in Columbus, Ohio in January, 2011 – thanks to a YouTube video that went spectacularly viral, receiving over 13 million views before it was removed at the request of the Columbus Dispatch newspaper due to copyright infringement.

What is Viral Marketing?

Think about that for a second. From homeless to being featured on Biography in only six short months. Such is the amazing power of viral marketing. So, what exactly is viral marketing?

In essence, viral marketing is word-of-mouth advertising. Or, to be more specific, Internet word-of-mouth advertising. And as you know, word-of-mouth advertising is the most powerful method of advertising there is, bar none – online or offline.

Viral marketing exists in many forms including articles, videos, e-books, software, reports, interactive flash games, white papers, text messages – even tweets.

Retweets and Viral Marketing

By Enzo F. Cesario in Featured

Twitter’s strengths as a messaging service come from the fact that the messages are short, and the service is easy to use. If someone can type within the character limit and handle a few basic concepts, Twitter is actually easier to use than many instant-messaging clients, and doesn’t even require an install on a computer.

An example of these basic concepts is the retweet, which is sending a tweet one likes or approves of to her list of followers. Retweets account for a lot of Twitter traffic, and form a major part of the site’s ability to promote viral content. If a retweet gathers enough steam, it can make the rounds of the entire web in a matter of minutes.

So how exactly does this work? The answer lies in the concept of overlapping spheres. Consider a Venn diagram, where two or more circles represent certain spheres of influence, and the overlap describes a mutual sphere. In this case, the overlap is the retweet, and the spheres represent the followers of the re-tweeter, and the followers of his followers.

Different Interests and Common Ground

The idea takes advantage of the sheer diversity of interests on the web. The idea of the polymath or Renaissance man – which is to say the person who displays interest and skills in many fields – is returning to the world now that people can rapidly research all manner of topics.

Viral Marketing: The Proof is in the Pudding.

By Forrest Yingling in Featured

Many folks today do not realize just how powerful viral marketing is and how much potential it has.  Viral marketing revolves around creating an intense buzz on the Internet. It is a truly powerful concept that causes viral campaigns to spread pandemically around the Internet with a rapid intensity.  If used properly, it can be a very successful marketing technique for your business.

One thing that we can all be sure of is that viral marketing works and it works very well.  In this age of high-speed communications – when a message or video can travel around the world multiple times in a matter of minutes or even seconds – advertisers have to learn to use that to their advantage.  Viral marketing is not just for the big fish either.  A viral marketing campaign does not have to be expensive or expansive and can be utilized by businesses of any size.  The campaign need only be creative, catch the attention of its audience and spread around the Internet like wildfire thanks to people referring others to the campaign.

This referral process has become even easier nowadays with services like RSS Feeds, social bookmarking, AddThis or ShareThis, Twitter’s “retweet” function and Facebook’s “like” and “share” buttons.  You no longer even have to forward an email or send a message, a user of a social network like Facebook or Twitter can simply click on a “Share” link and send the viral marketing material to all of their friends, fans or followers.

The first component of the viral marketing process is the actual creative material itself.  Will you use a picture, article, video or text?  Something as simple as the headline of a news article can be viral on the Internet.  If you can think of a creative way to promote your products or services that will strike a chord with people and make them laugh, cry, feel inspired or any other emotion then they will want to share what they have seen, read or heard with their friends, family, co-workers, neighbors or any others in their social circle.  Then the web of content sharing has begun and it’s “gone viral.”  It is truly amazing how fast something can go viral online and spread throughout the world in a matter of minutes.

After you create the viral campaign then you must “seed” it by planting it at strategic places on the Internet.  There must be a distribution network to get your campaign to the masses so you need to figure out what online mediums will work best for spreading your marketing to the masses.  Perhaps you start with making a video, uploading it to YouTube and sharing it with your Facebook friends, your newsletter mailing list and any other contacts you might have.  Then you can use social bookmarking sites like Reddit, Digg, StumbleUpon, etc. for a further reach.

If you strategically and intelligently use viral marketing techniques in your e-commerce business then you should find them an effective promotional tool.  Viral marketing is a tremendous way to build a ton of links in a little amount of time.  This is great SEO practice for your business and can help you climb up the SERP (search engine results page) in o time!

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Forrest Yingling is the Marketing Director for WebNet Hosting, a Premier Partner Miva Merchant Web Host since 2004.  WebNet Hosting provides reliable, fully PCI Compliant Hosting and e-commerce solutions at the industry’s most affordable prices.

How To Use Viral Marketing In A Powerful Way!

By Adam Price in Featured

Did you know that you can create viral marketing campaigns completely from scratch with tiny amounts to invest?

Yes, that’s correct, you don’t need to buy expensive advertising to be effective online and locally.

The thing is, how do you do it?

Well, the number one way to market is via word of mouth, or online it’s more commonly known as viral marketing.

I know it almost sounds grimmy and deadly, but viral marketing has been developed from the concept of viruses and how they spread so rampantly and quite often “unknown” about until it’s too late for the host to do anything about it.

Online, the principal is the same, you can silently ride the wave of modern trends and become extremely well known in a very short period of time, if you find the right hosts to spread your virus.

So, what does an effective viral marketing campaign consist of?

1. Innovation

In almost every instance viral campaigns have had a very unique twist about them, which has given them the “talkability factor” amongst it’s hosts who carry the virus and spread it on.

You can create innovation in products and services by breaking rules of the norm, using brand new technology and methodologies, change the marketplace in a way that no-one has ever seen before, invent or uncover an area that has previously not been identified.

2. Controversial

You need something that is very newsworthy and that often requires a great deal of controversy and opposition in the beginning, as that’s what turns an idea viral in the first place.

So the question to ask yourself is, does your new offering create anger, embarrasment, hostility, over eagerness, or some form of intense, unusual behaviour?

If not, most often you won’t see your campaign won’t be as viral and the originator won’t be able to forward it on with enough power to create an outbreak.

3. Secretive

There always seems to be a shroud of mystery around viral type news, products and services.

They also seem to be “out of reach” for a lot of people initially, and that also builds anticipation for those waiting to host the virus.

4. FREE

One of the most popular and responsive words in the world of internet marketing business is the word “Free!”

It’s used on almost every information capturing page to entice people to sign up for their newsletter and informational series, which are quite often free also.

If per chance you can’t offer a freebie, then you need to brainstorm what you can offer, that is valuable and in need from your prospects. People won’t become followers of your message if you offer sub-standard information.

5. Transferrable

The viral marketing campaign needs to have very simple and easy ways to spread.

For example, phone ringtones…

When you download a good ringtone, you load it into your phone and others hear it when it rings. If others like it and you and they have bluetooth compatible phones, it’s a snap to send it to your friend.

This is what I mean by transferrable, they have to be easily spread from host to host for the virus to grow quickly.

6. Expansive

The virus must be able to expand and scale from small to large in a very fast and aggressive manner.

However, the way that it spreads, has to be completely under the radar, or else competition will catch on its coming and craft an rebuttal for it.

The top viruses have been grown this way, and the powerful effects of a viral business marketing program has on it’s competition, when correctly executed will see your head spin.

7. Adaptable

The most successful viral marketing campaigns are very adaptable and common in their needs from host to host.

So in essence, each host will gather 7 to 10 friends as they cast the idea forward, and a percentage of them will accept it as they pass it forward.

Therefore, a very adaptable idea is easier to spread among hosts, than one that isn’t as easy to get hold of.

If you can take advantage of even some of these principal around viral marketing, then wealth and success will be yours.

Return regularly, because you’re going to learn more about viral marketing campaigns in action.

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Adam Price has been a full time internet marketer for over 10 years. His company that he’s created Nett Knowledge was designed to help local businesses get on their feet correctly in the online world. He has posted lots of regular articles at www.NettKnowlegeBlog.com

Viral Marketing – Using It To Your Advantage

By Enzo F. Cesario in Featured

In our technologically expanding world, where the Internet is the most available form of media, Viral Marketing is an extremely effective form of advertising. Before the Web explosion, this form of advertising would have been referred to simply as “word of mouth” or getting your message out by having your customer base spread the word.

Why Use Viral Marketing?

There are several studies that state that if someone has a good experience, chances are they will tell a few close friends. However, with a bad experience people will repeat it to anyone who will listen. Since the pace of the Internet is so much faster than that of word of mouth, you will want to be careful with the messages you put out there. The message you put forth can spread, and spread quickly, whether that message is good or bad.

Viral Marketing is exactly what it sounds like – advertising that works like a virus does. It can be as simple as a message that is attached at the bottom of an email. Like a virus, as the email is sent from one person to another, so goes the attached message. It is like an electronic version of that famous television commercial that said “you’ll tell two friends, and they will tell two friends, and so on and so on…”, only with the World Wide Web, one well placed message can have the ability to reach millions with one click of the mouse.

Remember when Hotmail was starting? You could only get an account if a friend sent you an email with the link. Everyone wanted one, and emails spread like wildfire. And BMW had that great campaign with very famous directors, a very new Clive Owen and very short movies – all on the Internet, which was becoming a brand new venue for movies. You may not have enough money in your advertising budget to hire Clive Owen, but there are still things you can do to attempt some viral marketing.

Essential Features

To tap into the potential power of a viral campaign you will need a few essential elements – free products or services that are easily transferred to others using existing communications networks. These products or services should be something that will exploit people’s natural behaviors and emotions. Some examples beyond commercials would be how-to guides, surveys, best-of guides, educational guides, tools, widgets, quizzes and badges.

Sometimes nothing grabs peoples attention faster than the word FREE. Free trials, free email accounts, free anything can put you in a potential customer’s head. Free can get your name out there and introduce people to the goods or services that will generate future revenues for your business.

There are rewards you can offer as well. Rewarding loyal customers with anything from percentage rebates and coupons for future purchases to free gifts for their continued patronage is another outstanding way to make sure that your ‘virus’ continues to spread.

Know Your Customers

Knowing and understanding your customer base will make your viral marketing more successful; tracking and analyzing what motivates them to want to pass along your message. You need to know what makes them tick. What is going to make the working mother of three take the time out of an already incredibly busy day to not only be drawn to your message, but also be interested enough to pass that message along to the other extremely busy moms in her address book?

As an example, say you have an errand-running service. You could offer a day of running errands to the lucky winner of a contest. All you have to do to enter to win the free day of errands is to register by clicking the link to your website. Strategies such as these can be a bit more effective as the people that register tend to have an interest in the services you offer.

If you can zero in on who your customer is, this type of marketing can be quite inexpensive and highly effective. Online surveys and questionnaires can also be quite useful in getting inside your customer’s head. They can and should be your most valuable resource when it comes to figuring out what they want. Careful consideration of your customer’s needs and the commitment to meet those needs is what will ultimately make you successful in business.

Viral Marketing is a useful tool and it’s something to think about along with your other online marketing strategies. However, you still need to create something unusual and useful that people will naturally want to share and tell others about.

With the Internet there are opportunities to reach a much larger number of people much faster than in decades past. However, the basic marketing rules still apply if you want your viral marketing campaigns to be successful. Know your products or services. Know what demographics you are targeting. Get in their head and figure out what they need to feel compelled to not only spend their hard earned money with you, but what will make them want to keep coming back, and more importantly, bringing their friends with them.

About The Author:

Enzo F. Cesario is a Copywriter and co-founder of Brandsplat. Brandcasting uses informative content and state-of-the-art internet distribution and optimization to build links and drive the right kind of traffic to your website. Go to http://www.Brandsplat.com/ or visit our blog at: http://www.brandsplatblog.com/

Twitter Marketing: 6 Steps to Creating a Viral Marketing Campaign with Twitter Hashtags

By Donna Gunter in Featured

Twitter, as a popular social networking platform, is a viral marketing strategy all on its own, especially if your followers like your tweets and retweet them to their followers. However, I’ve recently noticed another trend in Twitter usage that increases its viral marketing capabilities through the use of hashtags.

What’s a hashtag, anyway? Also called the pound sign, the hashtag (#) is added to a tweet as a way of creating trackable categories, groups, or topics that others can use to search for info using the Twitter Search feature. One of the most common uses of the hashtag is to tweet what’s happening at an event or conference. The event organizer will request all attendees use a specific hashtag, i.e. #yourevent, when tweeting about the event to your followers. So, then, someone who isn’t present at the event but wants to follow what’s happening there can simply search for #yourevent and see what’s going on and what participants are saying and sharing about the event.

Multiply Your Marketing Like a Virus

By Michel Fortin in Featured

In today’s Internet, conversations are cropping up all over the place. People are talking. They are talking about products. They are talking about businesses. And they are certainly talking about their experiences.

When you look at how blogs, forums and social networking sites have exploded in the last few years, you can see how powerful word-of-mouth is. But the question is, is it all really important? Can it really help your business?

Yes.

And I’m not talking about traffic. And you don’t need to be controversial, either. I’m talking creating systems to leverage, manage and profit from the “buzz.”

How to Instigate Viral Marketing Components

By Paul Smithson in Featured

It’s hard to beat the marketing power of thousands or even millions of people doing your marketing for you, but getting a campaign to go viral can be a tough challenge.

In order to go viral, something has to have mass appeal. This is why it can be very difficult to launch viral campaigns for niche subjects. When a niche is particularly small, there may not be enough volume to generate sufficient interest to spread far and wide.

Viral marketing is definitely better suited to larger niches, although it can be done in smaller niches with a little thought and creativity.

At this moment in time the primary means of getting something to go viral is video, but it certainly isn’t the only means. Other possibilities include photos, eBooks, special reports, and software.

Whatever vehicle you choose you need to find people who will be willing to spread the word for you. These people love to tell other people about things. They love being the first person to spread something new, whether it’s a funny video, a great new piece of technology or some insightful information.

Seth Godin, a keen advocate of viral marketing, released a free ebook on the topic called “Unleashing the Idea Virus.” He called these people “sneezers.” Sneezers not only love to spread news, they have enough charisma to make people listen to them!

Finding these people can be tricky, but all it takes is a few, and word can spread like a wild fire in a forest of tinder-dry wood.

For example, if you’re selling an Internet marketing product, you’ll want to get your viral marketing piece into the hands of some of the top Internet marketing gurus. If necessary you can offer them monetary compensation to help you spread the word, but ideally you want them spreading the word because it’s something worth spreading the word about.

If you have an affiliate program, you can offer potential ‘sneezers’ their own copy of your viral media with their affiliate link embedded. If you already have a large list of your own, you could use that as leverage to get them to JV with you. If a few big names decide to do a join venture with you, your campaign has a much greater chance of going viral.

Once a few of the bigger names start talking about your campaign, it will trickle down. The mid-level people will start talking about it, and their followers will start talking about it. Pretty soon you have lots of people talking about it, and it’s everywhere. The virus has been unleashed, and it’s spreading like wildfire!

But remember, this viral marketing piece has to have mass appeal. People aren’t going to spread the virus if it isn’t contagious. You need to make your viral marketing campaign very appealing. The best way to do this is by offering massive value for free. This is a technique that has been used very effectively by many leading Internet marketing experts over the last few years.

Of course, you can achieve viral marketing success and the fame that goes with it by performing some crazy stunt. In the early 1990s a UK band called KLF managed to make headline news throughout the world by burning a million pounds. Unless you have a spare million that you don’t mind setting fire to, this can be a very expensive route, but with some serious creative thinking you might be able to come up with something seriously newsworthy that will spread virally to your target market in record time without breaking the bank.

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Paul Smithson is the founder of Intellimon and the driving force behind the best-selling XSitePro web site development tool (http://www.xsitepro.com). Paul has set up five multi-million dollar companies, one of which is now owned by the BBC. His areas of expertise include business strategy, e-commerce, on-line and off-line marketing, software development, and maximizing the potential of on-line businesses.

The 7 Elements of a Viral Video Campaign

By Jerry Bader in Featured

The biggest problem most websites have is that they are instantly forgettable. They sell or say the same thing as hundreds or thousands of other sites; to an audience that is so quick to click-away that a large percentage of their traffic never appreciates why they should buy anything or listen to what’s being said.

© Copyright 2012 All rights reserved. Jayde Online, Inc.

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