Viral marketing describes a method of advertising in which the advertiser provides freebies and or promotional materials to consumers in the hope that they will get the word out on the company’s services and products. The use of viral marketing involves techniques that can be used both online and offline to promote a business. What follows are 5 of the best viral marketing ideas for business.
Viral Marketing Ideas for Business
- Social Media – The huge popularity of the social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter has become a big resource for the viral marketing efforts of a business.
- Not only are the sites free to use for this purpose, but they provide and enormous quantity of people, many hundreds of thousands, who daily sign in to their accounts to check statuses and to read updates.
- Businesses will need to verify that their targeted audiences use these social media sites. They will then need to identify which sites they use before they can join the same, and contribute to the conversations these audiences are already having that relate to the very products and services that the businesses promote.
- The approach is for the business to create its business profile on the site, post updates and tidbits of information on its products and services. Social media is a resource that a business can use to gather feedback on and suggestions for the improvement of its products.
- Coupons and samples of products can be offered and the targeted customers will be encouraged to spread the word to others. The generosity always puts the customers in a positive frame of mind to virally promote on behalf of the company, often without realizing they are doing just that.
- Viral e-Books – Another online form of viral marketing involve the use of branded e-books, with links inside them that point to the company’s website.
- This tactic is frequently utilized by online marketers who produce these e-books and encourage readers to distribute them to their email list of subscribers and to others. That process will generate additional viral traffic and branding for a marketer’s products and services.
- Creative Use of Video – Using video in marketing is a formidable way to virally promote a company’s products and services. Online videos serve a variety of purposes.
- In many cases people seek out videos to educate themselves in a process rather that read material for the same information. Links are placed in the description area of the video and they will point back to the company’ website.
- With the advent and the phenomenal growth of free video sharing sites, videos are now being generated to entertain the general public. These sites, and the videos uploaded to them are probably the best news as far as viral promotion is concerned.
- Now businesses can create short videos to entertain and inform its target audience of its product and services. When these videos are produced in a humorous or even in a funny way, viewers cannot help passing them along to friends and sharing them with family and co-workers.
- Viral videos can be used to portray the product in a humorous manner or they can be used to discreetly reference the product, but whichever way they are used, they have a very strong impact on the promotional effort of the business.
- Using Swag – The term swag refers to free giveaways. Again, the purpose of the giveaway is the promotion of the company’s products and services.
- The business will spend a portion of its advertising budget to have magnets, pens, pencils, software, cd cases, bags and other goods made with the company logo, name, address and contact information printed clearly on them all.
- The swag is given away to prospective customer who then will have the company’s name and contact information at its fingertips.
- Stickers – This offline method of viral marketing has been used in marketing campaigns for several decades now and is nothing new.
- Quite often we may see these stickers on the bumpers of cars and represent a form of free advertisement that moves from place to place so that it is being seen by a wide variety of people in a number of different settings.
- These stickers will carry the company’s name and contact details for further follow up by anyone who is interested.
The preceding methods represent some of the best viral marketing ideas for business that are currently being used by businesses today, and the possibilities are endless given the growth of the Internet and the possibilities to immediately connect with people the world over and around the clock.
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