Demystifying Viral Marketing

Viral marketing is simply any focused attempt to deliver a message from person-to-person. This message could be something simple, like brand awareness, or a call to action, like a grassroots political campaign. If the message is interesting enough, and easy enough to spread, then it travels to more people who repeat the process. Viral marketing often takes place online, but it could occur at a sporting event, movie theater, concert or anywhere else people are talking.

In order to demystify viral marketing, we need only answer three questions.

WHO ARE WE TALKING TO? We're talking to influencers, not audiences.

Audiences are the targets of traditional marketing. These targets are often a generalized group that experiences the message passively, taking it in with little or no participation. This message is broadcast. It's being sent out to a large area and has been crafted to appeal to the greatest number of people. Unfortunately, that lack of specificity also means the message has only peripheral awareness in the audience's mind.

Influencers are the targets of viral marketing. These are individuals who experience the message actively. An influencer is not the wallflower at the party. They voluntarily spread the message to their peers. In order to reach an influencer and inspire such evangelism, the message has to be narrowcast. It must be crafted to appeal to the interests of an individual, not a group. As the message spreads from the individual to the social network, its credibility is built upon those pre-existing relationships. Now that we know who we're talking to, and the benefits of reaching them through social networks, we can ask ourselves the next question.

WHAT ARE WE SAYING? In order to entice the influencer, a viral message should have two components.

Fidelity. Think back to your childhood and "The Telephone Game." You whisper a phrase in someone's ear, they do the same, and the message goes around in a circle. What started out as "Peanut Butter and Jelly" morphs into "Please Butterfly Kiss Me." This is an example of low fidelity.

A message released into the wild tends to mutate if left uncontrolled. Now imagine that instead of whispering in someone's ear, this time you pass a note that says "Peanut Butter and Jelly." The note doesn't change, despite its passage around the circle. That is high fidelity - a controlled message delivered from an external source that individuals could access independently.

Persistence is the seed of interest that will inspire an influencer to spread the message and inspire those second-generation influencers to spread it even further. Persistence is often based on emotional hook. Some hooks, like humor, can quickly become passe, but others, like safety or social issues, have been shown to have real staying power. To identify the persistent traits of our viral message, we have to ask the final question.

WHAT DO THE INFLUENCERS WANT OTHER PEOPLE TO CARE ABOUT? Viral marketing succeeds because the influencer believes that other people want to experience this message. The influencer becomes a "champion of a cause," finding a message personally relevant because they believe it will be relevant to the people in their social circles. There are three attributes to keep in mind to ensure the best possibility of "infecting" an influencer's social network with a viral message.

Exposure. How many times have you ignored a car alarm in the distance? What was once a jarring warning of a crime in progress has now become the white noise of every day life. Like a real virus, too much exposure leads to immunity. If the influencer is immune to the message, it will go no further.

Access. In order to have a successful viral campaign, you must not only know how your target hears messages, but also how they prefer to hear them. Be careful not to confuse a "preferred medium" with the "usual medium." Aside from the obvious tech avenues like email and instant messages, it's good to know what social events your influencer is likely to attend. The influencer may prefer face-to-face meetings or conference calls; may attend classes, meet friends in bars or attend sporting events or concerts. By understanding access, you will learn how, and with whom, the influencer communicates.

And finally, Heart is an influencer's emotional core, often existing independent of reason or rationality. It's our sense of humor, fear, love and loyalty. By crafting a message to tap into an influencer's heart, you can create a more persistent message, perhaps even allowing it blossom into a "cult brand."

Where does all that leave us? While "viral marketing" as a buzzword is new, the basic marketing principles behind a successful viral campaign have been around for years. It all boils down to researching your target, crafting creative messages and delivering them through clever media distribution. Soon we'll look back at the term "viral marketing" giggle nostalgically just as we do when we talk about the "information superhighway."

So the next time you get a forwarded email or someone recommends a movie, know that you're already involved in viral marketing. Understanding the issues addressed here can help your viral marketing campaign transcend the term itself.

by Daniel Solis ART DIRECTOR, THIRD DEGREE
daniel@thirddegreeadv.com