Viral Marketing
10.1 Introduction
Word-of-mouth marketing is powerful. Edelman’s 2010 Trust Barometer shows that 44 percent of respondents trust “a person like me” as a spokesperson. [1] In, you learned some of the ways that marketers can tap into the media that promote this kind of trust. Messages passed on from “a person like me” is word-of-mouth marketing, and online that same message can be passed on through social media.
Viral marketing is a form of word-of-mouth marketing that aims to result in a message spreading exponentially. It takes its name from a virus because of the similarities that marketers aim to emulate:
It is easily passed on.
The number of people who have been “infected” grows exponentially.
History
The term “viral marketing” was probably first coined by Jeffrey Rayport in an article “The Virus of Marketing” in the December 1996 issue of Fast Company.[2] That’s not to say that there weren’t viral marketing campaigns before that, but as the Internet developed, so have the electronic tools for passing on information.
Word of mouth has existed as long as there have been words and mouths, but it is a fairly recent phenomenon in the world of marketing. Positive word of mouth can have a tremendous impact on a brand and can take up little to nothing of the marketing department’s budget. However, planning for and measuring word of mouth can be tricky and unpredictable.
As the connected nature of the Internet has allowed for easier spreading and tracking of word-of-mouth information, it has become possible to see how this can be modeled on the spread of a virus in a population.
[1] “Edelman Trust Barometer 2010,” Edelman, 2010,http://www.edelman.co.uk/trustbarometer/files/edelman-trust-barometer-2010.pdf(accessed May 10, 2010).
[2] Jeffrey Rayport, “The Virus of Marketing,” Fast Company, December 31, 1996,http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/06/virus.html (accessed May 10, 2008).
10.2 How It Works
LEARNING OBJECTIVE
Understand the different types of viral marketing and their differences.
Viral growth occurs when a message is spread exponentially. Viral marketing campaigns work when a message is spread exponentially and it results in a desired outcome for a brand. Viral marketing utilizes electronic means to spread messages. It harnesses the electronic connectivity of individuals to ensure marketing messages are referred from one person to another.
Viral marketing campaigns can be tricky and unpredictable. However, the lure of exponential growth, at a very low marginal cost, means that they are being attempted more often.
MSN Hotmail: From Zero to Thirty Million
MSN Hotmail, the Web e-mail service purchased by Microsoft, grew to thirty million members in just two and a half years from its launch in July 1996. A large part of its exponential growth is attributed to the sign-up link that was in the footer of every e-mail sent with the service. When the company launched, every outgoing message from this platform contained an advertisement