Internet Marketing Tycoon

**Atomm** · 07-11-2006, 05:48 PM

Ok, so what exactly is Viral Marketing and how do you do it?

Obviously money helps (ahem EF), but what about those of use with limited funds?

**Steve_G** · 07-11-2006, 06:00 PM

Viral marketing is marketing from word of mouth... and it's always the best.

**xboxundone** · 07-11-2006, 06:01 PM

viral marketing is marketing some that is funny etc.. that people will pass it on themselves or reference people to it weather it is funny or cool or something like that....

There was GREAT article in WSJ yesterday actually whole section called the Marketing MAze it is a great read if you can get ahold of yesterday WSJ it included a read on viral marketing.

**imported_mattd** · 07-11-2006, 09:40 PM

Doesn't have to be just funny either! It can be "serious" or "sad" things too!

The point is it has to be different or interesting or "cool" enough for people to pass it onto their friends without any incentive to do so!

**Hoang** · 07-11-2006, 09:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Atomm

Ok, so what exactly is Viral Marketing and how do you do it?

Obviously money helps (ahem EF), but what about those of use with limited funds?

You don't need money to start a viral marketing campaign, heh. What works best with viral is humor or something that totally kicks ***.

**rex_b** · 07-11-2006, 10:14 PM

Viral Marketing on the internet is mainly spread through email. Thus having a "send this page to a friend" link on all pages is a good idea. Hmm this gives me a blog post idea.

**obenix** · 07-11-2006, 10:18 PM

Would small clips of funny videos be considered viral marketing?
Those clips spread like fire over emails.

**Lpspider** · 07-11-2006, 10:24 PM

Traditionally, viral marketing is basically word of mouth. Friends telling friends, emails, etc. that are sent out. If you have good content, it's unavoidable - which is a good thing.

**Hoang** · 07-11-2006, 10:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by obenix

Would small clips of funny videos be considered viral marketing?
Those clips spread like fire over emails.

Yeah, definitely. AOL calls them "viral videos" I believe.

**Pax** · 07-12-2006, 01:19 AM

So if i just whipped out the old video camera, made a spoof of a TV show (like pimp my underpants or something stupid) and it turned out reasonably funny, then I put it on a page with some adsense...whats to stop it just going to youtube or being an email attatchment.

A link at the end of the video?

**imported_mattd** · 07-12-2006, 08:59 AM

These things tend to get sent around in emails and as you say can end up on YouTube etc. You could embed it in some sort of flash type player that makes it harder for people to extract, but you wont be able to stop a determined user from extracting the video eventually.

You can ad in adverts at the start and end or somethnig, but there is a chance these will just get cut off at some point. Ideally you want the subject matter of your video/whatever to be directly related to your product/site etc.

Think of it as an advert for your site, i.e. a way to raise awareness and get that URL out there and get noticed, rather than just as a piece of "bait" to get people into visiting your site where they might or might not click on the ads whilst they are watching the video etc...if any of that made sense!

**Pax** · 07-12-2006, 09:02 AM

makes perfect sense. lots of these massive viral things happen by accident though. funniest home videos style!

**imported_mill** · 07-12-2006, 01:50 PM

Yeah anyone remeber that JediKid movie. Talking about viral marketing. It was all over the internet and the major news channels acorss the US and Canada. The parent sued the guys that distributed it and told them that they didnt appreciate their son being exploited like that. It was on thousands of websites.

The parents won their lawsuit for 50k dollars. But the owners of the original start wars fan site that got the kid to submit the video then added digital effects and stuff were going to pay for the kids college for 4 years, buy him a car when he turned 16 and a new laptop. Totaling over 100k. They spoke with the parents and the parents were to greedy to let it go and let them help the kid for his time. They lost out on a great deal. They still sent the kid a new laptop and I believe a vehicle. But no free education.

Now that was viral marketing at its finest ( websites, emails, news media.etc etc)

Here is the link to it, its on youtube now, but their was over a 100 remakes and remastered videos of this kid. it still cracks me up. http://www.jedimaster.net/

On June 19th Time.com named JediMaster.net a
50 Best Websites for 2003.
The site had only been up for 18 days.