| |
| |
|
Marketing Information |
|
|
|
Turbo-Charge Your Viral Marketing- Five Easy Ways
The world of marketing has changed. With increasingly better educated and more skeptical consumers, marketing methods must be increasingly accountable. Questions being asked by CEOs and business owners from the largest companies through to the smallest solo operators include: · How can you be more confident about your ability to quantify your return on your marketing investment? · How can you prove the effectiveness of your marketing? · How can you define, measure and take action on your return on investment? · How can you match your marketing to meet your corporate goals and expectations? · How can you predict what would happen to sales if the marketing budget were cut? · How can you forecast the impact of your marketing program on your sales? · How can you integrate modern marketing methods into your existing marketing plans? · How can you convince your boss that marketing does deliver measurable results? · How can you convince your boss to increase and not decrease your marketing budget? One of the emerging tools that answers these questions is viral marketing. Viral marketing describes any strategy that encourages individuals to pass on a marketing message to others, creating the potential for exponential growth in the message's exposure and influence Word of mouth marketing and personal referrals or recommendations from peers are the most powerful marketing tools. Email and the Internet have extended this by providing technology that induces Web sites or users to pass on a marketing message to other sites or users, creating a potentially exponential growth in the message's visibility and effect. A sort of word of mouse! And this is easily measured through using web statistics and sales data. So how do you get results by your customers, clients, subscribers or program members promoting your service for you? Here are five easy ways to turbo-charge your viral marketing efforts and quickly spread enthusiasm about your product or service. 1. Collaborate With Thought-leaders In Select "Communities" of Influence The more influential the group and aligned with your target market, the more likely you are to have success. This requires research, communication and understanding of your target market and affiliated, or potentially affiliated, businesses. 2. Offer An Incentive Most people are motivated by rational self-interest. Offer something they really want like a holiday, free knowledge or education, discounts, or package deals. Just as your company will benefit from their involvement, offer a benefit in return. 3. Follow-up With A Personal Approach Relationships are always strengthened by personal interaction. Often your emailed expression of interest or offer may be one of thousands received daily by a company. A follow up phone-call or meeting will develop a more personal relationship and strengthen your company's involvement. This also allows time to negotiate with the company directly and better identify with their needs. 4. Make It Immediate Viral marketing works when you consider news values such as drama, consequence and immediacy. Be aware of what's happening in the community and the world and try to tie in with recent dramas. An example of effective viral marketing in the wake of the London bombings is demonstrated by the following email widely distributed around the world: "Hi All, Don't usually forward emails but thought this may be a good idea. Following the disaster in London . . . East Anglican Ambulance Service have launched a national "In case of Emergency (ICE ) " campaign with the support of Falklands war hero Simon Weston. The idea is that you store the word " I C E " in your mobile phone Address book, and against it enter the number of the person you would want to be contacted "In Case of Emergency". In an emergency situation ambulance and hospital staff will then be able to quickly find out who your next of kin are and be able to contact them. It's so simple that everyone can do it. Please do. Please will you also email this to everybody in your address book, it won't take too many 'forwards' before everybody will know about this. It really could save your life, or put a loved one's mind at rest. For more than one contact name ICE1, ICE2, ICE3 etc." By acting on the incident, viral marketing has spread this message quickly, and cheaply, around the globe. 5. Make It Interesting To Create Buzz We have become rather immune to a number of tactics commonly used to generate attention. Spam emails, free offers etc. are often overlooked in a sea of similar materials received daily. Always think outside the box in order to make and impact. A good example of this is the recent US made TV commercial featuring Paris Hilton for a burger chain. PR expert Don Crowther said recently "it cost the chain eight to ten million dollars to air the commercial, plus, probably another million or two in production, Paris's fees, and website production fees. But what did it do for sales? Same store sales revenues at Carl's Jr. increased only 1.7%, at Hardee's just 0.7%. Sounds like a great investment to me - Spend 8 to 12 million dollars, get back $1.1 million in sales." On positive side Don adds "the ad has generated a significant amount of controversy, a reported 802% increase in web searches (though I seriously question how many people were coming to the Carl's Junior and Hardee's sites before...), 4 million hits on the spicyparis website, free showings on news shows, several petitions against it, and some franchisers refusing to run the ad. So, unquestionably, it generated buzz." Whether scandal, drama or incentives are being utilised it is important to capitalise in order to make your viral marketing effective, measurable and noticed. Thomas Murrell MBA CSP is an international business speaker, consultant and award-winning broadcaster. Media Motivators is his regular electronic magazine read by 7,000 professionals in 15 different countries. You can subscribe by visiting http://www.8mmedia.com. Thomas can be contacted directly at +6189388 6888 and is available to speak to your conference, seminar or event. Visit Tom's blog at http://www.8mmedia.blogspot.com.
MORE RESOURCES:
Marketing - Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
Building Skills in Information Marketing will Boost Your Business Yesterday I was sitting on a train going into London when I thought I'd take a look around the carriage just to see what everyone was doing. I wanted to make a mental note because my five year old son always asks me 'what happened at your work today Daddy?' So I put my newspaper down and took a look around me. Want to Increase Your Business? First You Need to Understand where You are at! Are you having trouble understanding basic situational marekting concepts? Then this article is for you.Alex Margarit shows you a simple step by step way on how to put together a basic situational analysis. Getting Your Services Used Every day I talk with professional service providers who do great work, have a valuable service that really helps people?and struggle to get their services used as much as they'd like.They get a lukewarm response after an initial conversation while networking, the referrals come in but don't convert to real business as often as they'd like, and they can't seem to get prospects to see them as that much better than other professionals offering similar services. Free and Easy School Fundraisers | Elementary and High School Fund Raising Ideas Parents are always looking for free and easy ways to improve their child's education. School funding plays a big part in the education that your child receives, especially if you are in a smaller school such as a church school or private, independently owned school. The Newest Marketing Course Certainly the newest earth quaking event in Internet Marketing insider circles is the release of John Reese's New, Traffic Secrets marketing course. I say certainly because I suppose to know what for you as Small marketer is more important. Ten Tips for Creating a Winning Proposal - Part 1 If you want your business to grow and attract new clients, you'll have to start creating meaningful proposals. The goal of a proposal is obviously to be awarded new work. Networking Events - Lose the Fear and Gain the Benefits "Kevin, are you saying I need to go to Networking events? I hope not because I hate them."No, of course you don't have to go to them. Grow Your Business By Getting Your Customers Buying From You More Often - 35 Ideas 35 Ideas to Spark Your Creativity:There are 3 ways to grow any business. Just 3:- Get more customers- Get more from each sale- Sell to each customer more frequently. How to Use Direct Response Post Card Decks as a Valuable Market Research Tool Market research specialists have discovered a new tool which enables them to quickly identify target market cells, measure buyer acceptance, test new product or service concepts quickly and inexpensively and survey market characteristics.. Marketing is More Than Advertising Marketing is a business process about which much is written, however is often not completely understood. Many think that "marketing" and "advertising" are interchange-able words. The 7 Commandments of Marketing Marketing is the key to success with any business, online or traditional. You can have a website or business location. Creating Great Charts for Persuasive Trade Show Presentations A well-designed chart can be one of the most persuasive elements of your trade show booth display and literature. It illustrates to your customers why your product is the obvious solution to one of their specific needs. Marketing with Special Reports. 5 Ways to Develop Content Your Prospects Cant Wait to Read So you've decided to start publishing an e-newsletter, or you'd like to develop a Special Report as an added-value for your customers, or maybe you've even decided to teach a teleclass or a seminar as a way to bring prospects into your business.So now you have to decide what you're going to write or speak about. Fertilizer For Your Grassroots Marketing Looking for a great way to drive traffic to your business? No million dollar ad budget last time you checked? The solution may be to harness the power of grassroots marketing.Grassroots marketing is simply taking the unconventional approach to getting people interested in what you offer. Global Market in the Cyber world-Go and Get It ! With the Internet opening up the doorway to the global market, everybody is up and running to reap the maximum benefit of this widely used medium. Not only has Internet gained importance as an important medium of communication but also has given a platform to thousands of people to nurture their entrepreneurship and realize their dreams of self-employment. Marketing Copy - Brand Identity Guru Tips on writing great copy for your marketing efforts.It's just four steps that I call the Writing Path1. Increase Your Response with Multi-Step Marketing "There is only one way to judge the effectiveness of a marketing piece, and that is by the number of responses you get." - Heidi Richards -Multi-step marketing is a simple yet extremely powerful strategy when you use it to its full potential. Sum of Its Parts I just spent a week at the beach with my family and, as much as I vowed not to think about work, stumbled onto a highly relevant lesson for marketing professional services.It was actually my mother who inspired this lesson, thanks to the following beachy quote she had on the refrigerator:"Saltwater taffy, for example, does not taste good. Why Market to Generation X? Generation X"--the 40 million or so people born between 1965 and 1976--understands it is living in a world of uncertainty where neither the govern¬ment nor private employers offer lifetime financial security. This is, however, the next generation of responsible adults, bright young people with families to protect and educate. How To Let Your Customers Search For YOU! - Part 2 First I want to welcome you to part two of the article 'How To Let Customers Search for YOU!', where you can learn how to attract new clients at any time you want. The techniques I describe here have proofed to work for me and a lot of other people.
|
| home | site map |
| © 2006 |
