11.1
Introduction
This module will teach you about viral marketing.
Viral marketing
is not a traditional type of marketing and is a fairly new concept in the
industry. When a message about a brand is transferred from person to person, it
comes under viral marketing. This module will include details about viral marketing,
its effectiveness, and how one can create viral adverts.
11.2 How to Create a Buzz With Your Marketing
There was a time when there was no interaction between two customers using
the same brand.
People would buy items, use them, and whether they liked them or not, they did
not have an easy-to-use platform to share their views and reviews. However,
today, the Internet has changed everything.
People can now interact with each other on social platforms and
share with them their experiences. When people talk about a brand, whether in a
good way or bad way, they are creating a buzz.
When a brand does something foolish, it is in the headlines, and the story
starts trending on Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms. Although
people may speak of the brand in a negative way, people are still talking about
it, and more and more people join in the conversation.
This is what viral marketing is, and anything that people may
find unusual, funny, or shocking can go viral and market the brand. It does not
matter whether the brand is shown in a good light or a bad one; the buzz always
ends up marketing the brand and increasing its reach.
In order to create a buzz in the market, marketers need to be
creative, and they need to think outside of the box. They need to come up with
a unique idea that has the ability to bring attention to their brand.
When it comes to creating a buzz about your products and services, marketers
should make use of marketing and advertising tactics. By creating a hype about
a product that a brand is about to launch, marketers can increase sales.
Buzz can also be created through advertising. When a brand is launching a product,
for instance, it can buy ad space in all the major media channels to promote
their product.
Let's take a
look at some ways in which buzz can be created.
A good way to increase awareness about your products and services is to invest
in public relations, or PR.
PR is a great way to engage people in your brand and make them aware of your
products and services. However, it is always better to hire a PR agency instead
of handling everything on your own. PR agencies have good contacts in the
industry and know the right techniques to target the audience. PR agencies also
have connections in the press, which they can use to promote a product or
service.
These agencies also set up events to grab the audience's attention and make the
product or service popular. A great way to create a buzz about new
products and services is to make use of social media. Today, PR companies also
greatly target social networks to create a promotional campaign. However, buzz
can only be created if the content is creative.
If you make an ad campaign similar to your competitors' and other
brands, then the audience will have nothing to talk about. This is the opposite
of creating a buzz, and your brand will only be talked about when it sends a
unique message.
When marketers do something different or extraordinary, they successfully
create a buzz.
The audience needs an interesting topic to talk about and when a brand provides
them with a topic, they continue to talk about it with friends and others
through social media.
Marketers need to ensure that the product or service they are promoting is
presented in an interesting and creative way. Even if the product or service is
not so interesting, they need to find ways to make it look appealing. This is
usually done through storytelling. Marketers often tell attention grabbing
stories to the audience to make them talk about the advert.
Also, if a product is unique or has an appealing benefit, then the marketers
can use it as a technique to create a buzz about it in the market. By
highlighting the product's unique use and benefit, marketers can create hype
for it before its launch. Buzz is also created when products are sold at a
cheaper rate or are in a limited quantity. It is a marketer's
responsibility to see how they can create a buzz.
In order to target more people, marketers need to attend events,
parties, conferences, and meet-ups.
By attending such events, marketers can reach a greater audience, which will
increase their chances of getting heard and successfully creating a buzz.
Attending events is also quite beneficial for any brand to gain more attention
and awareness. The more places the brand is seen, the more buzz it will
generate.
Videos are quite effective in creating a buzz because they are highly
interactive, interesting, and contain impressive visual imagery and sound
effects. By creating an interesting and catchy video about a brand, marketers
can make it go viral.
Creatively made videos that either tell a story or make people laugh
are popular and get shared more often. With the availability of the
Internet, it has become quite easy for marketers to create a buzz for a brand,
product, or service, and any interesting video shared on one of the social
platforms instantly attracts attention.
Buzz can never be created with a laid back approach. In order to create hype
about the brand in the market, marketers should be active in promoting the
brand in the most interesting way possible. If the marketer and the PR agency
are not active in promoting the brand or its products and services, then
no one will remember their efforts.
When marketers are looking to make a brand go viral, they need to focus on
promoting the brand with an aggressive approach, which is the best way to
ensure that the majority of the audience gets the message.
Additionally, a buzz will never be created if the marketer is not consistent
and frequent. There are several brands and promotional messages that people see
every day, and for a brand to stand out, it must be the most active. Here are
some tips as you begin to create a viral campaign:
Don't be Afraid to take Risks
Viral or buzz marketing is all about taking risks, and promoting a brand
through traditional marketing tactics is not risky at all. Marketers know how
the audience will react to traditional marketing and what impact it will have
on them.
Risky tactics on the other hand, are different and unique. When marketers come
up with ideas that are creative and new, they are taking a risk because they do
not know about the audience's reaction. Your viral marketing strategy may or
may not work, which is the reason it is risky, and it is okay to take this risk
because the end result is totally worth it all.
Organise an Event for Product Launch
When a business is launching a new product, it wants to ensure that its product
gets the necessary attention and hype which can help make it a success. A good
way to create a buzz about a new product is to launch it at a big event.
By staging an entire event around your product launch, marketers can create
hype and get the right attention from the audience. Arranging an event is a
good way to tell the audience that something important is happening, too.
Businesses can also arrange a big press event to grab the audience's attention,
including people from the media. When brands make a big deal about their
product, they are successful in capturing attention from everyone. Furthermore,
people from the media also capture the event and play it on different media,
which acts as a form of marketing.
Create Buzz with the Product itself
Many brands launch products and services that are unique, appealing, and
beneficial, and do not require additional viral marketing efforts. If the
product that the marketer is promoting has unique benefits and uses, then these
plus points can be used as tactics to create a buzz.
Let's say a brand is launching a bottle that has two compartments; one for cold
drinks and the other for hot drinks. The bottle's unique selling proposition,
or USP, is that it keeps hot drinks hot and cold drinks cold for several hours.
When promoting such a product, marketers can highlight the benefits to grab the
audience's attention.
A good way to create excitement is to create suspense about the product that is
about to be launched. Many brands like to build up excitement amongst the
audience by revealing only a little about the product and letting the audience
wonder. By releasing small but exciting details about a product, the brand will
make the audience curious about it. This type of hype is great for making
the product a huge hit even before its launch, so by the time the product is
actually launched, it will gather enough reputation that it will not require
additional promotional efforts from marketers, and people will be willing to
purchase it.
Buzz is when the majority of people are talking about your brand. This popularity
can be achieved by making use of the above mentioned techniques and strategies.
When brands are successful in creating a buzz, they are better able to spread
awareness and increase brand recognition.
Word of Mouth Marketing
Word of mouth marketing is one of the most powerful tools that brands can use
in their favour to make their products and services a huge hit. Word of mouth
marketing is not done by the brand itself, but it entirely depends upon
customer reviews and comments. The type of experience the customers have with a
brand is what is reflected here, and word of mouth marketing has the ability to
make a brand or break it.
The reason that WOMM is essential for businesses is that it is
the purest form of marketing. When someone has a good experience with a brand,
they will share their experience with their friends and family members. The
brand is not paying for marketing in this case because the service and quality
of its product are doing that for them.
When customers have good experiences with a brand, they will spread positive
comments about it in their circle of friends. This way, more people will get to
know about the brand and they will consider purchasing its products and service.
When it comes to purchasing new products and services, people trust their
relatives, friends, and family members for reviews and opinions. If a friend
tells you that their experience with Brand X was not pleasant, will you still
buy Brand X products?
We tend to listen to the people we know when it comes to buying new goods, and
we are picky about the things we spend money on. This is the reason someone
else's opinion helps us make a purchase decision. People often rely on review
sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor to learn about different products and places.
They read customer reviews on these sites and then decide whether they want to
spend money on a brand or not. If there are too many bad reviews about a
company, people will automatically look for other options.
Word of mouth marketing is not something that any brand can force or buy. It is
the type of marketing that is based on the comments and reviews of happy
customers. A brand cannot just sell a poor product and expect people to spread
positive reviews about it. Anyone who wants to spread a good word about their
brand must ensure that they are offering the best service to their customers.
Word of mouth marketing is like customers doing marketing on your behalf. When
happy customers leave, they market your brand telling stories about their
experience. This is the purest form of marketing because the company is not
paying anyone to talk about them, but they are making their service and
offering speak for them.
Recommendations Matter
When a relative or a friend tells you that they had the best pizza from a new
pizza place and the service was incredible, would not you go and give the new
pizza place a try?
FACT
According to a survey, almost 92% of customers make purchase decisions after
taking recommendations from their friends and family.
Source: Forbes.com
No one wants to spend money on something new because they take it as a risk.
They want to be certain that the products they are planning to purchase are
good and worthy of their money. It is a low percentage of customers who purchase based on their
level of trust with the brand. People who are loyal to a brand are the ones who
do not need suggestions from friends and family when buying products from such
a brand.
It is the small companies who struggle to get customers to trust them. Because
they are new in the market, people take time to trust them and their offerings.
Therefore, such companies can really benefit from word of mouth marketing. Word
of mouth is a positive marketing technique that makes a brand look good in the
eyes of the audience.
Word of Mouth Marketing and the
Internet
It has become easier than ever for brands to make use of the amazing marketing
technique known as word of mouth marketing. People can now socialise on social
networks and connect to anyone living anywhere in the world. Where it is a huge
benefit for businesses, it can also become a pitfall if a negative word about
them spreads on any of the social networks.
When people have a good experience with a brand, they will be really happy, and
they will share this happiness with the people they know. They may, for
instance, update their Facebook status talking about their amazing experience
with a brand. This status message will be seen by their friends who can also
share the message on their profile, which will be seen by friends of friends
and the cycle continues.
More people will come to know about this brand, and they will be more likely to
consider purchasing from it. Similarly, if a customer was mistreated at a
restaurant, they will be furious and share this information, too. These
negative comments will also spread like wildfire, threatening the reputation of
the company and making it lose thousands of customers and their trust.
FACT
Consumers sharing a brand's message generated more than double the sales that
resulted from paid advertising.
Source: mckinsey.com
11.3
Personal Word of Mouth Marketing
Digital word of mouth marketing consists of social networks, Internet, and
mobile technology.
There is another
traditional method of word of mouth marketing; personal. When people hang out,
they talk about different topics and share their experiences with each other.
Face to face marketing is when two people meet up and share their experiences
about a brand.
Face to face
conversations are much more powerful than digital word of mouth marketing
because there is more involvement of emotions and expressions. People also tend
to believe in words said to them in person than on any other platform.
Word of mouth
marketing is not a quick recipe that you can use to improve a brand's image,
but it is a whole process that involves a lot of hard work and effort from the
company. Businesses can encourage people to talk about their brand by following
these tips given below:
Working on Customer Satisfaction
Happy customers
will spread positive words about the brand. Therefore, it is important for
businesses to work on customer satisfaction by offering unparalleled customer
service and products. When the products the brand offers are great, customers
will automatically want to stick to the brand. On top of that, offering great
service will allow brands to shine in the eyes of their customers and encourage
them to talk about the products in a positive light.
Offer Great Customer Service
Businesses
looking to make their customers promote a brand need to ensure that they are
offering good customer service. From answering customer queries to helping them
with the purchase process, everything that a brand supports the customers with
comes under customer service. Therefore, businesses need to make sure that
their customers are leaving them with a smile.
Brands that give
value to their customers can easily receive good reviews from them. Companies
should ensure that their team is serving customers well and interacting with
them at every step of the way. They should also ensure that their sales team is
being supportive and helpful to every customer. The more positive the
interaction is with a brand, the better customers feel about it.
Brands that set a
distinct image in the market are often talked about the most. Nike, for
instance, has maintained its image over the years, and people talk about it
with respect. It has created a superior place for itself in the market after
years of hard work and effort. This is what every brand should try to
accomplish. To make more people talk about the brand, companies need to ensure
that they stand out from the competition. They need to form a solid image in
the market that speaks volumes of their credibility.
Customers run
your business and without them no brand will be able to succeed. This is
exactly what every brand needs to understand. They need to treat customers
nicely. If a customer is not satisfied with a product/service, the company
needs to find ways to make the customers happy. If a customer has a problem
with a product, businesses should look into the matter to resolve the problem.
A brand that does not care about its customers will never be
able to receive good reviews from them.
Every brand
should try hard to keep their customers hooked instead of letting them go away
and spread a negative word about them in the market. When businesses value
their customers and treat them well, they are, in turn, making them say good
things about them. The customers that speak nicely of their experience with a
brand are able to bring more customers.
Any business that
is looking to win over customers, needs to give importance to word of mouth
marketing. Word of mouth marketing is a powerful tool for businesses to attract
more customers without spending money. However, the reason that WOMM is crucial
is that it requires continual efforts from the company.
A company that wants to
spread a good word about themselves in the marketplace needs to work closely to
make their customers feel important and most importantly, satisfied. The customers
who leave the business with a smile on their face are the ones who tell
others about their wonderful experience, making others become customers too.
This marketing is
different because it cannot be bought. Customers will say what they have experienced
with the brand. Therefore, it is important that businesses make the most of
this marketing technique to achieve success and gather a great customer base.
Module Summary
Viral marketing is the goal of most marketing plans, as every company wants its
products and services to be known worldwide. In order to make these viral
dreams a reality, however, it is necessary to ensure that each advert has
certain elements. In some cases, an advert will go viral out of the blue, but
in most, there are a number of preparations that must be done to place the
advertisement in the position to become viral.
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