Marketers aim to spread the word about their brand to a wide audience, and they often do this by trying to make their content ‘go viral’. Viral marketing is a technique, which marketers use intentionally to spread their message like wildfire.
The term “viral marketing” might sound disgusting to the masses. I mean, let a digital marketing professional call himself/ herself a viral marketer and people will take two steps back. Given the current scenario, some might even wonder, “Do they have a vaccine for that yet?” Indeed, just like a biological virus (*cough*… corona… *cough*), a viral marketing campaign spreads from one person to another, resulting in a large number of views, substantial amount of social shares and remarkable brand awareness.
A viral marketing campaign aims to be able to tap into the emotions of the users, especially positive ones like laughter, joy and awe. Then that positive emotion can flow from one person to another like a domino, generating a lot of buzz. Viral marketing is useful as a stand-alone marketing tool or as a part of a larger campaign that uses multiple kinds of marketing. It is especially attractive to smaller businesses or companies because viral marketing can be a cheaper alternative to traditional marketing efforts.
There are three basic elements in viral marketing — the messenger, the message and the environment. All three must be effectively taken care of in unison for a message to go viral.
We take a look at what constitutes a great viral message/ campaign.
Appeals to Particular Target Audience(s)
A successful viral marketing campaign can only be creating keeping a certain target audience in mind. For any campaign to go viral, it must resonate with the audience so much so that they decide to share it with their family, friends, and followers.
Viral Marketers have to answer the following questions before conceptualizing a viral campaign.
Who do I want to connect with? What content would they feel passionate about? What are their hopes, dreams, and values? Why would they care about my campaign? What will can I do to make them want to share my content with their social network?
Has Strong Emotional Appeal
Although it’s sort of difficult to make content go viral, some companies are apparently piecing the puzzle together. And more and more of them are pointing to emotions as the leading factor behind viral content.
Fractl conducted an exclusive study on viral emotions to gain some first-hand insight. This revealed that certain emotions were more viral than others:
A Hubspot study shows the following emotions as the major drivers of virality.
(Source — HubSpot)
Has Great Creativity
What sets a viral message apart from a non-viral message? All successful viral content have some or the other refreshing and innovative idea behind them — the campaign needs to be something not seen before as well as eye-catching.
Needs Timed Publishing
Marketers use major holidays — such as Durga Puja, Eid or Christmas — as well as major events, like big sporting tournaments and Super Bowls, to their advantage for pushing out content which they expect to go viral.
This is because many people are scrolling through social media feeds, watching TV, and keeping up with current events during these times which causes marketers to spend more money to make their content go viral in these periods.
Having studied how content goes viral, its time to look at the exact advantages which viral marketing provides businesses with.
Can be done on low budgets
Viral campaigns, unlike other forms of marketing can be successfully conducted on low budgets. Nowadays, all it takes is a well-thought out video shot on any decent cam-coder or even a high-end smartphone. Humongous budgets are seldom required while producing viral content, unless of course celebrity performers are roped in for the campaign.
Also, viral campaigns are organic and cannot be pay-to-win. In the case of any sort of trend, whether or not something gets shared around is ultimately decided by the audience. Content spreads organically. That’s how viral marketing works.
Could help build brands overnight
Branding can receive a huge shot in the arm with this kind of marketing. This is probably the biggest advantage viral marketing can provide a business with.
Many content creators, or people who simply upload a random video, have found themselves become famous almost overnight. It’s not about the resources and budget — it’s all about what catches the attention of the internet. Marketers don’t always need a large-scale production with a celebrity to make their campaign funny, surprising, relatable, or informational.
For instance: Jonathan Goldsmith, the man behind the “Most Interesting Man in the World” commercials didn’t have very many gigs done prior to getting his big break when the campaign went viral.
Can find new target audiences or customers in the long term
Campaigns are considered “viral” when they have a large reach. Companies may experience an increase in sales, greater engagement on social media, and a boost in conversation about their brand and products.
When everyone starts talking about the viral content pushed by a brand, the brand automatically comes in the spotlight. New section of target audiences could be developed as a result of this over a period of time — say, new prospective buys of a different age group.
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