Almost any website wants to get more traffic, and viral marketing can be one the fastest and most effective ways to do it. Many marketers may believe that this strategy is actually done on social-networking sites. Even though those sites are one of the places to perform viral marketing campaigns, there are also other ways to do it that can be just as effective.
What is Viral Marketing?
The easiest way to explain viral marketing is to say that it is a new-age version of word of mouth advertising. Viral marketing can be basic things like people talking to one another online, sending emails to others, or sharing messages with their friends on social networks. It can also involve simple links being shared among friends.
There are also other things that are commonly passed around or mass distributed online like videos, software, or even e-books. Marketers can utilize any of these things as a source of viral marketing traffic. The real key is not what is actually being passed around, but how the whole strategy is set up to actually encourage something to be shared with others.
What makes viral marketing different from other kinds of marketing is that the consumers will actually do a lot of the work for the advertiser instead of the other way around. The advertiser gets everything started, but it is up to others to continue to pass it along. As more people continue to share something with their friends, and those friends share it with their friends, it creates a massive snowball effect of traffic and leads to the advertiser.
Viral Sweepstakes and Giveaway Contests
Social networking sites have given rise to a new trend in viral marketing that is extremely effective. Sweepstakes or giveaway contests can be planned and marketed on sites like Facebook. The lure of a free giveaway prize appeals to at least a decent percentage of almost any given group of people, making it a relatively easy way for companies to attract new leads.
What really makes this whole strategy work so good is the way social media sites like Facebook work. When someone clicks on an advertisement or another message about a contest, they will end up visiting the Facebook page of the business or person sponsoring the sweepstakes. This page will initially contain information about the contest and how to enter it.
There are a few different ways that companies will conduct these types of viral marketing campaigns, but almost every single one of them on Facebook will require the entrant to Like the business on their own account. After performing this action, the business page on Facebook will then display the actual entry form for the sweepstakes.
The actual action of liking the Facebook page for the business will generally get published on their wall, which may also end up appearing on the wall of their friends. After entering a contest, entrants will typically be encouraged to share the contest with their friends. Many giveaway sweepstakes will even offer extra entries for referring others to enter the contest too.
The end result of this type of viral marketing campaign can be a massive gain of new leads, website visitors, and most likely sales. This can all be achieved with relatively minimal advertising by the company conducting the giveaway when the campaign is designed in a way to encourage sharing. Many of these contests can be executed with relatively low costs depending on the prizes being given away.
Non Social Media Viral Marketing with E-Books and Other Products
A lot of marketers are not aware that there are a ton of different ways to market a company, product, or website without social media sites using e-books that are relatively easy and fast to make. When this type of viral campaign is done in particular ways, these e-books can even make money while they market for a business at the same time.
Beyond e-books, there are even other types of products that can be used in this same manner. As an example, someone could make some type of free software tool for internet marketers. This tool could then be distributed on a variety of internet marketing and free software download websites. After they were able to gain some exposure and loyal users, the tools could easily begin to be shared with others.
These tools can effectively promote a business or other relational products and services that are for sale. Since they are frequently used over and over again, it would give continued exposure to businesses that utilize this strategy.
The first thing to do is create an e-book or a variety of e-books that cover specific subjects. These books must be useful in some manner without any advertising. The books should be titled to draw attention and not just list the name of a subject, especially since the titles may be indexed by search engines or mixed in with hundreds of other e-book listings.
Once a book is finished, add a few promotions to it at the beginning and end. These promotions will generally include a bit of information along with a link to the site where the product or service can be purchased. Readers should be encouraged to share the book with the friend and to join a newsletter run by the marketer for even more information.
Viral E-Book Distribution
Next, marketers will want to submit their e-book to a variety of distribution websites. The good news is that this can be done for free with almost all of these sites, although some of the sites may not blatantly advertise that they are accepting new books. In general, any site with its own collection of free e-books is an excellent choice. The owners of these types of sites can often be contacted to offer them a good e-book for free to include on their site or in their distribution package.
Since these books are generally written to be tutorials of some type or simply useful information on a subject, they are often acceptable to be sold. There are numerous sites that allow individuals to sell their own e-books. Many of these sites even have the option to allow the sold e-books to be shared with friends and family.
Some of these sites like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Google, and iTunes can generate a lot of traffic, sales, and exposure for these books. This results in money being made and free marketing on other promotions in the book, which is simply a win-win situation for viral marketers.
Since there are so many different places that e-books can be distributed online, it is important for those conducting a viral marketing campaign to do some research to find sites that are more likely to deal with relational types of books. Unless they get distributed to people that are actually interested in the subject of the book, it can be a waste of time to submit it to a lot of different sites.
