What makes Viral Marketing…Viral?

What is it?

Viral Marketing is an online marketing tool used by brands or organizations (such as NGOs, events, etc.) wherein a content induces individuals or to spread a message to other platforms or individuals, creating a potentially exponential growth in the message’s reach and effect.

Viral content can be a hashtag, picture, video, quote, a meme or anything that interests and excites viewers. Viral Marketing can be a standalone content started by individual(s) or by organizations as part of their marketing campaigns.

Viral marketing is gaining its share of popularity as more and more brands and organizations are getting active on social media. Viral marketing is done by small businesses and big ones too, but it is more beneficial to the smaller ones due to its cost-savviness. Viral marketing’s success is uncertain as the least expected content somewhere on the internet can become an overnight sensation and a well-planned content may not getting the desired response.

Approaches to Viral Marketing

There are 2 ways content can become viral: The “Top-Down” approach or the “Bottom-Up” approach. The Top-Down approach is when organizations ask celebrities, influencers or other online handles to share their content or participate in their movements such as a challenge, hashtag, act, etc. Brands ask such people to endorse who would attract their desired target audience. Since renowned handles are promoting the content, the uncertainty factor of “Awareness” and “Interest” parameters of the AIDA model reduces significantly. Since these endorsers have a large following base, the content reaches masses easily and the chances of the content going viral increases. It may also happen that other pages engage in the trend without being paid just to be a part of the momentum and make their online presence known. The Bottom-Up approach is when some content is made by an ordinary individual and soon is acknowledged by the masses and becomes famous enough to reach the popular handles and they too join the trend to involve their organization in the movement.

A Top-Down Approach is when Coke started its #ShareACoke Campaign and became a major-hit.

Another example of Top-Down Viral Marketing is when social media influencer Andres Borges posted about a new feature in Zomato Gold and Zomato reposted it.

Let’s have a look at a few Bottom-Up approaches.

Currently, there is a trend going on where people write when a discovery or practice was started and a funny way of how people did things prior to that. Here’s how Fevicol joined the trend.

Another recent trend started by masses where people would say whose companionship they have to rely on. Here’s how Netflix had to contribute to the trend by showing duos of some of it’s popular shows. We can see in the comments how its increased engagement for the page as people tagged their knowns.

Pros and Cons of Viral Marketing

Pros:

• Low Cost: Viral Marketing can be low cost when organizations don’t pay other handles to initiate the movement. This can be achieved when the content is good and appreciated by the masses and handles to the extent that they themselves wish to share it.
• Develops Personal Association: Content which is relatable, inspiring, or connecting with the target audience really hits-off and helps in creating a brand connect.
• Reach: The reach is organic and reaches to multiple segments, desired/target ones and new exploratory ones.
• Rapid Growth: The content spreads faster than wildfire and brand awareness can be achieved really quickly.
• Mainstream Media Exposure: All organizations and brands, big or small, have access to the same social media platforms and it becomes a content-game. Handles with more innovative and engaging content win, however both these terms are relative. This is unlike traditional media where brands with bigger pockets get access to ads on premier TV channels at prime time.

Cons:

• Difficult Measurability: It becomes challenging to know extent of reach and segmentation lines may become blurry.
• Nuisance Factor: Viral Marketing may backfire if the content is taken in a negative or unintended spirit by a certain group of people. These groups may spread negative publicity which may affect Brand Image. Thus, organizations need to be very conscious about the content they put-up and how they respond to people’s concerns and feedback otherwise there could be a negative viral about the organization.
• It’s a Ripple!: Viral Marketing trends are like ripples in the ocean. Its momentary and are soon replaced by another one.
• Association with Unwanted Groups: There might be certain segments or groups which an organization may not want to associate with, but now its out-of-control for the organization. For example, a fitness brand targets a segment with a certain buyer persona and its content is shared by a celebrity who is unfit and disliked by the target segment.