What is viral marketing?

Much in the same way a rampant virus spreads amongst people – from which viral marketing derives its name – this strategy too has the power to leverage the juggernaut of word-of-mouth marketing but with modern technology viral marketing now predominantly derives its viral effect from various social media platforms through the power of sharing.

Viral marketing typically supplies its audience with something of value for free. This can be something as simple as an amusing song (like pen-pineapple-apple-pen) or game (remember Pokémon Go and how it took the world by a storm?). Whatever the viral content is, it must encourage people to share with others so that myriad of people can receive the content’s message. The ROI generated from this strategy is unfathomable. One day you are sitting recording a video in your bedroom and the next, you are interviewing with Ellen Degeneres (Damn Daniel!).

Now the question arises of who should be the one leveraging the power of this magnificent strategy, ofcourse individuals can and already do it on a personal level but there are also examples of businesses that came up with creative ad content to become internet sensations.

Dollar Shave Club upended the industry’s traditional business model by offering a subscription service that sells blades for as little as $3 a month. The day they started selling subscriptions in March 2012, the company released a YouTube video starring founder Michael Dubin. He tells viewers the product is f***ing great, “so gentle a toddler could use it.” After the release of the video, the website crashed and the blades sold out in the next six hours. The video has been viewed about 23 million times and just last year Unilever bought them for $1 billion! The blending of a cheap and convenient product with entertaining content helped the company snatch customers away from traditional razor sellers; do you think such an arduous task would have otherwise been possible if not for the power of social media?

Now that you know the perks of viral marketing what are you waiting for? Get in touch with social media marketing agencies such as Shamoor and brainstorm your next big creative ad content and make it go viral!