Viral Marketing Explained

In this article we describe what viral marketing is and how you can use it to promote your website.

The idea of viral marketing is to distribute a free item of such good quality, that it will be duplicated and spread by itself like a virus. On the Internet, there are virtually no restrictions to what such an item can be. Some video clips have been very popular items used in viral marketing campaign. Nike for example has used video clips with great success. You may yourself have come across clips with popular footballers like Ronaldinho showing off their skills wearing Nike gear and you yourself might even have forwarded such clips to your friends.

If you have an online business and wish to promote it, you can consider using viral marketing. It may not be within your reach or appropriate for you to use a video clip, but there are plenty other options. You may for example create some informational product and make it available for free download. Or you could create a piece of software which will appeal to a large audience, a game or any kind of service.

For a successful viral marketing campaign you must consider the following.

The item you produce must be of so high quality and provide some sort of value so users will want to distribute the item to their friends and family. If you produce something which is useless, no one will distribute it and your efforts will be wasted.

Don't make it too obvious that the item is meant to attract visitors to your website, generate sales or increase awareness of your brand. If you create an info product and plaster it with too many references to the product you want to promote with the campaign, users may be put off. Do however remember to put at least one reference to the product you are promoting.

Make the item easy to use and duplicate. If you create an info product in a format requiring some viewer to be downloaded or which is very large in size, some users of the product will not want to duplicate or forward the product to anyone else.

This very article can be considered a viral marketing tool although it was not created for this sole purpose. Articles like the one you are reading now are duplicated and distributed by ezine publishers. One really good article with a topic of interest to a large audience can indeed spread like a virus and increase your online presence and help you make money online.

About the author:
Andrew Nielsen is an internet entrepreneur and is currently helping small companies and individuals make money online. Andrew is the author of the bestselling eBook The Online Business Builder.