Viral campaign’s two marketing lessons

The viral campaign, which really translates to word of mouth, is a “nifty” competition where users can refer people to register their blogs, podcasts and news sites, and in return they stand a chance of winning a prize. This leads to our first lesson.

Lesson #1:

If you need to grow your user base, use pre-existing networks to do the work for you. In return, offer them an incentive. www.afrigator.com is using an Apple Video iPod (which, I’ll tell you, is a really cool prize – from backing up data to entertaining you with video and sound on long flights, it’s a must have!) It doesn’t stop there though.

It has also asked current users and fellow bloggers to blog about the competition and, as another incentive, the first 50 bloggers will receive a limited edition of t-shirt (guys, does it come in black?) Enter lesson #2.

Lesson #2:

If you’re running a competition or launching a new product – as two examples – use influencers in small communities to generate interest within target groups. One powerful way is to tap into the collective power of social media and engage with the blogosphere to create a buzz that complements the competition or leads up to the product launch. Peer reviews really are the future of marketing and PR. It’s a leap forward from yesteryear’s one-way marketing efforts.

Bonus lesson:

Blogs are a very good way of creating an interactive, two-way press centre for product launches. Creating a “Blog Press Room” kills two birds with one stone. First, consumers have access to a repository of the product’s press material, such as press releases, photos, etc. Secondly, consumers can interact with a product spokespeople by commenting on press releases (which are posted as blog entries in a more conversational style).

To compliment this, bloggers too can engage with the “Blog Press Room” to research their own posts about the product launch, plus benefit from extra traffic to their blogs through trackbacks and pingbacks (for legitimate posts, of course). Read more on blogging for business here.

Marketing and PR today is about thinking out the box. Sending a press release to a newspaper isn’t the only answer.