The Evolution of Marketing Viral Campaigns

Introduction

"Make it simple. Make it memorable. Make it inviting to look at. Make it fun to read."

Leo Burnett

The quote presented above, explains best what talking to consumers is all about. Either you talk them through a TV commercial, or a Facebook page, or a PR representative, the message transmitted has to be simple, memorable, inviting to test the product and fun so that it will send a message of relaxation.

The concept of marketing is in its nature a very new one which has been continuously evolving along with the changes in the macro-environment. Such changes include the Internet, a technology quite new which has yet to continue growing and evolving. We can state that it was only natural for the Internet to be a marketing tool as well, as the information travels at unimaginable speed with no geographical or political boundaries. The information transmitted this way not only travels faster and undamaged but it also has the potential of lingering in time, unlike the traditional word of mouth. Furthermore, with Facebook and Twitter joining the scene, a company's brand has become exposed to critics and bad reputation.

In this context it has become increasingly harder for companies to promote their product in a way that will make it memorable and inviting. This is one of the reasons why we chose to present a topic that in the last years has become one of the most important strategies for a company to promote its products: Viral Marketing.

Our research analyzes how marketing viral campaigns developed in the last couple of years. This is a secondary research based on the available information found in different sources (mainly books and Internet). At the beginning of the project, we decided to introduce the reader in the notion of viral marketing with some theoretical information. Next, we presented three comparisons between campaigns from Romania with ones from foreign countries, all in different periods of time to show the evolution in time of these campaigns. In the end, we briefly stated some conclusions and forecasts relating to the evolution of this type of marketing.

Chapter I

Brief introduction of viral marketing

Marketing, over the years, has been in a constant evolution and involves not only imagination and creativity, but also keeping up with the latest trends, technologies and means of communication. The latest technologies in communications have permitted the marketers to thrive towards new markets, new customers and the growing internet accessibility has brought a new way of advertising, promoting and selling goods. Viral marketing is the phenomenon which facilitates and encourages people all over the world to share their findings regarding a certain product or service and is often used to increase brand awareness and promote a certain product the same way the word of mouth did for centuries now. The difference is that it now involves social networks and virtual platforms associated with the 21st century. It was influenced by the dynamic and complex technological environment which has continuously been revolutionizing marketing, year after year.

Viral marketing is quite a new concept, being first mentioned as we presently know it in 1996. The term "viral" has been adopted from the medical field, being associated with an epidemic. The premises are that once a certain person has been infected with a message, that person becomes infected with a virus, and once he shares this virus to others, they also become infected, which resembles an epidemiology.

At the beginning, companies who owned a World Wide Web domain used it mostly for advertising, public relations and communication, in a proportion of 81%. The first company ever to use viral marketing was Hotmail, who used to append advertisements in every outgoing e-mail from their users. What is more incredible and relevant to the subject of viral marketing is the fact that their number of users went from 20.000 to 1.000.000 in less than 6 months, so finally after one a half year to hit 12 million subscribers! What is more remarkable about their results is that the money spent for advertising did not even reach half a million dollars.

The number of internet users has registered a continuous growth in the past few years and it will continue on an ascendant path, as authorities all over the world, especially the European Union, have included this objective on their agenda.

The picture on the left shows the percetage in the total population of those who have internet access. We can observe that the most developed countries, such as US, Canada, Australia, some European countries, which are also the most important consumers and market segments, have scored highest on this list. Also, the penetration level in all the countries has registered a significant growth over the last decade, of over 400%. In Romania for example 39% of the total population has internet access and it is therefore an important aspect for marketers to consider.

Although it implies certain costs, such as technical staff and appropriate equipments in order to sustain it, viral marketing has a high rate of efficiency, regarding media coverage. One of its most important advantages is that this type of marketing can be seen by anyone with access on the internet 24 hours per day, from anywhere in the world.

We may find viral marketing presented as video clips, games, flash applications, e-books, software, images and even text messages. But in order for all this to be viewed by the public, there are methods needed to be used to obtain the highest efficiency: customer participation, internet search engines, websites, blogs, social networks, and of course, through the help of radio and television.

The social networks occupy a very important position in viral marketing, as there is a huge number of internet users who visit on a daily basis one of the well know websites. For example, Facebook has more than 800 million active users, and more than half of them browse the network daily, each and every one of these users having an average number of 130 friends. These numbers indicate that advertising through this method would be more efficient than buying a few seconds of a commercial on television, during prime time.

However, the conglomerations of advertisements and commercials which pop up on our browsers day by day are starting to become annoying or disregarding. Therefore, viral marketing also needs a touch of creativity and art in order to make people share it with their friends and acquaintances. Simply because viral marketing is so accessible there has to be a great deal of work put into it, to make the ad really impressive: