Principles of Marketing

Assignment Paper

Topic: Viral Marketing: a powerful marketing tool

Submitted To: Submitted by:

Prof. Venugopal P. Manas Rai

11BCE0187

Slot - B2

Viral Marketing: a powerful marketing tool

Manas Rai

School of Computer Science & Engineering,

VIT University

manas.rai2011@vit.ac.in

Abstract: Viral Marketing is basically a

promotional tool which companies use to

build brand awareness and to meet other

marketing goals cheaply and rapidly. This

paper is an attempt to describe viral

marketing, the key elements of a viral

marketing strategy and the common viral

marketing strategy being used currently in

the business world. Keywords: Viral

Marketing, Marketing Mix, Marketing

Strategies.

Introduction

Viral Marketing describes a strategy which

stimulate the individuals to transfer a

marketing message to others, creating the

potential for exponential growth of a product.

Viral Marketing the term looks offensive. If

anyone call himself a viral marketer surely

people will take a step back. But we have to

admire this virus. Like viruses only these

techniques make use of rapid multiplication

to explode the message to thousands, to

millions and billions. Viral marketing is

basically a promotional tool which

companies use to spread WOM (word of

mouth) about their products, and to build

brand awareness inexpensively and at a fast

rate resulting in increase of sales.

The Viral Effect

According to a leading research nearly 90%

of customers said they told at least one person

about a website when the original

recommendation came from a friend.

Key Elements of Viral Marketing Strategy

There are six basic elements in viral

marketing strategy. To be more effective the

viral marketing strategies should contain

most of these elements. A powerful viral

marketing strategy:

Grants products or services.

Provides for effortless transfer to

others.

Scales easily from small to very large;

Avails common motivations and

behaviors.

Makes use of existing communication

networks.

Takes advantage of others’ resources.

1. Grants Valuable Products or Services

“Free” is the most attractive word for a

customer and most commonly used by

marketer. Albeit “cheap” or “uncostly”

attracts a lot but “Free” generates a wave of

interest at rapid rate. For example free email

services, free storage, free account etc. is

commonly used by the marketer to attract

eyeballs. Viral marketers exercise delayed

contentment. They may not get profit at

present but if they are able to generate a buzz

from something free, surely they are going to

get good profit in future and may be for rest

of their live.

2. Provides for Effortless Transfer to

Others

Viruses only spread when they can be easily

transmitted. Same way the medium should be

easy to transfer and replicate that carries

marketing message: social networks, email,

website. Viral marketing is more effective on

the Internet as it reaches to a lot of people

with less effort and cost. A marketing

message must be simple so that it can be

transmitted easily without degradation.

3. Scales Easily from Small to Very Large

To be viral, the transmission method must be

rapidly scalable from small to very large.

Prior to campaign launch a marketer should

take into consideration server bandwidth,

space, support staff, stocking and fulfillment

to capitalize the full success of the campaign.

4. Avails Common Motivations and

Behaviors

Crafty viral marketing plans utilizes common

human motivations. Greediness drives

people. So does the hunger to be loved,

understood and popular. People loves to be in

touch, thus leading to formation of millions

of websites and email messages. A marketer

should focus on a marketing strategy that

utilizes common behaviors and motivations

for its transmission to get success.

5. Makes use of Existing Communication

Network

Most people are social. Surveys show that on

an average one person has a network of

minimum 8 to 13 people in his network of

family, friends, and associates and can be

upto thousands depending upon an

individual’ position in the society. For

example a shopkeeper meets hundreds of

customers daily. These networks must be

utilized by the marketer to easily spread

message and create buzz in cheaper way.

6. Take Advantage of Others’ Resources

The best viral marketing plans utilizes others’

resources to transmit the message. For

example people keep their graphic link on

others websites like we can see on cricinfo or

any other website. Thus someone else’s

resource or webpage is circulating your

marketing message resulting their resources

depleting rather than your own.

Viral Marketing Advantages

Allows marketers to effectively and

easily reach to the consumer.

Inexpensive marketing strategy.

Reaches to the masses rapidly.

Viral Marketing Disadvantages

If not done properly viral marketing

can backfire and create negative buzz.

Like positives if something went

wrong negatives also can spread

rapidly.

Threat of spam.

Brand Dilution.

Marketing Mix

Viral Marketing is not a substitute of

conventional marketing strategies. It should

not be considered as a standalone miracle

worker.

Brand Director for Virgin Mobile Mr. James

Kydd described viral marketing as: “viral

marketing is best used not as a one-off

tactical end in itself, but as an integrated

strategic part of the overall marketing mix. It

is a means to an end whereby it not only

generates buzz, but also provides ongoing,

quantifiable brand benefits, such as increased

awareness, peer-to-peer endorsement and

ultimately more sales.”

Common Viral Marketing Strategies:

Viral marketing strategies differ from

campaign to campaign. Most of the

successful campaigns used some common

approaches. These approaches are generally

used in combination to get the best result.

-Free Services or Products

Most of the viral marketing programs

provides free products or services to attract

and generate buzz. Giving low-cost items

free, such as belts or t-shirts often increases

the likelihood of the sale of higher cost items.

-Compelling content

Creating a quality content is mostly

expensive than giving away free products but

it gives better results. To make a campaign

viral the best strategy is to create a

compelling content which may be hilarious

or raunchy or even controversial. This

strategy is utilized by many small companies

to attract eyeballs.

-Financial Incentive

Financial incentives and rewards plays an

important role in viral marketing campaigns.

Marketers can stimulate users to pass on a

message to get rewarded with points, special

offers or may be cash. For example

‘Buyhatke’ gives flipkart money boucher for

every 5 referals.

Case Study – Myntra.com

Myntra.com is an online shopping portal of

fashion and casual lifestyle product.

Myntra.com, established in February 2007 by

Mukesh Bansal and Ashutosh Lawania,

within 5 years became India’s largest online

fashion store. In its success there is a big hand

of viral campaigning done by the company.

Co-founder of Myntra.com, Mr. Ashutosh

Lawania said that “Technology is a game

changer in the crowded e-commerce market”.

Myntra.com has a solid media presence on

social networking sites. It utilized the social

network brilliantly to expand its customer

base as now most of the people are more

active on social networking sites than

socially. In February 2012 it came up with a

very compelling campaign OOH (out of

home) across many cities to promote online

shopping which created a lot of buzz. It offers

free return service and exchange service

within 30 days. Also it offers financial

incentives in form of myntra coupons to its

users for each referral thus promoting its

website smartly and expanding the customer

base.

We can observe that how beautifully

myntra.com utilized the basic viral marketing

strategies for message passing like providing

financial incentives, giving free services and

compelling content as we discussed in the

previous section to achieve great success at

rapid pace.

When Viral Marketing went wrong

Viral Marketing can backfire if not executed

properly and with good planning. In Jan 2012

McDonalds tried on a social media campaign

to boost its emotional appeal to the

customers. It used its own hashtag on Twitter.

They thought that people will share their

good experiences with

McDonalds. But it backfired as thousands of

negative stories were bombarded from the

users thus creating negative publicity for the

brand.

Conclusion

Viral marketing is a reliable marketing

strategy that can give good results in less

efforts and at a rapid rate if executed properly

as we see in the case of myntra.com. But at

the same time if it is not executed properly it

can backfire. So viral marketing is a mixed

blessing as it can spread both positive and

negative words. But keeping in mind the

potential gain of a successful viral campaign,

the marketers should utilize the potential of

viral marketing to achieve their business

goals.

12. References

[1] Wilson, R.F. 2000. The six simple principles of

viral marketing, Web Marketing Today.

[2] Coupey, E. 2001. Marketing and the Internet:

conceptual foundations.

[3] Azeez, W. 2001. Will viral marketing become an

epidemic? New Media Age.

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[6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viral_marketing

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[9] www.slideshare.net/swatiluthra5/myntracom-

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