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Viral Marketing: On
The Internet You Can Fly
By Peter
Greene, InfoStar.com, pgreene@infostar.com
Well, actually you can’t but your Web site, a brand name,
or your digital product can almost seem to fly at hyperspeed if you have the
right idea. Certain Internet companies products
and services are seemingly acknowledged and accepted at light-speed on the
Internet via customer referrals. Simple
word-of-mouth referral with an online marketing twist and things are off and
running.
Why? The Internet facilitates communications
among its users in many different ways.
Through understanding the different ways we can communicate via the
inter-networking of the Internet environment you can begin to appreciate how
useful Web applications and services spread like wild fire. Follow my examples in the next paragraph to
visual how a cool or neat Web product or service can quickly spread like a
virus!
The Internet is a network
of network of computers. The immediacy
of the media allows communications through a variety of different formats. Word
travels fast by: Internet email (www.hotmail.com), the World Wide Web (www.recommend-it.com) with its
nearly 1 billion Web pages (and exponential growth), file transfer protocol
(ftp) that allows for access to seemingly endless amounts of software
(www.download.com), free services and software (www.callwave.com),
free games and entertainment (www.waycoolgames.com)
newsgroups (www.deja.com), interactive chat (www.icq.com), message boards
(www.coolboard.com), online communities (www.aol.com), Post-it Notes for Web
pages (www.thirdvoice.com), newsletters (www.audettemedia.com), ezines
(www.ezinemoney.net), Web portals (like Yahoo or create your own -
www.everyone.net), Intranets (www.intranets.com), magazines
(www.pathfinder.com), newspapers (www.madison.com), and by being hyped by our
new interactive media (TV and radio shows have their own Web sites and
talk about the Internet all the time).
And, Wink (www.wink.com) is planning to add another dimension to our TV
viewing.
The eWay of spreading the
word by referrals, and how quickly it is accomplished are the underlying
principles and concepts behind what people are calling viral marketing. An excellent online reference about the
viral marketing concept (http://www.drapervc.com/viralmarketing.html)
written by Steve Jurvetson and Tim Draper of the Venture Capital firm, Draper
Fisher Jurvetson, is a must read.
The viral marketing strategy
has produced popular Web applications such as: Netscape (the browser
that really made the Web rock!), HotMail (a free email service), ICQ (probably
in the top 5 of most popular Internet activities), eBay (largest
Internet auction site www.ebay.com), Blue Mountain Arts’ Electronic Greeting
Cards (one of the more fun things to do online - www.bluemountain.com), Amazon
(spread virally through the use of their associates’ marketing program),
NetZero (free Internet access www.netzero.com), Priceline (www.priceline.com),
Third Voice (www.thirdvoice.com), and there are others.
There will be many others to
follow including these next likely candidates: eBoodle (www.eboodle.com),
eBates (www.ebates.com)
and ClickTheButton (www.clickthebutton.com). This message board service
(www.coolboard.com) looks like another affiliate and viral marketing
winner. I think just having an Opinion
Online (www.o-pinion.com) could be quite viral, or having a chance at winning
a $10,000, $1,000,000 or $10,000,000 (www.iwon.com) is catchy too! Maybe my luck will be better at LuckySurf
(www.luckysurf.com). For the
individual, you can enhance your eRevenue opportunities with affiliate and
viral marketing programs such as AllAdvantage (www.alladvantage.com)
which has 4 million users in less than 1 year.
A Web site like DialPad (www.dialpad.com)
can seem to spread virally without much effort and without rewards simply
based on function (calling people for free over the Internet). These new products and services will quickly
re-shape the Web commerce landscape for years to come.
Whichever way you look at
viral marketing, it should be considered (http://www.searchz.com/clickz/102698.shtml)
and discussed as part of your Internet marketing strategy. A general observation as related to
entrepreneurial successes such as McDonald’s, Coca Cola, Holiday Inn in the
bricks and mortar world is the perceived value (usually low cost for high
quality) for the cost of product or service delivered, consistent quality,
ubiquitous presence, and large numbers of satisfied customers will play a big
part of the magical eCommerce success formula and what leads to viral marketing
success. The technology that is in
place for tracking these Internet referrals is what makes the opportunities for
everyone seem limitless, and one of the reasons why you keep hearing that the
Internet is the next gold rush! There
is some similarity between the new age successes that the Internet has created
at light speed, and the greatest entrepreneurs of our last century that took
years to build.
If you’ve been following Web
Tactics since it started, then you’ve come to realize that we left the hype
about being on the Web along time ago.
This column is about new media strategies, online trends and eCommerce
techniques to enhance your Internet marketing efforts and increase your online
sales.
There are many online
resources in addition to the ones I’ve mentioned. To have easy access to them, log on to the Internet, point your
Web browser to WEBHITZ (www.webhitz.com)
and select WebMaster Menus. There are
many Internet Marketing resource links for you to access via the pull down
menus.
Direct your questions to pgreene@infostar.com or to Peter
Greene, InfoStar.com, 7637
Farmington Way, Madison, WI 53717, and
(608) 345-2149.
Peter Greene is the CEO of
InfoStar.com, and teaches classes on E-Commerce
& Web Marketing. Peter is known for
his monthly public radio talkshow on computers & technology.
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