Viral Marketing - This Is One Bug You Want Your Business to Catch!

Mar 16
18:05

2008

David Eissman

David Eissman

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Any aware business person today understands that the Internet is playing a continuously growing role in marketing their business. There are two questions that this will answer: What does viral marketing mean? How do you catch this virus?

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Any business person who is tuned in realizes that the internet is playing an ever growing role in marketing their business

There are two questions that this will answer: What does viral marketing mean? How do you catch this virus?

First,Viral Marketing - This Is One Bug You Want Your Business to Catch! Articles let's discuss the concept of viral marketing. This is the process of creating a presence on the web in a number of different methods and in a number of different venues designed to create a significant number of places on the web for you to be found. When done consistently and properly you and your brand will spread like a virus.

So,how do you catch this bug? It is the system of constructing an internet presence with many strategies and tactics that dovetail together to create a sizeable amount of publicity. When these strategies are linked together properly potential prospects will begin to find you and resulting in a drive of traffic to your website that can be beyond your wildest dreams.

The Internet is changing the face of business-to-business marketing. Traditional marketing requires the business owner or the salespeople to go out to the marketplace and find prospects. Some of these methods include cold calling, direct mail, networking and client referrals. While these methodologies still work, some better than others in today's world, there is a tremendous opportunity to transform a large part of your marketing to include a retail type component. If you look at your website as your retail store and the web as your advertising market than you can create such an environment. Your web strategies serve as a way to be found by the marketplace and for them to enter your store which in this case is your website. By creating a viral marketing strategy it is analogous to a great traditional advertising campaign that drives flocks of customers into a traditional retail store.

Let's examine some of the strategies and tactics and see how they linked together.

1. Your website- this is the cornerstone of your viral marketing strategy. Once the "store "is entered, you must have a website that communicates a very clear and concise message about your business and who you work with so that prospects can identify whether or not they are in the right "store."

2. A blog- this is becoming a very key component in a viral marketing campaign. The reason it is so powerful is because sites that have continuous content updating will get attention from the search engines. Your blog is a tremendous opportunity to continue to build relationship with your prospect base both on a business and personal level. Remember, prospects buy from those businesses they know, like and trust. Showing some of that personal side is a great way to build on that part of the relationship.

3. Articles- this is one of the strongest and most powerful ways to go viral. The major purpose of articles both online and off-line is to establish you as an expert in your field. If you continuously put out a series of interesting and meaningful information you will be seen as an expert and it will drive traffic to your website.

4. Social networking - this is an opportunity to incorporate many of your tactics into this strategy. You can connect with potential alliances, prospects directly and in many cases you can incorporate your blog post and put up your articles. There are many other tactics depending on the social networking site that will permit one to further establish yourself as an expert. This might include answering questions pertaining to your area of expertise or simply providing general information that is being requested. Depending on the structure of the site there are several other opportunities for strategic marketing.

While these are several of the main strategies and tactics for going viral there are many other avenues that can be traveled. This can all be overwhelming as it is growing every day. My suggestion, is not to try to do all of it at once but to start with one or two and implement them completely. It is better to incorporate fewer strategies but more complete than to do just a little in each. The fact is that the depth and the consistency are the key to success.

If you implement just a couple of the strategies on a consistent basis you will see recognizable results in the increase of your website traffic.