You certainly know by now that the term "viral marketing" is not just another dot-com clich?. Quite the contrary Authentic Alonzo Mourning Jersey , it describes the incredible, unmatched power of the Web to promote your business by marrying email to the traditional concept of "word-of-mouth."
Viral marketing, the concept of making each customer a marketer by encouraging word-of-mouth referrals, is indisputably one of the most effective mediums of ongoing self-promotion a site can employ. It gives Internet companies a cost-efficient, proven tool to increase traffic and lower advertising costs.
Hotmail originally broke through the mold by proving that companies no longer needed to spend millions on flashy advertising to become the best and biggest in the business. With a simple viral marketing campaign they effectively cornered the market with a budget that spent money on original customer acquisition and not over-the-top Super Bowl ads.
However Authentic Jimmy Butler Jersey , instead of just standing by idly and hoping it happens, you can actually "drive" viral marketing by crafting an extremely effective viral marketing program targeted to your audience. This article will provide you with the key steps to create a viral marketing program that will power your business to new heights of success, and do it for a fraction of the cost of other promotional efforts.
-DO EVERYTHING RIGHT FIRST
Your potential customers now have the power to tell colleagues, friends and family about great web site experiences in greater numbers and far faster than we could have imagined just a few years ago. Think of the power of a dense email address book and a few mouse clicks. In fact, that is the "fuel" behind viral marketing. The downside is they can do the same thing regarding bad experiences with the same efficiency and speed. Research has shown that people share bad experiences up to 5 times more often than they tell about good ones. Before you post a site to your server and invite people to visit it Authentic Goran Dragic Jersey , everything should be quality tested and in perfect order. While software makers can sometimes get away with shipping buggy software, you can't issue a "patch" to a site that has already turned off your target audience because in this market, your audience will go somewhere else, fast. And instead of gaining customers "geometrically", you'll be losing them exponentially.
-TWO TOOLS: Buttons and Links
There are two basic tools in your viral marketing arsenal: buttons and links. The idea is that with a single click a visitor can share your site with others Glen Rice Jersey , and those people in turn can do the same. The goal in designing and placing these buttons and links is to make them obvious, easy-to-use, and perhaps even rewarding to use. By making your buttons more obvious, you give the visitor a visual cue to pass your site on to a friend and take an active role in the creation of your own viral marketing campaign. You can take an even more active role and move beyond mere suggestion by actually offering your visitors an incentive to pass something on.
-ELEMENTS OF SUCCESS
The analysis is pretty straightforward. For your buttons andor link to work, you've first got to get it in front of your target audience of potential customers. Second Shaquille O'Neal Jersey , your potential customers have to be able to readily tell what it is that has been artfully put in front of them. It's that old three-click rule - if you can't find what you want on a site in three clicks, you're going to surf elsewhere, and if you can't understand what you're reading immediately, you're going to tune out. Part of what needs to be clear to potential users is what they need to do and exactly how they can do it. If you fail in any of these elements or if you confuse your message with unnecessary complications, you're potential customer is gone Tim Hardaway Jersey , and you've blown your possibly one shot at a few seconds of their attention.
Your referral tool needs to, at the minimum, accomplish seven critical things:
Stand out from the clutter of the page.
Be instantly understood
Embody a clear call to action.
Give clear instructions on how to act.
Be placed effectively.
Offer an incentive.
Make the offer simple, clear and obvious.
-BUTTON VS. LINK
Button: Eye-catching, can be graphical. Link: Line of blue text. Both viabl