Memes and Viral Marketing

Internet marketing is a very complex undertaking. With the sheer size of the Internet, there is really a wide range of methods that marketers can use in order to promote a product or a service and to create buzz for it. Among these methods is something called the Internet meme, one form of viral marketing.

What is a Meme? The term ‘internet meme’ derives its origin from memes, which are collections of ideas and cultural phenomena spread through written, oral or other forms of media. Internet memes, in essence, follows the original concept. However, the ones on the Internet are more like trends and fads and nothing quite so permanent as a culture or an idea.

Still, Internet marketers see Internet memes as useful marketing tools. Take a couple of films, for example, that rode on huge online viral marketing campaigns that involved memes and viral marketing to assure box office success. The Blair Witch Project, a 1999 horror film, and Snakes on a Plane, a 2006 horror feature film, both relied extensively on viral video and word of mouth marketing.

As a testament to the incredible buzz generated on the Web, one reviewer from the UK even called Snakes on a Plane “perhaps the most internet-hyped film of all time.” Snakes even had a lot of memes associated with it prior (and even after) its eventual theatrical release.

Of course, there are many memes that apparently seem to be borne out of people having too much free time. You’ve got your 4chan memes as prime examples of this. Still, that’s not to say that they don’t have exploitability in terms of marketing purposes.

Creating and capitalizing on memes depend heavily on a thorough knowledge of crowd psychology and awareness of the netizen group dynamic. Memes allow extremely fast proliferation of content, especially if you can drive it enough to become a hot trend.

The Internet is really the prime prospect for many marketers because of its immense potential to generate publicity. The only problem is that there are so many avenues, so many things that internet users do and see in on the web, that it seems so hard to pinpoint which one would be the most effective to focus on.

When it comes to rapidly spreading the news about a product, memes are the way to go. It will be a difficult task and requires a lot of hard work, research, and perseverance. But if you get it right, surely the buzz will be enough to guarantee a big payoff. This is why companies will continue to make campaigns that are aimed toward capitalizing on memes and viral marketing.

Become an Internet Star

The Internet and Stardom; The Redefinition

By now, it is obvious we regard many artists as class acts, even though they were of a different generation. We upload the hits of the Beatles and the Police into our IPods. Michael Jackson was remembered in a moving tribute that is sold as a CD or on DVD. Real or pirated, the great musical talents from our parent’s generation are available on any street corner bazaar or even a CD bar. But as we are the most well-connected generation, we have an extra advantage. What are they? Youtube, Newgrounds, MegaVideo and Veoh; sites where anyone with a digital camera and access to the internet can upload music or videos to share with the whole world. The general aim; to strut their stuff and let the world know it!

We are a generation connected by the world-wide web. And as people of many ages and nationalities are wont to do, we like to show off to our friends, families, even complete strangers. The recent boom of talent show on TV like American Idol and America’s Got Talent are evidence of that. But because of the heavy completion and strict judging processes, not everyone can get their shot at the limelight (or the multimillion music contract and makeovers from well-paid make-up artists and dressers and trainers to keep bodies nicely toned and fit).

People are also persistent, time and time again that has been proven. With the same drive that shot Neil Armstrong to the moon and split the atom, people take their video cameras and do just about anything to get attention. There are comedians, amateur documentary crews, film makers and, surprise surprise, musicians. Justin Beiber stands out as an example for the moment, whether he is talented or a flash in the pan debated very furiously (but not rationally, given the internet’s gift of anonymity has given some people unwarranted arrogance and aggression) in forums and chat rooms. Even the established stars acknowledge the power of the internet with a resurgent Neil Patrick Harris in a starring role in Joss Whedon’s Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog.

Then, there are the less-savory characters with internet access. Amateur pornography is very much available for viewing. It stands to reason that the participants are aware that they’re taping themselves or have no idea that the video meant for private viewing has been uploaded onto any number of video-viewing sites. There are those that have vicious and hateful rants of any topic under the sun that are there just for the sake of being there. There are those that record themselves engaging g any manner of stupid activities, like immature pranks that could seriously hurt the participants. There are even those who post videos or blogs just to let the world know that they exist and, by reason of apparent talent and wit, must be worshipped and paid attention to. And those are only the penguins at the tip of the iceberg.

The road to stardom has come a long way from agents waiting in the wings of talent shows and gigs. With the resource pool of the almost the whole world at their disposal, agents need not do much than log into Youtube and stumble upon the next big thing in music or skateboarding. But the question to ask is; how long will those stars shine?

Mobile Internet Marketing

With mobile internet quickly becoming the norm nowadays, it is but natural for internet marketers to follow suit and develop internet marketing strategies that target mobile internet users. Actually, mobile internet marketing is one of the newest trends at present and it is yielding pretty good results in terms of conversion. This is one bandwagon that it wouldn’t hurt any business to jump in to.

The first question is why join the bandwagon? Because it’s still a fairly new market. As we all know, it is the pioneers that more often than not strikes it big. If you look at the success of Iphone and Google phone in mobile applications, you know that there’s a large market out there. And when you consider the advances in technology, it is not far off when every mobile phone user would use their phones to access the internet in a regular basis.

But back at present. There are several successful campaigns that show the rewards to be reaped in doing mobile internet marketing. For example, Subway’s campaign in giving out coupons via messages to mobile phone showed a good conversion. Another case is in Japan, where about 25% of mobile owners make their purchase decisions from ads and messages sent through their mobile internet connection. These cases make it worthwhile to look at the mobile market and develop a strategy that market these users.

The trend is certainly catching up. Now you can see mobile apps for your favorite social media like Facebook or Multiply. Though the trend may be more prevalent with social media sites, this is still a good venue for you to launch your social media marketing. Even if you don’t get conversions outright, you can still benefit by building familiarity with your site and your reach in mobile internet.

How do you start? You can look at your existing data from your analytics tool. You can look through the data to check how many users are visiting your site via mobile browsers. If you have a considerable amount of visitors, you can start e-mailing or sending out coupons to these potential customers and see their reaction. Another thing that you can explore is creating a mobile site of your own so that people would have easier access your products. It would all begin from there.

Of course, one can still be skeptical about trends since some of them come and go. But in the case of mobile internet, it’s like the internet all over again. With the advances in mobile technology and how companies are developing this new media as an alternative to the personal computer, it’s not far-fetched to imagine that internet access would be standard with all mobile phones. That day is approaching soon. As such, it would be smart to invest on mobile internet marketing and find ways to reach that market for your product or business. Though there may be risks involved, the rewards to be gained outweigh those risks in terms being among the early prospectors in the area.

The Role of Word of Mouth in Internet Marketing

Word of mouth is one of the most effective techniques used when it comes to Internet Marketing. Because there are now many avenues in which consumers can interact with one another, a properly-planned word of mouth campaign can spread like wildfire, delivering the traffic a web site needs to get the face of its product out on the market and drive sales.

In essence, word of mouth is accomplished by creating content or making a product that is worthy of positive praise and that users or viewers will be more than happy to pass on to their friends and peers. Of course, with internet marketing, there is less “mouth” used. Instead, word of mouth materializes through social media status messages, blog posts, reviews, and other forms of widely accessible user-generated content.

One big part of word of mouth marketing is social media. With the popularity of social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter, many businesses have utilized them to boost their marketing efforts. Social media also provides companies and organizations with an excellent (not to mention low-cost) opportunity to interact directly with their clients.

Viral marketing in general works on this principle, as does buzz marketing. The latter aims to directly infuse interactions with the buzz that will help drive a product’s sales. The aim of buzz marketing, after all, is to avoid the usually automated or scripted marketing pitches and inject more creativity and uniqueness (not to mention spontaneity) into the experience of each unique user or customer.

When you think about it, doing marketing by way of word of mouth isn’t even all that difficult. As long as one has an excellent product or really interesting content, then the spreading of the news will take care of itself. This is why positioning and proper identification of the target audience is important, to ensure the success of the internet marketing campaign.

In a way, one can say that word of mouth is easy because it practically takes care of the marketing. There would be no need to spin the product or market the service after the initial effort, as people will be doing the spinning for you. Then again, this puts much more pressure to make sure that the product or service really will elicit positive or favorable reactions.

Internet marketing is a burgeoning industry, tapping the practically limitless potential of the World Wide Web to market products and services straight to the screens of consumers. In this effort, word of mouth indeed plays a big role—albeit one that transcends its traditional definition. This is where people really play the biggest part of marketing, and that is also the main reason why it is so effective.