Four Viral Marketing strategies to generate free traffic, and drive new sales to your Web site

• Interesting
  
• Attractive
  
• Funny
  
• Profitable
  

…you can spread yourself across the Internet at lightning fast speed, using a technique known as Viral Marketing, where word of your business rapidly moves from one person to the next.

Launching A Successful Marketing Virus
For Your Business Leads To Explosive Growth!

The best part is, costs and on-going maintenance are minimal. You leverage the rewards of a small amount of effort long into the future. In fact, there are viral campaigns launched over five years ago that are still going strong!

» Click here for an example

Your own personal marketing virus can come in many different forms, from a pass-a-long people share with their friends, to an affiliate program that pays commissions for referrals.

The sweet part about a successful viral campaign is that in most cases, people share your products, services, and Web sites with their friends because they want to, not because they have to.

This Means Your Marketing Virus Is A “Friendly”
Way To Reach New Customers!

This is opposed to other techniques, which are often seen as intrusions, such as email marketing or pop-ups.

Viral marketing allows you to use pre-established relationships to reach new prospects. When a friend tells a friend about a cool new product or service, the sales resistance is minimal because prospects know and trust the person who vouches for you.

For example, let’s say you use a free report as a viral trigger, and get a highly regarded expert in your field to send it to all their users (with an affiliate link to your site, of course). In the report, you encourage all the readers to share it with their friends (and so on, and so on).

When people visit your site after reading the report, they are in a far more trusting state than if they click on a banner ad or search-engine listing. You have in effect been “recommended” by the expert. This is important because the report is much more likely to get read and get spread.

When a product or service solves a serious problem in the
market place, it can take off like wildfire all by itself!

One example is the Firefox browser as an alternative Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. Firefox spread quickly, much to Microsoft’s chagrin, because people were tired of security and SpyWare threats to their computers, and Firefox is far less vulnerable to these problems.

The fact that people generally dislike Microsoft probably didn’t hurt either;)

This led to Firefox skyrocketing in popularity and claiming a huge market share in a short period of time, competing against one of the most aggressive companies in existence.

People couldn’t help but hear about this cool new browser from friends and co-workers that ran fast and didn’t crash. There were articles in the paper, on the Web, and free download links to try it out.

But good product or service alone does not guarantee your virus will succeed. You must detonate it!

There Are 4 Proven Strategies To Detonate A Virus On The Web!

Strategy # 1: Through Email

All it takes is the click of a button for your message to spread across the web in the form of an email. The most well-known email strategy is to add a “tell-a-friend” form to your site. This is where you encourage your customers to refer others to your business through an email form.

But unless you have something extremely valuable (the Paris Hilton video, for example), tell-a-friend forms usually receive only a 1 – 5% participation rate, which is not nearly high enough to be “viral.”

However, if you add an incentive to the offer, and encourage participation, that figure can easily increase to 50% or more. A great example is at:

http://www.thegaryhalbertletter.com/MarkJoyner/hp1.htm

Here’s another offer that builds the “tell-a-friend” form into the registration process itself:

http://www.simpleology.com/

Another place where email can turn into a virus is with a newsletter. You should establish your publication as worthy enough to spread, and even encourage people to do so like we do with our PDF free e-zine articles:

A key point about viral marketing through email is that your goal is to generate targeted traffic and build a list of hot prospects. Don’t just aim to get more exposure, remember to sell by driving the traffic into a specific offer!

Strategy #2 - Viral e-books, e-reports, and other content

Valuable content is one of the most potent viruses you can ignite. In addition to establishing you (or your company) as a credible expert, it also helps build a relationship with prospects prior to a sale. Viral content takes on several different forms.

1. Resale/reprint rights
   When most people think of viral marketing, they think of giving something away that will get passed on. But that’s not always the case. By charging a fee for the reprint or resale rights to an eBook, you pretty much ensure the purchaser is going to send it to their sphere of influence, or sell it to their list, because they have a financial interest in it.
   
   The fewer restrictions that come with the rights (such as the ability to sell it on eBay or give it away as bonus when buying a product), the further and faster it’s going to spread around the web.
   
   Keep in mind, these rights will devalue a paid product in the long-run, so this isn’t the way to go if you want to sell your product for many years to come. Rather, it’s a way to establish yourself as a credible source, and include upsells, links, subscription forms, and premiums in the content itself. An example of a paid virus:
   
   http://www.JingleSongs.com
   
   This was tied into the Christmas holiday (what was on people’s mind at the time of release). Then, they wrote a press release and offered reprint rights to the songs.
   
   
   
2. Free e-books and e-reports
   The key to making viral content spread is putting both a social, as well as a financial incentive for people to use it. This is done with branding and software like:
   
   http://www.ViralPDF.com
   
   Viral PDF allows others to personalize your reports and put in their affiliate links inside. Most list owners would rather give away a copy of a report when they are going to get paid for their effort (and it appears like it was especially made for them).
   
   You can find a number of examples of free viral e-books here:
   
   http://www.free-ebooks.net/
   
   http://www.web-source.net/free_ebooks.htm
   
   Notice there are e-books for many different niches (not only internet marketing). Be sure to submit your own e-books, e-courses, and reports, in these various directories to get others to promote your viral work.
   
   There’s an important consideration when you use free content. Even though what you are giving away is free, you must make sure you’re providing solid value and desirable content. An e-report you can’t even sell, much less give away, isn’t going to spread very far.
   
   But, a book you previously sold for $29 that provides the most up-to-date information on a particular niche is going to spread like crazy. A powerful example of providing a solid product for free is:
   
   http://www.outsourcesecrets.com
   
   This page redirects to a page that gives away the product for free (notice how it looks like you stumbled into a private membership site).
   
   After you opt-in, you’re taken to a “one time” package offer at a special price, and automatically signed up to the affiliate program (so you can continue the infection;)
   
   
   
3. Free viral websites
   There are countless models to use here. One example is at Burger King’s “Subservient chicken” page:
   
   http://www.subservientchicken.com
   
   It’s a person in a chicken suit that does whatever you command (using pre-recorded video). This was a very clever campaign and did spread around the net, getting mentions on news and talk shows.
   
   The problem is… Burger King missed-out on a fortune by not monetizing it! Instead they focused on building brand “awareness”. They could have easily profited from this effort by:
   

• Adding a tell-a-friend form.
  
• Building up their own subscriber list.
  
• Offering a coupon or incentive to actually visit a Burger King.
  

So, here’s the point: It’s fun to be clever, but it’s very cool to turn that buzz into cash sales. Here’s a much better example:

http://www.theinterviewwithgod.com

This inspirational video spread throughout the Internet and generated tens of thousands of targeted subscribers, all of whom were demographically related and could be sold backend products. Another clever viral site is at:

http://www.milliondollarlaunchsimulator.com

This site builds a list by simulating a million dollar product launch. As you sign-up, you also enter your Paypal or Stormpay email address to join their affiliate program for the backend resell rights package, encouraging subscribers to become active affiliates.

Strategy # 3 - Viral software

Viral software is similar to viral content, but with a few small differences. You see, customers are often focused on the software features and usually pay little attention to who developed it. This is different from an article where a credible writer’s thoughts are providing the value.

But viral software also offers many advantages. Instead of reading your e-book or article once and forgetting about it, customers may use the software every day for years. This means you can put ads inside the program interface to refer traffic over a long time. The traffic driven by a heavily utilized viral software application does not die-off easily.

Another advantage of viral software is often it has high-perceived value. Unlike an e-book, you can easily charge $100 for a good piece of software. This makes a huge difference, especially if you are giving it away!

Some examples of successful viral software include:

• http://www.Eudora.com – This is an email application and competitor to Microsoft’s outlook. This tool becomes a vital part of their customers’ lives since they use it everyday. You can either buy it, or use the ad-supported version for free, which gives Eudora an opportunity to deliver targeted ads to the most used application on their desktops.
  
  
• http://www.goodkeywords.com – This is probably the most recommended free keyword tool online, and has received loads of new users and publicity as a result. The main functions are free, but there are upsells and additional offers built into the interface, which provides targeted traffic and revenue to the developers.
  
  
• http://www.musicmatch.com – This is a music player people can use to play and organize their MP3 collection and other audio files on the computer. Of course, it works best with Yahoo’s music download service, which is what they eventually want you to sign up for (at $10/month).
  
  

In other words, create tools and applications your customers want, need, and eventually become addicted to…

• Website designers might want a free HTML editor to give to clients.
  
  
• Writers might want a tool that calculates the complexity of their writing.
  
  
• Investors might want an application that finds profitable stocks.
  

Some great places to upload your software to ignite the virus:
http://www.hotscripts.com
http://www.download.com
http://www.tucows.com

Strategy # 4 – Referral rewards

After customers buy your product or service, they are aware of how valuable it is. They have used it to benefit their lives, and have personal experience with it.

This is why you should give them an incentive to tell others. But we don’t recommend a traditional affiliate program that pays commissions.

You see, if you are in a niche other than “Internet Marketing,” it’s often difficult to get people to promote your site on anything other than a casual, friend-to-friend basis. Many people won’t want the hassle of signing up for an affiliate program just to make one or two sales. (And you don’t really want low volume affiliates either.)

That’s why we suggest you set up an alternative referral system (for customers), in addition to a normal affiliate program (for marketers). You can spur activity and get customers excited enough to participate by:

• Offering special discounts to preferred customers (and the customers they refer).
  
  
• Giving away freebies or gifts just to say thanks and to stay in the forefront of your customer’s mind (T-shirts, mouse pads, etc).
  
  
• Offering your customers gift certificates they can share with others.
  
  
• Holding special contests for your customers to win and encourage them to tell others about you.
  
  

These tactics may be more effective than sending an affiliate check for one or two referrals. Plus, they make a lasting positive impression because you’re delivering much more than customers expect from you.

Additionally, you can also offer the referred friend a bonus, such as a 10% discount on their first purchase. This overcomes people’s reluctance to bother their friends with something promotional, since there’s an incentive for both parties.

Conclusion

Every website you own should use at least one strategy to fuel a marketing virus in it’s niche.

Focus on getting traffic, opt-ins, and sales, and not just buzz. When you do viral marketing right, you’re going to reach more people than you ever could with other marketing methods.

And you’re going to grow your business without long-term effort or extreme advertising costs.


Respectfully Submitted,


Hans Klein