Make Money Online – Viral Marketing
Viral marketing is not a new way to make money online, but it is more popular than ever. Basically, viral marketing is a way to gain brand awareness by connecting to an existing social network. Word of mouth advertising is a good example. As word spreads among the members, it isn’t long before all the members find out. But then everyone you come in contact with will also know about the brand. Then everyone they come in contact with, and so on. So, just like the flu virus that spreads through the classroom or office, the mark is transmitted “virally” from person to person.
Viral marketing is an important tool for making money online. So how is it done? Below are some important techniques and considerations when starting such a program.
First, give away something for free. Find something of value for the social network. Free eBooks, free product samples, or free online courses are some good options, as they are inexpensive and easy to administer. The easiest way to offer them is through a subscription screen on a website. In exchange for the visitors email address, offer something of value for free. If there is value, it will spread from person to person.
Of course, the free product is branded to increase brand awareness in the marketplace, but it is more integrated with affiliate links to related products and services. Are you beginning to see how huge it is to make money online with viral marketing?
It is important to make the “virus” easy to transmit. A virus will not attempt to leave its host on its own, it must be transmitted from person to person, and the easier the better. Use emails, website links, videos, podcasts, etc. so that the content is easy to forward. When the content is first discovered and the reader/viewer is excited about it, it should be very simple for them to take that excitement and send the content to everyone they know. Don’t make it too hard, or the excitement will soon wear off.
Another technique is the creation of a forum within the market niche. Allow people to use the forum freely and promote their own websites or interests. Brand the forum, so it becomes a recognized name. Some webmasters will not have their own discussion forums and are eager to find a forum to call home. Give them a place to offer a forum for discussion about your website, and in turn, they will bring in new traffic to be infected by the viral brand.
Of course, submitting articles (like this one) is a powerful form of viral marketing. This is an effective way to make money online. By submitting an article to a directory, like this one, you reach membership. But if each member used this article as content on their site, this article would appear thousands of times on the net. How many more people would that reach, then be replicated, over and over again? This is the viral effect of article marketing.
Look for “brand rights” products. This means that the product (ebook, software, etc.) can be rebranded to reflect the new owner’s name and URL. In this way, it seems to have been created by the new owner all along. While there are plenty of these products online, be sure to diligently search for quality. Subscribe only providers (potential customers) with quality content.
Viral marketing has been around offline forever, just like simple word of mouth. But with the introduction of the internet, it’s now even easier to launch and broadcast a viral marketing piece. In fact, the world wide web is the perfect medium for making money online with viral marketing.