A viral marketing campaign is one that is so good that it is self-replicating, travelling around the world by being duplicated and spread by the people who receive it.

Viral marketing itself isn't unique to the internet, some traditional marketing campaigns are designed to be copied and repeated - catchy campaigns such as the "Budweiser" - 'whazzup' campaign of a few years ago worked as much because of their viral nature, the catchphrase being repeated by people, and various take-offs of it on TV comedy shows, etc.

But the true power of Viral Marketing became apparent when the internet became popular in the 1990s. A single email forwared by one person could make its way around the world, be seen by hundreds of thousands of people.

A successful Viral marketing is the holy grail of internet marketing campaigners - such campaigns can be extremely cheap to operate and can bring in enormous results.

However, most Viral Marketing campaigns fail for one of two reasons:

1. Your viral marketing idea isn't as popular as you'd like to imagine it is
2. The type of people who would naturally read and forward the kind of message you are sending aren't the people who you actually need as your customers.

The second is the critical one - you can come up with great viral marketing ideas, but unless they're actually aimed directly at your target audience, then there's little hope of it working. And you have to have the right goals in mind. There is little point having a viral marketing campaign aimed solely at senor IT managers - most senior IT managers wouldn't forward emails they receive however funny or interesting they thought they were - and if they did, they may not know any other relevent people to forward it to.

Viral Marketing campaigns can work, but they need to be very carefully managed and executed. We can help you come up with ideas, and use our expertise and technology to help you prepare such a campaign and actually give you meaningful statistics as to its effectiveness.