Viral Marketing refers to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce exponential increases in brand awareness. Viral marketing describes any strategy that encourages individuals to pass on a marketing message to others, creating the potential for exponential growth in the message's exposure and influence. It can harness the network effect of the Internet and can be very useful in reaching a large number of people rapidly.

Off the Internet, viral marketing has been referred to as "word-of-mouth," "creating a buzz," "leveraging the media," "network marketing." But on the Internet, for better or worse, it's called "viral marketing."

Sometimes Viral marketing refers to Internet-based stealth marketing campaigns, including the use of blogs, seemingly amateur web sites, and other forms of astro turfing, designed to generate word of mouth advertising for a new product. The goal of viral marketing is to generate media coverage via "offbeat" stories worth many times more than the campaigning company's advertising budget.

The term "viral advertising" refers to the idea that people will pass on and share interesting and entertaining content; this is often sponsored by a brand, which is looking to build awareness of a product or service. These viral commercials often take the form of funny video clips, or interactive Flash games, images, and even text.

The concept of viral marketing is popular because of the ease of executing the marketing campaign, relative low-cost (compared to direct mail), direct targeting, and the high and rapid response rate. The ability to attract a large number of interested people   is the primary value of Viral Marketing.

Acquiring and retaining a large customer base is the hardest task for any organization. Through the use of the internet and the effects of e-mail advertising, the business-to-consumer (B2C) efforts have a greater impact than many other tools of marketing. Avoiding the annoyance of spam mail, Viral Marketing encourages users of a specific product or service to tell a friend which would be a positive word-of-mouth recommendation. One of the most successful perspectives found to achieve this customer base is the integrated marketing communication (IMC) perspective.

The types of viral marketing consist of:

Pass-along
It can be categorized as a message which encourages the end user to sends it to the other user. One form of this is refer a friend feature where a message at the bottom of the e-mail prompts the reader to forward the link.

Viral Marketing Strategy Undercover
It's a form of viral message presented as a cool or unusual page, activity, or piece of news, without obvious incitements to link or pass along. In Undercover Marketing, it is not immediately apparent that anything is being marketed

Incentive viral:
A reward is offered for either passing a message along or providing someone else's address. This can dramatically increase referrals. However, this is most effective when the offer requires another person to take action.

User-managed database:
The online service provider provides a database to the users so they can easily create and manage their own lists of contacts. The user can also invite other members to participate in their community and from there they can also create a viral self-propagating chain of contacts that naturally grows and encourages others to sign up as well.

Elements of a Viral Marketing Strategy

EDG’s viral marketing strategy focuses on building your brand image while creating a 'controlled' list of qualified prospects with whom your company can communicate.

Gives away products or services

"Free" is the most powerful word in a marketer's vocabulary. Most viral marketing programs give away valuable products or services to attract attention.

Scales easily from small to very large

To spread like wildfire the transmission method must be rapidly scalable from small to very large.

Explore common motivations and behaviours

Clever viral marketing plans take advantage of common human motivations.

Utilizes existing communication networks

Social scientists tell us that each person has a network of 8 to 12 people in their close network of friends, family, and associates. A person's broader network may consist of scores, hundreds, or thousands of people, depending upon her position in society.

Takes advantage of others' resources

The most creative viral marketing plans use others' resources to get the word out. Affiliate programs, for example, place text or graphic links on others' websites.

EDG puts the correct 'viral marketing' strategy into place for our clients, targeting various individuals that are guaranteed to pass on your marketing message and brand to others. As your message spreads like a virus, rapidly multiplying, it will grow in exposure and influence.