100 Million Unique Visitors

As I’ve talked about before, the success of a viral marketing campaign ultimately comes from the stickiness of the content, and the desire in the ‘host’ to willingly pass it on. Office max had an incredibly successful campaign last year with it’s “elf yourself” videos. The company employed a humor company, JibJab, to create dancing elf videos that anyone could upload their own pictures to, creating a video of dancing videos with their friends, family, or co-worker’s heads. At it’s peak, the website traffic rivaled that of Facebook, and in total was viewed by more than 100 million unique visitors. The company plans to recreate the magic this year, and to expand the features and available videos. Read more here.

The Value of Free Things

Seth Godin, author of Tribes, just wrote this very insightful article pertaining to the publishing industry. He makes a good case for the dynamic nature of ecommmerce, and how the market doesn’t owe anybody anything. Reaping the rewards comes from adapting to the climate, and not the other way around. Read the article.

Secret Marketing

Social networks can be leveraged in a way that was once dubbed ‘secret’ or “undercover’ marketing.  A few years back 60 minutes took a look at few guerilla marketing operations that put undercover marketers in situations where they appeared to be normal people. They were placed on street corners or in Starbucks’, and their task was simple; use a product and invite other people to try it too.  The ‘secret’ aspect was to combat the challenge that marketers face on a daily basis; people are so bombarded by marketing and advertisement that they are desensitized – ‘secret marketing’ allows marketers to reach consumers without them knowing they’re having a product pitched to them.