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Social media marketing

Social media marketing

, covered in the ‘Focus on’ section earlier in this chapter, can often be 

assisted through 

viral marketing

 approaches which harness the network effect of the Internet 

and can be effective in reaching a large number of people rapidly in the same way as a natural 

virus or a computer virus. It is effectively an online form of word-of-mouth communications. 

Smith and Chaffey (2005) say ideally viral marketing is a clever idea, a game, a shocking idea, 

or a highly informative idea which makes compulsive viewing. It can be a video clip, TV ad, 

cartoon, funny picture, poem, song, political message, or news item. It is so amazing, it makes 

people want to pass it on. This is a challenge for commercial companies since, to be successful, 

it will need to challenge convention and this may not fit well with the brand.

To make a viral campaign effective, Justin Kirby of viral marketing specialists DMC (

www.

dmc.co.uk

) suggests that three things are needed (Kirby, 2003):