Viral marketing: What is it, how it works, and is it still effective? 

I’m sure you’ve heard plenty about Tweets gone viral or viral TikTok videos, but not many people know what viral marketing is or how it works. This article is going to break down the concept of viral marketing and explain what it is, how a viral campaign works and whether or not it’s still an effective method of marketing. So, firstly: 

What is viral marketing? 

Essentially, viral marketing is something that creates interest in a brand, product or service through messages that spread quickly from person to person. Here, the users themselves choose to share the content for a multitude of reasons but mostly because they believe in its message or find it entertaining. 

As mentioned in the intro, social media is the place where this takes place. Recently, funny YouTube and TikTok videos are shared on social media platforms where they can be commented on, edited and reacted to by an even wider audience. If a viral campaign goes well it can do wonders for your brand but since a lot of the control falls into the hands of users, there’s always a risk that the message can be misinterpreted, imitated or otherwise wrongly taken. 

How does viral marketing work? 

There isn’t much that businesses can do to make their content viral other than create the content itself and promote it as much as possible. This is why virality often happens by accident when a user uploads a video, for example, that becomes super popular and starts to become distributed across the entire internet. 

There are two ways that brand videos can be dispersed in hopes of it becoming viral: visible and concealed. Visible is exactly what it says on the tin – the user is aware that the content they’re viewing is branded, whereas concealed means users don’t know it’s brand content until it’s revealed to them. 

Taking advantage of services like Finecast can enable advertisers to discover and reach new audiences through a variety of different ways and is worth considering when looking into viral marketing. 

Is viral marketing still effective? 

Now more than ever before, viral marketing is proving itself to be an extremely effective marketing method. One of the reasons it’s so effective is because it has the potential to reach so many users. No matter the size of the company or business, a viral video can reach an international audience with ease and without the company itself having to invest extra time or money. 

In contrast to other marketing tactics, viral marketing is completely non-invasive. The user decides whether to participate and share content, so the brand is perceived in a more positive light when compared with more traditional advertising types. 

Viral marketing is a powerful tool when it comes to building brand awareness because word of mouth is the oldest and most effective marketing device there is. When users are actively promoting your brand for you, they feel a personal connection with the brand that they want to share. In turn, brand awareness and visibility is greatly increased, highlighting just how effective viral marketing still is. 

And there you have it – everything you need to know about viral marketing, what it is, how it works, and whether it is still effective.