Clever Communications - Voluntary Action Media Unit

Viral campaigns
few years ago it was the next big
A thing in marketing. Why? Because
viral = free. The first wave of funny video
clips got sent round by e-mail from person
to person. One would send it to ten friends,
then on to ten more. And so on. And
the total media cost? A big zero. Pretty
compelling. In theory.
Sometimes those things that people
were sending round were ads. To
capitalise, marketers looked at the funny
things that folk were sending and tried to
extract the juice out of them. Let’s make it
funny, racy, something that looks like we
weren’t meant to see it. All the tricks were
tried, and sometimes they even worked.
But then the viral ‘sneezers’ (the unwitting
e-mailers) caught on; and their willingness
to send on marketers’ messages dwindled.
It still happens from time to time, but your
‘thing’ has to be fantastic: better than all
the competing content in cyberspace. A
tall order.
Likewise, the channels for ‘viral’
distribution have changed. Before
it was e-mail, now blogs and social
networks have taken over.
So marketers have started to pay
to ‘seed’ messages in these spaces:
infiltrating conversations and sucking
Iain Tait, Poke
up to bloggers in search of campaign,
product or service coverage. Making viral a
meaningless term.
So why is this relevant to charities? Viral
marketing was great for charities. Your
message had a good cause attached to it
so people were more likely to pass it on.
There was less cynicism around charity
campaigns. And less competition too.
Now, every company is doing a green
or CSR thing, that’s no longer true. It’s
great that everyone’s doing their bit. But
at the same time it’s making it incredibly
difficult to get your message out there in
a crowded marketplace. Being a charity
still counts for something, especially with
your core supporters. So don’t be afraid to
use them as a place to ignite a campaign,
but don’t expect it to spread like wildfire.
You’ve got to make sure the ground is
prepared properly and the wind is blowing
in the right direction too…
Iain Tait is founder of
digital agency Poke
who’ve worked on online
campaigns with Jamie
Oliver’s charity and the
recent Get on Board campaign for WWF.
www.pokelondon.com
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