Viral Marketing is all about giving away your own free
product or service along with your ad copy (contact information,
link, email, etc.). In turn, recipients of your free product
are allowed to pass it along to their own clients, prospects,
visitors and others as a freebie. This is a quick way to
multiple your marketing at no extra expense and without
extra effort on your part.
Here are some popular viral marketing techniques to follow:
1. Ebooks – Share your no cost ebook with your website
visitors. Include a nice full-color ad for your most popular
product line with links to your website and email. Tell
recipients to share copies of the ebook with their own site
visitors and other contacts.
2. Software - Share a trial or “lite” version
of your software with your website visitors as a freebie.
Don’t forget to include that ad for your most popular
product line with links to your website and email. And tell
recipients to share copies of the software with their own
site visitors and other contacts. For help creating software,
hire help from online bid sites like Elance.com.
3. Web Host – Offer to host small business web sites
on your server at no charge. In exchange, place your own
banner ad at the top of the site for viral marketing. You
can setup a fold for their site and they can choose their
own domain name and have it redirected to that folder.
4. Templates – Design your own website or other templates,
include your own marketing information on them and give
them away as free downloads or as an electronic package.
Grant permission for recipients to pass them along.
5. Articles – Write articles about your industry.
Include your website and contact information in the byline
and grant permission for others to publish as long as they
keep the byline in tact. Then people can use your contact
on websites, in ezines, newsletters and other places where
once again, viral marketing will speed the spread of information
about your business.
6. Discussion Board - Set up a Discussion Board on your
website with your banner ad attached at the top. And invite
others to link to it and use it for their own sites.
In summary, by using viral marketing strategies, you can
reach out all over the Internet with much less effort. See
which methods work best for you and repeat them as often
as needed.
