Viral Marketing Case: Sina Micro-Blog - Part II

The most outstanding advantage of viral marketing is low cost. Before the launched date of Sina Micro-Blog, Sina had invited 800 hundred people (including some artistes) to use the Micro-Blog. Through the word-of-month from these trial users, the registered blog users dramatically increased. Since Micro-Blog is an online public platform that users can post his/her messages, buzz spreads much more rapidly.



There is, however, one significance drawback of viral marketing. Once the message spreads, it cannot be controlled, especially some negative buzz. Many users feel dissatisfied with Sina as their messages are deleted and their accounts are removed when it thinks the contents include some sensitive political words. The voice of discontent widely spread via online and offline channels and that could not be stopped by Sina. There is no doubt that negative voice will affect people's desire to sign up to become a user.

Reference: http://t.sina.com.cn/, news

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Viral Marketing Case: Sina Micro-Blog - Part I

Sina Micro-Blog is developed and owned by Sina. The web site (http://t.sina.com.cn/) was launched in September 2009. Until now, there are over 75 million registered users. What is the reason causing so many people registered to become a blogger in few months? Because of the successful viral marketing strategy.

Sina Micro-Blog is a fully opened platform that users can post their messages, can read, follow, comment and forward other users' messages even they do not know each other. Therefore, information transmission in the blog is very fast. Also, since there is a verification system for artistes, singers and celebrities in Sina Micro-Blog, they are willing to become a member, willing to leave messages and photos in their blog. Due to these interesting features, the current users of Sina Micro-Blog are willing to invite and recommend their friends to sign up and use.

As the success of Sina Micro-Blog, the traditional broadcast media also reported and even used some information posted from the bloggers as their news headline. Therefore, more people know Sina Micro-Blog and are interested to sign up as a member in China and Hong Kong.

Reference: http://t.sina.com.cn/, hk news, china news

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Viral Marketing Case: "Avatarize Yourself" - Part II

Viral marketing is a useful strategic and tactical tool in any promotional model. It is a speedy method of transmitting message via the web. Basically, the duration of a film showed in cinemas is just about few months. How to make the exposure of the film's messages grow exponentially must be the most important aspect for a movie. In this sense, viral marketing is a useful tool for promoting Avatar.

The film Avatar cooperated with McDonald's to create and promote this online application not only because it can reduce the promoting cost, but also it likely let people be a part of the movie. When the user uploads his/her photo in the web site, it can create his/her sole picture that is different from the others. This individualization leads the users feel interested and then they are willing to send to their friends. Thus, once the viral marketing launched, the viral message does not require any resources input from the originating organization.

This viral marketing campaign not only bring a great box office record for the movie, but also benefits McDonald's for short term revenue and buzz.

Reference: http://www.avatarizeyourself.com

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Viral Marketing Case: "Avatarize Yourself" - Part I

An application Avatarize Yourself, that promoted by McDonald's, suddenly became a hot issue in the internet. Likely everyone wanted to upload a picture in the website avatarizeyourself.com and become a member of "Pandora" nation Navi.

In fact, there is no Chinese version for this application Avatarize Yourself as McDonald's promoted this campaign in Europe only. However, there are many curious Chinese movie fans tried to use this website to turn him/her into an Avatar. They also posted many messages in the forums to share these interesting experiences with others. Besides, some of the users even uploaded his/her photos in the Facebook as his/her own profile pictures.

On 18th of December, Avatar film was on show. At that date, when used Google to search the word "McDonald's", it was automatically linked up with "Avatar". Also, there were 1,600 search results in Chinese in Google and that cannot be found the day before. It can reveal that this campaign was so successful.



Reference: http://www.avatarizeyourself.com/, news

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Definition of Viral Marketing

Viral marketing is also called buzz marketing (or word-of-mouth) and network marketing. It describes any marketing strategy or tactic that encourages individuals to pass on a marketing message to others. Successful execution means the message's exposure grows exponentially - like a virus and hence the word viral.

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 clips a TV ad, a cartoon, a funny picture, a poem, song, political message, or a news item. It should be amazing and with perceived value that can make people want to pass it on. Finally, the originator of the message can benefit from its propagation.

Viral marketing highly depends on the pass-along rate from person to person. If a large percentage of recipients forward a message to a large number of friends, the snowballs can grow very quickly and can create unexpected outcomes in a short period of time.

Reference: Dave Chaffey (2006) Internet Marketing Strategy, Implementation and Practice, 400-401, viral marketing

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