Newbies’ Guide to Niche Marketing

There are probably ten million people online, looking for downloads at any given time. Of course, a lot of them could be looking for pornography or free software but still, reaching a minimum on a million people on any given day does offer some rather intriguing possibilities.

For example, we’ll talk here about music downloads. But don’t think for a minute that file sharing applies only to music. Refer back to the section on video and audio files as viral tools.

People like using file services to download music for two simple reasons, they’re free, and there is an incredible selection. The fact is Pandora’s Box has been opened. In Napster’s wake, other quasi-legal services quickly emerged… a lot of them. Even if they are closed, others will succeed them.

Major record companies would like to thing otherwise but they are never going to stop file sharing. Net users are file sharers…plain and simple. Long before the Internet came into being, people made cassette tapes of their favorite music for their friends… CD burners are so much easier and faster.

So how can you use this to help your viral marketing campaign along?

Think about this. Once someone downloads your MP3 files and those files are available on that listener’s hard drive, viral marketing begins. After two users start sharing your files, suddenly, your music is on the hard drive of a second computer…then a third…and on and on.

When users are searching and they find your music on a lot of different computers, they are more likely to download the files. It’s just a matter of time before you’ll find your files showing up in more and more places.

In this new paradigm, you aren’t hawking a product, you are offering free music via a medium that lets you be directly connected with your audience.

How to increase the flow of traffic on a website is the recurring dilemma of webmasters. One of the methods that have spawned many success stories in driving traffic into websites is viral marketing.

Viral marketing is simply making use of the tendency of a person to share something they find informative, entertaining of amazing and blogging is one of the ways that viral marketing is facilitated.

These days, everybody is blogging and you can incorporate blogging into your sales marketing and have a lot more success.

It isn’t that hard to do. Just have your customers write diary entries about goals they have reached using your product, the good emotions it’s given them, the fears and worries your product has taken out of their lives, how bad their lives were before they bought it, how it has helped other people in their lives, how much better their lives are since they began using your product, and on and on.

Customers could update their blog daylily, weekly or monthly. It will depend on how often they use your product. If you are teaching them a skill, they can blog their progress.

You must provide your customers with web space for writing their online diary (blog) or have them e-mail you the blog entries for you to publish.

Your customer’s online blogs can be made extra persuasive by including personal profiles, pictures, online video of them using your product, net audio of them talking about your product, and so forth.

An online blog would likely outsell the common testimonial because it is updated on a regular basis and gives more personal information and since a diary (blog) is considered private, it makes people more curious to read it and believe that what is said is true.

Getting recipients of your viral advertising e-mail to forward it to their friends and coworkers isn’t as hard as it sounds. The whole trick is to make them WANT to share it and thereby share your advertisement. Neat! Cool! Free!

Because entertainment has value, interactive content like a quiz or test can inspire forwarding, especially if it’s fun. Personality tests, fitness quizzes, or compatibility questionnaires are all things that I have received and sent at one time or another.

A really cool, multimedia experience is always going to achieve some pass-along action. Rich media email is getting a lot of press of late. Someone is always touting the benefits. It does take more time and a little money but the messages have great appeal. Rich media has the advantage of being new and therefore has the novelty and tech factor. That alone is often enough for the message to be seen as valuable and worth forwarding.

There are vendors like RidicalMail and AdTools that have “Forward to a Friend” capabilities built right into their technology. Right now this works but eventually marketers will still rely on the value of the proposition in their message to be enough to distinguish it from the rest.

So should you try to capitalize on viral marketing? Absolutely!

At the very least, it would be unwise to leave out factors in your e-mail advertising campaign that would inspire forwarding. After all, don’t you want maximum penetration into your target audience?

You need to stretch those advertising dollars so hard you make George cry. You do, however, need to understand that viral marketing is a tactic that works toward achieving your campaign objective.

Oh…one more thing. No matter how brilliant you craft the offer and no matter how great the message, if the customer visits your site and has an experience less than what was promised, it will come back to bite you.

Let’s say that you sell products used in baking. If on your website you offer a free download of an eBook with recipes that call for ingredients you sell, it is possible…even probable that you will sell more of the products that you manufacture. That is the basic concept but there are many ways that eBooks can help get free viral marketing for you.

If the free eBook you give away on your site is good, informative, funny, or contains timely information, the public will pass that information along to their friends and family and thereby, generate a lot more traffic on your site. Just the fact that they found something interesting or useful on your site will make them return again and again.

Each time they return is another opportunity for them to become a customer.

The cost of an eBook is just about zero, which makes it a pretty attractive tool for marketers large and small. The only cost is in time and creativity and the benefits are endless.

Of course, eBooks do not have to be free. They can also be sold. The trick to selling your eBooks is to be certain that they are worth the price you charge for them.

So what is the consumer’s advantage of an eBook?

· eBooks are ideal for those who want information in the quickest possible time.

· eBooks can include video, sound, games, children’s activities and many other interactive multi-media elements.

· eBooks have search engine and electronic navigation technology. No more flipping back and forth through pages to find that elusive paragraph.

· How to… eBooks can included video clips or many different color images to show you exactly how to piece together that Antique Grandfather Clock Kit, without having any bits left over.

More and more advertisers are adopting online video and audio for ad delivery, as broadband availability continues to rise and ad-serving technologies become more sophisticated.

Online multimedia advertising is really taking off. User attention can be captured and ads stand out from the crowd in an increasingly ad-cluttered online environment.

It is true that video and audio formats cost more to serve than standard banners or text ads, and they involve a lot more production and implementation work. But they may well be worth the added expense if they achieve greater response rates.

Where to use online video and audio is what advertisers must carefully consider. Video to be used on the Internet should be information and communication focused while video to be used on television should be focused on entertainment.

Like everything else, there are good ways and bad ways to use video advertising. Right now most marketers are incorporating their audio-visual content into existing embedded ad formats like banners or over-content formats like pop-ups.

Though this could reach a potentially large audience, viewers are likely to be less captivated and more annoyed by these disruptive and distracting placements.

Cached or streaming video and audio on a specific destination site offers the best chance of interesting consumers in brand messages, but it is not likely to reach a large audience unless it generates a viral outcome.

Whatever you come up with, don’t forget to make it easy to open and distribute. File size is important, as is the media format. If your viral video has been created for a particular type of software that not many people use, how will you get people to spread it like wildfire?

Also, if you’ve made a video the impact will be better if you send the clip as an attachment rather than stream it. It’s cheaper and, if you’re not hosting it, it’s more viral, too.

More ideas to create buzz for your Information product:

5. “To register your own (whatever), click here”. You have just received one…now buy one yourself. From Bouquets to “gifts for the fisherman”, “share-me” products give you the opportunity to spread your message inside what you sell. The product becomes the pitchman. Brilliant! You can find marketing services on the Internet that can create a customized e-newsletter package that will spread your business message to target users all through the Internet grapevine. Your customers will continue to love your product because they will tell and sell others.

6. Pay it forward. You can generate more sales pretty easily. “Thanks so much for your business. Share this coupon with a friend and she will receive a complete facial at 20% off. To receive your free gift, please sign below.” That’s business author Jan Norman’s magic. She just helped you land a customer you’ve never met, and rewarded another one to boot. Just little things like “remember to tell your friends” at the bottom of an invoice are simple, easy and free ways to boost sales and start a buzz. On your web site offer something free for new names on your mailing list and your customers will join your sales force.

7. Because she’ll tell two friends and they will tell two friends, and so on and on….Forget the fancy marketing theories. Buzz marketing works because it is heard from a friend who liked it and not from some paid pitchman who will sell anything for a buck. If your customers are happy with your product or service, then devise a way for them to share that joy with their friends. Help your customers to tell each other and your product will sell itself.

8. Overcome their resistance. Problem solving guru, Jordan Ayan, points to persistence as the key ingredient to championing your business idea. Like that winter flu that some people don’t get until May, some customers will need many exposures before they “catch” it.

Buzz marketing is the vehicle that will take your new business to dizzying heights. Here are a few suggestions to help you make that happen.

1. Pursue what’s happening now. James Dean made rebels out of all of us and Madonna caused nice girls to wear a bustierre. So…how did that happen? It happened the same way that Rosie’s Tickle-Me Elmo happened. They started a commotion. A commotion can send the world on a buying spree. You need to get the right person to “sneeze” to spread your viral message. For instance, sell the president of the Realtors Association on your house-painting service or gets the urban kids to make your streetwise electronics cool. Just get your message to the influential people who can start the buzz.

2. Give them something to talk about. It makes people feel smart to know something that others don’t know. “I know where you can get a terrific deal on software” or “My carpet guy can get those stains out”. They know the answer. Give your first customers a great product and you become their brag. In order to get them talking, you must fill a need. Remember the first time you saw a Walkman? What IS that and where can I get one? Now you’ve got them talking.

3. Package your product or service tightly. Your buzz or viral blurb needs to be short, sweet and make the point. “They sell beautiful shoes” or “You’re kids will love this” are the kind of things that don’t get lost on the tip of a tongue. Make it easy to remember. Describe what you do right now until you say it virally right. If you can’t do it, your customers can’t either.

4. It’s like a cold in kindergarten. The best way to spread your message is to “sneeze” it in the right direction. It needs to be aimed at your target customers and in the places where they can be found. Once you get your “sneeze” aimed in the right direction and at your general pool of potential customers, the next thing to do is identify the “Typhoid Mary’s” in the group.

More in next post.

We all know what a computer virus is. It spreads from one computer to another in the blink of an eye. The next thing you know it is everywhere. Now “Buzz” is the virus of marketing … it spreads to other customers and causes an epidemic of sales of your product or service.

By starting a buzz you can turn your new business into the next urban legend….that latest piece of juicy gossip that people can’t live without.

Think of it like this.

Everybody knows certain urban and social legends. They have never been marketed …. nobody spent the first dime to let the world know that there are alligators living in the New York City sewer system …. or that Bigfoot is happy and well in the backwoods of America.

So how is it that we all know stories like that?

Those little bits of information that people share over a cup of coffee.

The outrageous occurrence that someone just saw and can’t wait to describe .

The incredibly cool product that a friend of a friend just bought.

Those are the heart and soul of buzz marketing or viral marketing, depending on what you want to call it.

A better question is …. what if it were your product or service that enjoyed such common knowledge?