Viral Advertising

Viral Advertising

An odd thing is happening in the advertising world. We are becoming more and more conscious of numbers: balance sheets, profits, merges, staff sizes, compensation, costs, cost per points, efficiencies return on investment. At the same time, while we are preoccupied with measuring all of these things, we are becoming much more sensitive about creating advertising that "touches" people from the inside out. While we are, in fact, still not able to measure whether or not we are really touching people with advertising, we are acting like we can and do. This is turning into a good thing.

Tipping Points

In a recent best seller, the Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell discusses what creates a trend, fosters a fashion or sells a style. He contends that some trends start small, very small. They are started by influencing a very few influential people, who in turn act as willing missionaries to sell to a larger group by using their influence. Sometimes, this is so insidious; we don't even know it is happening. This is never done overtly and it takes a near advertising genius to take advantage of these tactics to sell. That's what makes great campaigns. They are viral in nature and in the way they influence behavior. They are immediately recognized by a few key people, and quietly spread until they reach a point where everything tips over and mass behavior changes.

This is very good news for marketers. We are outwardly and actively trying to measure success or failure and in fact predict it on one hand and on the other, we are inwardly trying to create advertising campaigns that create behavioral epidemics.

The model

Here is a snapshot of the process, the model in English, not math. Writers and art directors create a viral message, a secret, to be told to a few very cool people who will "get it". Media people then have to plan and buy media to carry the message in an infectious way. The method must be cost effective, in keeping with the message and be able to deliver the secret inside the head of the cool people, the missionaries. Of course, those people must be identified very clearly and their feelings and behavior understood, which is another matter entirely. The game is now afoot, because word of mouth must take over to compensate for a minimum media expenditure to help reach out to new people. The infected group however doesn't mind reaching out at all because that is what they do well. Those they in turn affect don't mind at all or even know what's going on because they are being unconventional by conforming to this new pattern of behavior. Think Blair Witch Project.

The contagious behavior, within a demo or psychographic, now spreads, beyond boundaries, creating epidemic sales or at least that is the hope. And walla- we have a stunning success. In mathematical terms, this is like playing six degrees of separation.

Six degrees of separation

Take the number 10 and multiply it by 2 and you get 20. Multiply that product by 2 and you get 40 and so on six times until you arrive at 640 after going through the process six times.

Now try again, with a much smaller initial investment of the number 2, instead of 10. Square the number 2 and you get 4. Square that product and get 16 and so on six times. The final result is over 18 billion. A much smaller initial investment, a different method of multiplying and the result on one hand with traditional multiplication is under 1000. On the other hand, with a less conventional method of squaring, after six degrees of separation, the result is over 18 billion.

While this is a bit unfair and an exaggeration of human behavior, the principle behind the mathematical model holds. As media people surrounded by tools to measure the length, width and depth of every choice, we have an obligation to try to find targets who are credible and influential messengers and media that will infect. Maybe it's always been that way, but these times are making it much more apparent that this is our role.