Viral Marketing

[NaescentAdam]

Hi Guys,

I hope I'm not breaking any rules here by requesting commercial services, but a client of mine has asked to have a book they are doing to be taken viral.

I've not done any viral campaigns myself, and I think he has just heard the word and grasped hold of it without any real meaning to himself, but could anyone offer any companies that would be willing to attempt it or some similar marketing?

Thanks,

Adam

[MarieHaynes]

I dont' have an answer for you as far as commercial companies go, but I wanted to give my input.

I have found that I just can't predict what goes viral and what doesn't.  I have some incredible content on one of my sites that really should have gone viral.  It is good stuff that hours and hours were put into.  Often this kind of stuff will get a few shares and that's it.

And then, occasionally, an article just takes off.  My last one that went super viral was a post that I wrote in about an hour.  I never expected it to accomplish much but somehow it hit a nerve with people and enticed people to share it like crazy on FB.

The moral of the story for me is that you can't "make something go viral".  The exception, perhaps, is if you have good contacts with top people in your niche.  For example, if I created something really really good for SEOs and I got Rand Fishkin to tweet about it, then BOOM, I could have a viral sensation.

Perhaps, instead of "viral marketing", though, what your client really needs is advertising.

[EGOL]

has asked to have a book they are doing to be taken viral

heh....  They think you are a magician. 

I have the same experience as Marie.    I create content that I think should explode on the web and submit it to slashdot and not much happens.  Then, two years later one of my visitors submits same content to reddit and it spreads across the web, bringing me 100,000 visits to that page in 48 hours.

I have several pieces of content that have done really well but for each of those I have several that I thought would do the same thing but did not... and an awful lot more that are "best-on-the-web"  for their topic area but have not gone viral.

The topic isn't right to go viral, or the time isn't right, or the right person isn't pointing to it.  These things are really important.

Tell your client to get the Pope to say that he is reading their book... or have Justin Bieber be seen carrying it around for a week or two.  Things like that have more influence than you on the success of their book.  If they have written a sleepy little pamphlet about something that nobody gives a hoot about then it will be easier to make pigs fly than to get their book going viral.

[anthonydnelson]

Some good responses so far. In short: Content wins, can't predict virality.

If you have the content part down (great book that people actually want), you may find this blog post useful.

http://unbounce.com/social-media/how-i-created-a-viral-ebook-landing-page-for-8-using-themeforest-paywithatweet-kissinsights-and-unbounce/

[NaescentAdam]

Arrggh I'm so sorry for such a late response guys. I'm in the Bahamas and my internet went down. Lightning and a truck hitting a pole not a good combination.

Thanks so much for the replies. I think I will print them off and give them to him

He's a nice guy but he's latched on to this word and I think he thinks if you use the internet you are a magician...

I think I'm going to have a proper conversation with him and find out better what he wants without using the word viral.

Would you recommend a marketing agency?

Thanks again,

Adam

[EGOL]

If this book is something that is intended to be sold the thing that will make it go viral is its quality.  Honestly, how many books that are sold have you seen going viral on the web?

If this book is something that is intended for free distribution then I would make it into a website and that will get it out to everybody everywhere with minimal cost. Give it away in html, pdf, kindle, txt and a dozen other formats.   And, if it is worth the time to read it will go viral with zero work from you.

But, don't hold your breath unless the client is the Pope or the Dalai Lama or Desmond Tutu.

[NaescentAdam]

Its a book based on a high profile situation in Iraq, so I think it could but I'm not a judge of writing quality so I have no idea.

Those ideas are food for thought though, I wonder if I do something with free chapters on the most interesting parts and see how if that works. Seed it in various locations and see what happens..

But you're right, I think I need to go get the Pope to be the official sponsor, know any cheap deals to Italy??