Everyone knows all about viral marketing, right? That one video that everyone seems to pass around constantly, the marketing campaign that has countless shares on social media, commercials that everyone seems to quote constantly..
Surely, as a culture, we’re gonna stop falling for stuff like this sometime, right?
I’d argue that we already have. A few years ago it was totally possible to get viewers just by word of mouth– and somewhat, that’s still true. People share links all the time, sending articles and videos all the time.
But to truly score “internet gold” and have your viral marketing campaign take off, that only happens once in a blue moon. Every year, the one-upmanship of Super Bowl commercials gets more and more unbearable. Every single company is trying to make a commercial more memorable than the last, and honestly, they’ve gotten less memorable, if possible. The Super Bowl is the mecca of marketing, and yet every year, people make lists of the best and promptly forget about them. Every year the production values and budgets go up, and they still fall flat.
So why even try?
The guerilla marketing strategy is well-liked by young people because they don’t feel like they’re being marketed to, per se. They know you’re selling a product, but that seems to take a backseat to the enjoyment that they’re getting out of your advertising. If you can trick people into sharing your videos, you barely have to spend the money advertising them. If you can do it well, do it, but maybe fall back on more tried-and-true marketing techniques, because you could end up with an un-funny mess.
Like Delta, trying to cram every single Internet meme into one video:
……Yeah, I think we’re all embarrassed by that one. It got publicity, but I think it just left a sour, surreal taste in everyone’s mouths, rather than encouraging them to patronize Delta.
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