Viral Marketing

Viral Marketing With Twitter

Twitter is one of the twenty-first century's most popular forms of new media. Everyone from politicians to movie stars have made Twitter a critical part of their marketing strategies. Here's how to make viral marketing with Twitter part of your company's strategy for success.

Unless you've been living in a cave for the past few years, you already know that Twitter is more than a passing technological fad.

It's a bona fide phenomenon that is transforming the way businesses, individuals and even government agencies market themselves to the public.

As a small business owner, you should be particularly interested in Twitter's viral marketing potential. Under the right set of conditions, it's possible to use your Twitter platform to create conditions that are ripe for viral messaging. If successful, your message will run like wildfire through Twitter and eventually spread to other marketing mediums.

But viral marketing with Twitter doesn't happen by chance. Although you can't entirely control the outcome of your efforts, a coordinated, Twitter-based marketing initiative increases the likelihood that your message will go viral. Here's how to make the most of your company's viral marketing strategy on Twitter.

• Strategize. Viral marketing success can't be controlled. But viral marketing campaigns should always be intentional and strategized. Random tweets lack the staying power to take on viral proportions. Instead, you need a strategy that leverages multi-channel marketing and strong storylines that can be communicated in 140 words or less on Twitter.
• Target market. You can target your Twitter audience by intentionally following people and organizations that have the power to influence others. For viral marketing purposes, any Twitter follower is a good follower. But great followers are ones that will pass your message onto groups of like-minded people - and those relationships begin when you choose to follow the right people with your Twitter account.
• Be interactive. The most annoying Twitter users are businesses or individuals who tweet self-serving information, but never interact with other Twitter users. Twitter interaction means participating in dialogues on Twitter. The more adept you are at it, the easier it is to promote viral messaging concepts.
• Make it interesting. Your tweets should be interesting and attention grabbing. Stale Twitter posts have no viral potential because they aren't worth passing on. Incorporate intriguing messages into your Twitter strategy and direct readers to other online assets that reinforce your viral ideas.
• Promo your Twitter link. Do everything you can to promote your Twitter link. Websites, emails, print ads, TV spots - it's all fair game for inviting consumers to follow your brand on Twitter and interact with your viral Twitter strategy.

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