Copyright © 2008 - 2009 evodesign. all rights reserved.
16
Sep
Ask any PR guru and they will tell you one of the biggest problems with press releases is tracking conversions - in other words attributing a given activity directly to the release.
Historically PR has been regarded as an activity that falls outside the domain of marketing. This flawed approach has only been overcome in the last decade or so, during which time companies have begun to see how PR and traditional marketing activities should work in unison.
internet marketing; the place in which PR and marketing become so intertwined as to be almost inseparable
Perhaps the biggest reason for this merging is the growth of internet marketing; the place in which PR and marketing become so intertwined as to be almost inseparable.
Nevertheless, the infrastructure of the web and the different nature of consumerism online bring unique challenges which must be approached with an unconventional strategy.
Several hundred years ago the world gave birth to the printing press and in so doing, for better or worse also came the newspaper. For a monochrome, 2D, low resolution medium the de facto method of grabbing attention became the headline. It’s no different today. The average news stand has a seemingly infinite number of papers and magazines, each vying for your attention.
Print has always used the headline; ergo the goal of the journalist is to produce eye-catching, clever headlines which, in an instant, turn that casual glance into an insatiable need to find out more…. and hence, make you part with your money.
A computer algorithm can’t unpick the nuance of a metaphorical headline.
The human brain has a limitless capacity to invoke symbols and images, play with metaphor, debate irony, double entendre and the word play. This offers the average journalist an enormous catalogue of potential when crafting those wonderful headlines. On the web things are very different. Very different indeed.
01
Sep
The frequent use of the term viral marketing and/or viral advertising would suggest a relatively new phenomena. In fact the idea has been around and used with success for many years, though it’s true, in the area of Web 2.0 - social networks, video sharing and Flash gaming, viral marketing has seen an explosion.
Viral marketing itself is not tied to any specific medium and at its core refers to the way in which information is spread. The notion that the message is self-replicating, in other words the recipient is filled with a desire to ‘spread the word’ gives rise to the idea of a virus.
Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and Twitter create the perfect conditions for a marketing virus
It just so happens the world of social networking and video sharing using applications such as Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and Twitter create the perfect conditions for a marketing virus.
Unfortunately many organisations fall foul when embarking on a viral marketing quest. They do so because they fixate on the concept of the virus (the vehicle) rather than the content (the payload). In other words, marketers think the following: Facebook is cool. Therefore my message will be cool. Therefore Facebook users will think my company is cool.
If there is one thing users of Facebook are not going to think, it’s that you’re cool for using Facebook
Not true. If there is one thing users of Facebook are not going to think, it’s that you’re cool for using Facebook. In much the same way as someone using a telephone doesn’t think you’re cool if you are using one as well.
To truly go viral you need to ‘not’ think viral and instead take your product, service, company or brand and make it look completely different to anything that’s come before. You need to turn things on their head and present them in such a way that people are genuinely surprised, even for just a few seconds.
Copyright © 2008 - 2009 evodesign. all rights reserved.