Viral Explosions!

Proven Techniques to Expand, Explode, or Ignite Your Business or Brand Online

Peggy McColl

• Publisher: Career Press
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9781601631190
• eBook ISBN: 9781601637468
• Topic: Commerce
• Subtopic: Marketing numérique

Internet growth has surpassed all projections and continues to expand every day. Those who are adapting to the online medium will reap the rewards for years to come and have the potential to grow their businesses and build their brands exponentially.

Peggy McColl tells her story of discovering the power of online marketing to break through the clutter, capture a global customer base, and build her business. Using many examples and stories,
Viral Explosions! gives you:

• A specific, proven program that even those who aren't techno-savvy can follow and tailor to their own goals.
• The vital differences and similarities between offline and online marketing that every marketer needs to know to be successful.
• The critical steps needed to build a global customer base, generate additional revenue, and foster customer loyalty...without having to leave the comfort of your home.

Chapter 1

You Can Launch a Viral Explosion !

Are you living from your passion, or are you settling for the life you think you have to lead?

I believe we all have a passion, even if we haven’t discovered it yet. When our work is aligned with our assion, then we’re operating with rocket fuel.

Whatever your passion, you can tap into it to create a product, service, or offering that will benefit others, then launch it into the stratosphere using the Internet. You can create a viral explosion.

Most people have something to promote, even if it’s just a funny video they made that they believe will inspire or amuse others. If you’ve got a product to sell or a service to offer, you’ve probably wished your message could rush through the Internet with all the speed and excitement of the Susan Boyle “Britain’s Got Talent” audition video. We all know the potential to “go viral” and reach millions of people is enormous, but how can you do it? The secret is to create a great product, to make your promotional copy irresistible, to partner with people who can help you reach a mass audience instantly, and to have a plan.

An emotionally engaging video of a singer, or a lion hugging his former human owners, or a man who discovered that fast-food hamburgers take months to spoil, gets passed along like wildfire because:

1. It has strong emotional appeal.

2. It seems fresh and new, like something you’ve never seen before.

3. It asks you to take immediate action (to watch it, to visit a certain Website, and so on).

4. People want to share something of value and interest with other people they know.

These four types of appeal are behind successful Internet marketing for everything from teleseminars to eCourses, books and eBooks, jewelry, astrology readings, Webinars, t-shirts, mentoring services, software applications, and a million other products and services that have a potentially huge audience. Your viral explosion will generate excitement because it’s being recommended person to person, via e-mails, social media, existing social networks, and other online methods. It will contain an offer that speaks to people’s emotions, that feels new or different in some way, and that creates a sense of urgency, encouraging recipients to act now.

Once you know the recipe for designing an irresistible offer and setting off a viral explosion, you can use that formula again and again, combining the elements in different ways so that you can build your brand and business and get your message out there. Although the Internet is always changing and new technologies, applications, software, and services crop up all the time, the techniques offered in this book are timeless. They’re like the staple ingredients in your kitchen that you combine in different ways to create a recipe for success. The ideas in this book are all based on sound, proven marketing principles, which is why I’ll often point out an offline example of how a particular technique has been used effectively.

I truly believe in an approach to Internet marketing that uses the power of spreading a message from person to person, because I’ve seen it work again and again.

Viral explosions are extremely exciting because they can have an impact far beyond what you might have imagined. They can launch you from living paycheck to paycheck to being the master of your own financial destiny. They can take you from unknown to having a highly recognizable brand. Their potential to change your life and business is amazing.

Here are three viral explosions that took off beyond anyone’s expectations, all very different from each other, but all combining the elements of a successful viral explosion. They involved a red paper clip, a whale with a silly name, and an eBook of advice from self-growth experts.

Viral Explosion #1: The Red Paper Clip

Kyle MacDonald made an offer in his blog to trade a red paperclip to someone with an interesting item to swap, and in time, the swaps became quirkier and more valuable. People started swapping expensive items because they saw that there was increasing attention being paid to his stunt, and they wanted to get in on the story and shine the spotlight on their own causes. In one year’s time, Kyle had made enough trades to be able to say he was the proud owner of a house in Saskatchewan!

Does this story make you laugh? The elements of humor and entertainment value were strong in this viral explosion. People told other people about it because they were eager to hear about the next installment. And the project was participatory : You could act now by making your own offer to trade something to Kyle McDonald, or you could pass it along to someone else and amuse and intrigue him or her.

Viral Explosion #2: Mr. Splashy Pants

Greenpeace, the international nonprofit organization, had a plan to put a microchip in a whale and track its movements to draw attention to the illegal whale hunting that was reducing the whale population. To get people excited and involved, they started a poll to name the whale they would track. They figured people would choose a dignified name that fit the seriousness of their cause, but were surprised to see that, thanks in large part to the efforts of some bloggers, people in large numbers were insisting that the whale be dubbed “Mr. Splashy Pants.” The more Greenpeace resisted the name, the faster word spread on the Internet about the possibility of naming the whale “Mr. Splashy Pants.” In the end, so many people voted for this silly name that Greenpeace relented, and to their surprise, the publicity from the campaign put so much pressure on the whale hunters that they actually called off the hunt. Even better, Greenpeace was able to sell t-shirts, mugs, and bumper stickers with a cartoon of a whale and the words “Save Mr. Splashy Pants,” netting them revenue that hadn’t expected.

This campaign, too, had all the elements of a successful viral explosion. It was entertaining, a call to action (vote for naming the whale!), had a fresh and novel angle, and invited people to get their friends to join in on the fun. Although this explosion took off in an unexpected way, it shows you that if you’re open to altering your plans a bit, you might achieve even better results than you’d anticipated.

Viral Explosion #3: 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life

David Riklan of Selfgrowth.com put together a $27 eBook of more than 400 pages called Self-Improvement: The Top 101 Experts Who Help Us Improve Our Lives, which included advice from 101 self-growth experts. Knowing my reputation and success in Internet marketing, he called me up and asked if I could help him sell it. I could immediately see the potential for a viral explosion, so I created a spreadsheet of potential partners and signed up 155 of them. I setup a page attached to David’s Website where anyone who bought the book could go to download several free bonus gifts, then wrote copy for an e-mail that affiliates could send to their e-mail list subscribers. Finally, I wrote the copy for the landing page he was setting up, set a date for our launch, and got ready to watch the explosion.

Between that first campaign and a second one of about the same size, which I launched a month or so later, David was able to sell just under 7,000 copies of his eBook, generating $189,000 in revenue. Given the book’s tremendous success, he decided to self-publish it as a traditional, physical book, and successfully sold that one via Internet marketing as well.

The offer David made was for a limited time only, appealed to people’s strong desire to receive information and advice on living a better life, felt very fresh because no one had collected so much guidance from so many recognized experts before, and was passed along person to person, using e-mail lists. Nowadays, if I were to launch this campaign, I would have him not just partner with list owners who could send out e-mails, but also use all the social media sites that weren’t available to us back them.

The World Wide Web connects you to huge numbers of people, in many cases instantly. If you use the proven techniques and the staples of marketing, combined into a recipe for a viral explosion, you can connect with a mass audience that will embrace your message or product!

Creating a Viral Explosion Around an Information-Based Product

One of the ways you can benefit from the remarkable viral explosion formula is that you can use it to deliver information-based products for low or no cost, spurring on interest in your brand, message, and business. These products can include informational audio, video, and text products, from eBooks to traditional books, to teleseminars and Webinars, to newsletter services and “by subscription only” clubs, to mentoring, coaching, and consulting packages, all of which you’ll learn how to create in this book. These products can be designed, produced, and sold or given away, in most cases, with only a very minimal financial investment. In an age of information, your expertise may have tremendous value! So, even if you are selling physical products, I hope you’ll consider creating a viral explosion around an information-based product as well!

The Viral Explosions! Program

Viral Explosions! isn’t meant to be an encyclopedia of every single tool an Internet marketer can use (although I have plenty of ideas to offer, and have an appendix with extra suggestions for promotion if you’d like to expand your strategy further). The basic elements of the formula, which can be combined in many different ways and expanded upon just like a recipe with many variations, are:

~ Create your brand.

~ Set up a Website.

~ Begin and build an e-mail subscriber list.

~ Sign up for a shopping-cart service.

~ Design and produce a product (such as an information-based eProduct).

~ Write a landing page and put it up on the Internet.

~- Sign up affiliates to help you get the word out.

~ Offer bonus gifts.

~ Pick a launch date.

~ Set yourself up to spread the word using social media and other promotional opportunities.

~ Launch!

What I’m presenting is a basic formula or recipe that has proven to work, uses effective online and offline marketing techniques, and can be adapted by anyone.

Before you set up your schedule for your launch, you’ll need a few things that I’ll help you create or acquire:

~ Your own brand. What differentiates you and your products and services from those that others are selling? If you don’t yet know what you’re going to offer, that’s okay. Start thinking about who you are, what you know, what your skills are, and what value you can offer others. Although big companies create brands all the time, most people don’t realize that they can come up with their own recognizable, signature brand and set themselves apart in the marketplace. You don’t have to give in to negative beliefs about how much competition is out there, or how your products have to be extremely unusual and one-of-a-kind to draw in customers. I’ll help you find what’s special about you and how to express that in a brand and in products and services.

~ Products and services. Technology and highspeed Internet access have created an explosion of possibilities for information-based products you can create by yourself for minimal investments of time and money, including eProducts that can be delivered electronically, such as audio, video, and text files. To give you just one example, a few years ago, the only way to sell a book was to work with a traditional book publisher who was willing to take on your project, or produce it yourself, then stack your self-published book in your dining room or garage, and try to get it into bookstores. Now, you can write an eBook of any length, design a cover, and get your book edited and proofread (or even ghostwritten!), and sell it through shopping cart software on your own Website. In fact, you can also sell it or give it away through eBook sites, other people’s newsletters, and on others’ Websites. Today, if I were creating my first book, I would do it using a print-on-demand service that allows you to upload your electronic file for the book to a Website and have it printed out for each individual buyer, or a few copies at a time. Although the cost per copy of the finished book can be as much as three times the cost per copy of a book that had a minimum print run, the initial investment is far less.

You have many options for creating information-based eProducts to sell or give away, including Webinars, teleseminars, audio downloads, and eCourses. You can reuse your information and sell it again: for instance, you might create an eCourse that you then turn into an eBook and audio product. If you want to sell your mentoring, coaching, or consulting services, you can now reach clients all over the world via the Internet. And if you have a product to sell and ship rather than something that can be downloaded, you still have abundant possibilities for a viral explosion, as you’ll see.

~ Partners or Affiliates. We all need help to reach our goals. Even if you can only think of one or two people who might help you promote your product or service, don’t worry. I’ve learned that creating win-win partnerships with affiliates is far easier than you might expect (and what’s especially great is that the customer wins, too!). I’ll show you whom to approach, how to get others excited about helping you, and how to set up a business model that will cause people to want to participate in creating your viral explosion. I’ll also explain how, when the viral explosion involves a product for sale, everyone gets paid easily and simply using software programs readily available at low cost to you.

Every day it becomes easier to launch a successful viral explosion. A wealth of software programs allow you to accept payment or host a Webinar; new software and applications crop up suddenly, become popular, allow people to make a fortune, and then transform as users’ needs and desires change, offering even more ways for people to make money. Paypal, the online service for instant payment, took off because of eBay, the online auction site where individuals could sell items fr...

Table of contents

• Praise
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Dedication
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 - You Can Launch a Viral Explosion !
• Chapter 2 - Brand Yourself and Your Products and Services
• Chapter 3 - Discover a Need You Can Fill
• Chapter 4 - Information-Based Products You Can sell or Give Away
• Chapter 5 - Passion!
• Chapter 6 - Prosperity Consciousness
• Chapter 7 - Partners
• Chapter 8 - Set Up a Website and Build a Subscriber Base
• Chapter 9 - Create Your Products
• Chapter 10 - Launch Your Viral Explosion!
• Appendix - More Strategies to Promote Your Newsletter, Brand, and Website
• Glossary
• Resources
• About the Author