August 8, 2010
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July 8, 2010
Here are some ideas for leveraging other social media tools to help promote your videos and increase awareness to them. Assuming the content is unique, original, entertaining, etc, the more people that view it, the greater the chance you have of it potentially “going viral”.
Blogs – reach out to influential bloggers to check out your videos (more effective if you already have established relationships)
Facebook – Leverage your followers and share a video with them (the larger your network, the more impact this will have)
Email – Send the video out to your contacts
Your Friends – Ask them to watch the video and forward it to their friends too. You tell two friends who tell two friends who tell two friends and so on…
Influential Social Media Contacts – if you have these, leverage these – if not, begin to build these. The benefit is real simple, get them to show your video to their large groups of followers, who will in turn show it to their networks of friends, and it potentially keeps repeating.
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July 1, 2010
Terms like viral video, viral marketing, etc., have in many ways become cliché. Everyone talks about them, but no one really explains it. There is no “magic formula” to follow for content to go viral but there are strategic elements that are usually present. Here are just a few of these elements to consider.
Let’s analyze a couple of viral videos to see how these elements are addressed
Video #1 – Lost Generation
Click here to watch
Some have called this one of the most inspirational videos on YouTube while others have criticized it. Regardless of your view, it has clearly went viral and generated millions of views.
Video #2 – The Toshiba Space Chair Project
Click here to watch
Last Video, #3 – Will It Blend? – iPad
Click here to watch
Wrap Up:
Three distinct video types that each went viral but they all shared similar characteristics. However don’t forget, while viral videos have certain common characteristics, it needs a certain level of luck too!
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June 30, 2010
To help you figure out which sites to participate on, here are some suggested things to try and/or think about:
- Ask your customers and prospects – “Where are you online”? This can range from asking them during the checkout process or through the use of comment cards or by sending out a very simple 3-4 questions survey.
- Ask yourself:
“Do I sell directly to a consumer”? If so, Facebook and Twitter could be good places to participate.
“Do I sell to other businesses”? Then LinkedIn, Blogging and SlideShare might be sites to investigate further.
- Determine where your competition already participates. Not sure? Then run a search on them across the various main social media sites. Check out how they interact and assess whether you should be interacting at that particular site too.
- Go into Social Bookmarking – Digg, iMixx, delicious, etc and search key terms as they relate to your target audience. Read some of the articles. See if they offer some clues for where these targets “hang out”. You may end up learning about some new influential sites, like the daily deal coupon sites, which are offering a powerful direct response for certain audience types
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June 22, 2010
Social Media as we like to say is literally a “conversation on steroids”. Now that you understand where your audience is, the next step for you is to engage them.
In “Social Media 101”, by Chris Brogan, he offers his opinions on things to think about in the engagement process. Most importantly, you need to think from their (i.e. your audience’s) perspective:
- What’s in it for me?
- How does this impact me?
- Do I have to do something?
- What’s this going to cost me?
Think long and hard about these simple points. In doing so, you will make it easy for your audience to engage you. If you don’t, it will be just as easy for them to go somewhere else where someone is thinking about these points and addressing them for that particular audience.
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