25 July 2009

Viral Marketing With The Social Media Craze

by Davin Ogden


Why Doesn’t Social Media Marketing Work For Most People?

If you have been wondering why no matter how hard you try and grasp this whole concept of Social Marketing you are not alone. Every day we are being told that in this day and age, if we aren’t using the power of social media and creating communities in our marketing efforts, then we might as well curl up in a ball.

“Hey pal, you better get pouting in a corner because you are going to get nowhere fast if your not involved in this!”

“Are you a complete idiot? You need to be using social media to get your message out there!”

We hear these types of statements all the time. Yeah, and if you want your messages to be spreading using a viral means, you’d better put in twice as much thought and effort.


So why is everybody failing miserably at it?

We have huge companies trying to take advantage of the Social Media craze, yet, very few are making even the slightest dent in the landscape of the medium.


Here seems to be the problem :

Communities don’t come together and form around a certain product. Most often this seems to be the big mistake that people trying to build communities don’t understand. It’s a very rare occurence that a community will ever take off and build any sort of following with this type of thinking. Yet, most marketers are attempting to do it this way.

If you think that there is much money to being made by marketers blasting product recommendations back and forth at each other, you are sadly mistaken. It’s no wonder that people aren’t making the profits with social media that they had hoped for. Have you ever wondered why spammers are banned so fast, and are usually on the low end of the money chain when it comes to marketing online?

Marketing with social media has to have a much bigger scope, and a much BIGGER idea behind it, if you are wanting other people to help build your business and sell more of your products. There must be a common goal within a community that delivers and answers the “What’s In It For Me?“.

The real power of making money with social media is by finding that group of people with a common goal and indirectly marketing within this community that you have formed.


Great Examples :

Jack Humphrey - this guy sells a crap load of his products. Why? It’s because Jack has built a whole community about teaching people not only how to market within Social Media circles, but, he also provides the software and tools for them to make it happen as easily as possible.


Charles Heflin
- another great example of a man that delivers the goods. He markets products around his messages within the same like minded thinkers, in which he has built his community as well. Yes, again he teaches people how to market successfully in Social Media circles. He provides the “What’s In It For Me!”, by making their challenges easier in the products and services he creates.

Read a helpful PDF concerning Syndication Revelation.

So could you form a community based around a product like “thimbles”, which may be what your company sells? Probably not directly, no. But, by building a community about the passions of sewing and knitting that thousands of people enjoy, then you might get somewhere. By providing many useful products needed by that community then you are likely to sell a lot of your products!

People need a “reason” to come together and form a community. If this isn’t supplied, success using this “potentially” great viral and social medium will fall short. Try not to form your community around your product. Communities are formed by providing something that we, as human beings, find value in and are passionate about, from a much deeper stand point.

If you understand this, and provide helpful solutions and products relating to the “community need” you are fulfilling, your chances of success are going to be much greater. If your community becomes very popular because of the “benefits” you are providing for it’s “needs”, it will grow and take on a viral marketing effect in due time.

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