Everyone wants to grow quick, grow fast, grow easy. Everyone wants to become a part of the internet sensation. They way views go up by millions on YouTube, likes go up in thousands on Facebook, retweets rake up lakhs of users, the viral sensation has provided the business owners a way, a means to go out and tell the people that they have arrived. But. The public is harsh. Highly creative, hilarious, adorable or something which tingles the heart only get the top page across websites. And in these testing times, the tough and creative stand out. So we listed out a few factors that might indeed help you instill the viral factor in your start-up:
1) People like to brag
Bragging comes to us naturally. “If you have it, flaunt it.” They’ll like a product, they find it usable, they find it interesting, they tell more people about it. That is how Facebook grew, that is how twitter grew. Make it such that the people do come back to it the second time, then third time. First glance might not help, but a second or third glance will indeed work for you. Constant notification e-mails, online rewards if friends sign up etc.
2)Affect them emotionally
Emotions play a bigger role then we think they do. Imagine walking into a car dealership with a budget of 5 lakhs. But you see a gorgeously designed car with all kinds of technology in it, but priced at 8 lakhs. Now you are in a dilemma.You promised yourself at home that you wouldn’t go above 5 lakhs, but that beauty of a car has affected you so much that most of us will end up buying that. Researches have proved this fact. Impulses play a very big role in business.
3) Practicality of the product
You designed a product. It is brilliant. It is good looking, it has great design, your idea of it is also nice. But, there is no use of the product per se in today’s time. This will hinder your product more than anything else. This is what Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg banked on. The deep desire to connect with people they hadn’t had any contact with, or to search for classmates and be able to interact with them in a more friendly manner. This why it was such a boom, because that’s what the most college goers at that time wanted to do in their spare time. So, build your product that it is highly usable and practical in today’s terms.
4) Friendships matter
This is also one of the major things that can make a product go viral. People want to do what their friends do and be able to discuss the same with them and in turn tell their friends to do the same. I’ll use the Facebook example here also. One person received an invite for Facebook. He found it deeply engaging and interesting, so he sent it to his other friends. But he missed out on one friend by mistake. Now seeing the whole group talk about Facebook, he felt left out and hence asked one of his friends to send him an invite as well, so he could be an active part of the discussion also. Word of mouth publicity is often considered the best of all.
5) Be a story
Nobody wants to be a walking advertisement. They like to relate your product/service to an incident that happened. Such stories, incidents make it even better than a simple advert. For example, the Taxi For Sure campaign in bangalore banks heavily on twitter to book it’s cab rides. This campaign allows people to book a cab just by tweeting or messaging the details to Taxi For Sure. This gives the whole thing a good story and a nice feel to it and “I forgot to book a cab online, but a friend of mine had once suggested that they book via a personal message also. How cool. ISn’t it?”, sounds way more fun than “This service allows you to book your cab even by messaging the details.”
6) Easy Sharing
Make the product or the info the product a easy sharing one. Have accounts across the social media platforms, respond instantly to any queries that pop-up. It is also important to know what kind of platform you could get more traffic from. If your product is visual and artistic, use Instagram, Pinterest etc platform. If your product is more text-based, use blogs, use Facebook etc to bank on users.
7)Make them feel special
Make your users feel special. Give them special discounts, give them something to talk about, about your product, make them stay ahead of the learning curve. People love to talk about stuff that makes them feel good, that makes them feel important above all. Give them some inside information, give them an offer that is specially for them since they have been so loyal etc. Be creative enough to let people do your marketing for you.
What techniques do you use? Share it in the comments.
