Do you really need viral marketing software? Here’s a look at the five elements of an effective strategy. After you learn these, you may decide that what you need is something else.

Offer something free. What you offer may be information, an e-book, a software program or something else entirely. For example, you might offer a free download of a “basic” software program that you have created. But, in order to get the “premium” version, the customer would have to pay.

Video game providers often use this technique. You can play their games free on the web, but to get certain features, you must buy their “complete” version. People that enjoy the game will often pay the price for the extended version. Viral marketing software cannot tell you what to give away. Only you or a company that offers personalized service can determine that.

The second element is to create a method that allows your free offer to be transferred effortless from a single person to all of their friends. Typically, this is done via e-mail. Surveys show that when a person finds something interesting on the web, they share it with an average of six friends. You can see how the number of people that you can contact grows exponentially, which makes the next element very important.

You must be able to effortless and effectively handle the increased influx of business. Oftentimes, this means that you need an auto-reply generator or other “assistants”. You may need to upgrade your website to handle the traffic or increase your stock, if you are selling an item. If you provide a service, you will need to determine just how many new clients you can handle. Can viral marketing software do that for you? No.

The fourth element is to take advantage of common reactions. For example, a common reaction to a picture of food is hunger. If you sell food, you want photos in your e-mails and on your websites that are “appetizing”. Another example is the “what will it do for me” attitude. People don’t want to know that a car has reinforced side beams. They want to know that the side beams protect their family during an accident. Tell a person what your product will do for them and you will have a customer.

Last, but not least, is to take advantage of existing communication networks. That’s the one thing that viral marketing software might be able to do for you. But, obviously, it cannot provide everything that you need for a successful campaign.

The viral marketing business model was first described by Tim Draper and popularized in 1997 to describe Hotmail’s practice of adding advertising to the outgoing mail of their users. However, viral marketing has been around for as long as people have been selling things. Basically, it is word-of-mouth advertising.

It relies on the average person’s tendency to “tell their friends”. It is really just the terminology that is new. Surveys tell us that the average person has at least six close friends. If they have a good experience with a product or a service provider, they will tell those six people about it.

Those same surveys tell us that when an internet user finds something valuable, informative, funny, interesting or free on the internet, they will share that with 12 of their “online friends”. Thus the internet is the backdrop for the most successful viral marketing business model.

We have also been told by the pros that in order to sell something, you need to give something away. I recently read a free e-book about dieting. It made a lot of sense. It was written by the head of a supplement manufacturing company. He suggested that you share the book with all of your friends. His goal, of course, was to sell supplements.

He could have sold the book. It contained as much information as many of the diet books that line bookstore shelves, but he realized the value of giving something away, in order to get something. Not only do people love free stuff, they have a tendency to “trust” people or companies that give them something with no strings attached, especially when that something has value.

You will see numerous software programs on the web that offer a free version and a “pro” version. This is another example of a viral marketing business model. When one person sees this free software program, they will tell, on average, 12 of their online buddies about it.

Social networking is becoming increasingly popular. People on MySpace and Facebook literally have hundreds of online friends and they “share” things with them on a daily basis. If you can provide something that they want to share, then you may have struck it rich.

There are other elements of a successful viral marketing business model. But, coming up with something free that people can share with others is the most important element.

If you do a web search for free viral marketing, you will see the system at work. Offering something “free” is part of the strategy. None of these companies actually offer free advertising. They may offer free information. But, it will be just enough to make you curious and want to learn more.

Reports, trials, test-runs and leads are some of the things that they offer. Of course, if you want more, you will have to pay. That’s how this sort of advertising campaign works. It is what you want to do with your business, too.

Whatever you are selling or whatever service you provide, you need to identify something that you can give away. Perhaps you are an expert carpenter. You can offer do it yourself advice and either publish on your website, an online magazine or create a newsletter for people that are interested in carpentry. Then find a way to let people know that you offer this information.

The only way to do free viral marketing is to do it yourself. You would need to build a list of e-mail addresses. Join online clubs or social networks. Post on forums. You can buy a long list of e-mail addresses and of course some companies offer a “taste” for free. Again, we know that giving something away often generates customers.

So, the success of a campaign depends on reaching a large number of people and offering a freebie. But, your success depends on the quality of the item or service that you have to offer. A product only reaches virus proportions if people really like it or they think that they have to have it, in order to be “cool”. The cool aspect wears off. Valuable items stick around.

Actually, I’m giving you free viral marketing advice right now. Do some companies charge for this kind of advice? There are actually classes that you have to pay for and what they teach is what I have just told you. Of course, they go into great detail to make you feel that the seminar was valuable. But, there really is not a lot to learn.

Do companies charge to do the marketing for you? Yes. You can do these kinds of advertising campaigns on your own, but they are extremely time-consuming. Your website might not even be ready for the kind of business that an effective campaign can generate. If you read some more about free viral marketing, you’ll see what I mean.

There are several ways that you can make absolutely sure you are able to do well with your business. The Word of Mouth Association or WOMMA exists to help you make sure that you can harness a unique power called word of mouth.

One of the best ways for you to be successful is to make sure that you are using WOMMA to your advantage. This means taking advantage of what word of mouth can do for you.

Word of mouth is very important in marketing. Word of mouth is basically what can get you hired of fired, what can bring you customers, and what can help you achieve the highest rank for reputation.

Word of Mouth Marketing Association helps you to harness things like customer satisfaction and use it to your advantage. The satisfaction of your customers is very important – chances are good that you know that already – but what you might not know is how important it is to treat those customers with the right type of respect and admiration. You want to be sure that when your customers talk about you, they are saying good things about you. The more positive that you can make sure they are, the more you are going to get out of the word of mouth marketing association that comes along with them.

WOMMA also helps take the pressure off of you for your marketing, and shows you how to let your customers do it for you.  In order to take advantage of it, you first need to have the right type of customers. They need to be happy customers, who have had an experience that is excellent from you. The experience should be something that they are proud of, happy with, and excited to have been a part of. It is going to be up to you to provide them with this type of experience, because this is what the marketing system is going to be all about.

Therefore, it is your job to make sure that your customers and clients have the right type of experience that they will enjoy – so that they talk about you. Even though this is your main job – you can use WOMMA to make sure that the job gets done correctly.

When clients and customers are very happy, they are going to be talking about you. This is the part that is going to benefit you – because as they talk about you, they’ll be saying good things about you and telling others that they should try you out. This is one of the best ways that you can be sure to draw in more customers – simply by allowing your current ones to tell others about you. These are the basic principles that WOMMA will focus on for your company.

There are several strategies that you can use for viral video marketing.  If you don’t have an effective strategy, your video will not go “viral”.  No matter how good you think that it is.  Reaching hundreds of thousands of viewers takes time and effort.  Here are just a few tips.

Keep it short.  A 30 second clip is perfect.  People have short attention spans.  If you have a long clip, break it down into parts.  If you use the correct keywords, the other parts will show up in the “related videos” section on YouTube. So, you don’t have to worry about getting your whole story out.  People will see it, if they are interested.

Post all of the parts and any other videos that you have at the same time.  The more videos that you have out there, the more likely you are to get a click-thru to your website, which is of course the ultimate goal of viral video marketing.

Try to avoid making an obvious or outright advertisement.  People won’t share your videos with their friends if it looks like an advertisement, unless it is truly amazing.  Once you get their business, you can use newsletters or other e-mails to bring in their friends.  Right now, your goal is to get viewers.

Once people see a thumbnail of your video, the next step is to get them to push “play”.  You can do that by using a funny or shocking headline, something that spikes their curiosity.

Viral video marketing works best if “you” have a lot of friends.  If you don’t have a Facebook and a My Space account, set one up.  Join groups.  Collect friends.  Whenever you have new videos, you share it with all of them.  Your list can include your real friends, you business acquaintances and your customers. 

Here’s why this is important. There are millions of people that have these kinds of accounts.  Each one of them may have a hundred real friends.  When they find something interesting, funny or cute, they will often share it with their entire list of friends, who then share it with their entire list of friends.  If you can get on to this list, at some point, you can literally reach hundreds of thousands of people in a relatively short time.

This all takes time and effort, that’s why there are companies that will do your viral video marketing for you.  They have made a business out of increasing your business.  Why not make it easy on yourself?