| When we speak about viral marketing, we are | | | | more time marketing thegreeting cards as the |
| not talking about the newestdisease. We are not | | | | rest of your site, since these tend to |
| talking about a Mad Cow Disease variant or | | | | createvisitors exponentially, while your site is |
| somethingthat you need to be vaccinated for. In | | | | linear. |
| fact, we are not referring to adisease at all. | | | | How do you put greeting cards on your site? |
| What we are talking about is literally the most | | | | First, pick a theme or two. |
| powerful trafficgeneration technique available on | | | | If your site is about model railroads, for example, |
| the internet. Viral marketing is sopowerful that it | | | | you might get somephotos of trains and train |
| makes the search engines look small and | | | | sets; you could include vacation photos, cuteanimal |
| insignificant incomparison. Even link exchanges, as | | | | pictures, scanned drawings or anything else that |
| powerful as they can be, wilt intooblivion in | | | | you feel wouldmake a good card. Just remember |
| comparison. | | | | to honor copyrights - make sure you havethe |
| What you do with viral marketing is create | | | | right to make copies of the materials before you |
| something, anything, thatvisitors will want to give | | | | use them. |
| to other people. This thing, whatever it is,contains | | | | Once you have a theme or two, you need to find |
| a link and perhaps a short advertisement for your | | | | a greeting card service. |
| website, ezineor ebook. So far so good, this is | | | | I've experimented with a few options. I've tried |
| just good marketing. The viral partcomes in | | | | hosting it entirely onmy own site, and what I've |
| because the people who receive these items | | | | found is it is difficult to maintain. I'vealso tried it |
| want to give them toother people, who in turn | | | | completely hosted on another site and found it is |
| want to give them away also. | | | | toorestrictive. |
| So you see? What you get is an explosion of | | | | The service that I settled upon is called |
| marketing for a very smallprice. It's actually kind | | | | CyberGreeting Network - This company, in my |
| of like an avalanche, in that you throw asnowball | | | | opinion, provides the bestof both worlds (local and |
| down a slope and it just grows and grows until | | | | remotely hosted). |
| the wholemountain of ice and snow is tumbling | | | | The pages, images and sound files are stored on |
| down. | | | | your own web site. Youcan tailor these all that |
| One very cool viral marketing technique that any | | | | you want so they blend with your pagesperfectly. |
| web site can takeadvantage of is greeting cards. | | | | This is the perfect freedom, and as long as you |
| I'm sure you've run across these all overthe web. | | | | set up theform properly all will work fine. |
| You select a graphic (a drawing, photo or other | | | | How do you do this? You download a template |
| image), perhapsa sound file and add some text. | | | | file (as explained in theirinstructions) and modify it |
| This is sent to one or more people viaemail. | | | | to suite your needs. This may require alittle effort |
| These people open the email and click on a link to | | | | on your part (as well as some skill with HTML) but |
| view theircard. They, of course, have the option | | | | the endresult will be worth it. |
| from here to visit your web siteand perhaps send | | | | The remote part of the product (which is free, |
| additional cards to other people (or back to | | | | by the way) is the piecethat actually formats and |
| thesender). | | | | sends the card. You see, on your page you |
| If your cards are good enough, you can find this | | | | getthe visitor to supply the answers to a series |
| technique alone willgenerate an incredible amount | | | | of questions in a form. |
| of traffic. Of course, you have the sameproblem | | | | The form data is submitted to a CGI routine |
| with greeting cards that you have with your web | | | | which puts everythingtogether into a greeting |
| site - you haveto get people to it to begin with. | | | | card. Your visitor simply answers the questionsand |
| Once you do that, however, you willfind that it | | | | presses submit. You pass all of this to the routine, |
| becomes more or less self maintaining. The more | | | | which then sendsthe card to the destination. |
| traffic youget the more you generate. Just make | | | | I was able to get half a dozen pages of greeting |
| sure that all of your greeting cardpages are listed | | | | cards working perfectlyin an afternoon. These |
| in the search engines, well displayed on your page | | | | remain on my site, and serve me well by creating |
| (andperhaps all of your pages) and advertised | | | | asteady, growing stream of traffic. I think you |
| elsewhere as much as practical. | | | | would do well to take alook and determine if this |
| In fact, it's a good idea to spend as much or | | | | will work for your site as well. |