The Role of Viral Marketing in Purchasing among Female Internet Users essay
The development of the new information technologies, including high speed Internet, and the wide scale penetration of them into all spheres of human activity have changed the nature of marketing. Viral marketing as a new and rather effective marketing technique has already become an essential part of any business. Today viral marketing plays an important role in purchasing among internet users, especially female internet users (Dellarosas, 2007). Word-of-mouth communication is effectively used “to describe any exchange of information between consumers, ranging from casual discussion with friends or neighbors to reference to consumer survey publications” (Kennedy, 1994:373). It is known that women are the major consumers in the market as they enjoy purchasing. According to Patricia Haddleston and Stella Minnahan’s study, “women have tremendous influence over total consumer spending” (Haddleston & Minnahan, 2011:1). Moreover, it is found that currently, women “control $20 trillion in spending, and by 2014, that figure will increase to $28 trillion” (Haddleston & Minnahan, 2011:1). In some cases, they even influence the decision-making process of the male purchasers.
The major goal of this paper is to define the role of viral marketing in purchasing among female internet users and to represent a critical review of the aspect of viral marketing in the content its conceptual application to event marketing.
DEFINITION OF THE TERM VIRAL MARKETING
The term viral marketing was introduced by Steve Jurvetson and Tim Draper in 1997. The definition of this term is represented in different ways. Some experts consider that viral marketing is “a word-of mouth advertising in which consumers tell other consumers about some product or service”, while other experts consider that “true viral marketing differs from word-of-mouth in that the value of the virus to the original consumer is directly related to the number of other users it attracts (Phelps et al., 2004:1). That is, the originator of each branch of the virus has a unique and vested interest in recruiting people to the network” (Phelps et al., 2004:1).
Today viral marketing is a rather new phenomenon (Quint, 2008). That is why it is defined differently. However, in the nearest future it will be word-of-mouth advertising for most internet users, as this concept describes one more way of attracting new customers “by encouraging honest communication among customers” with the help of e-mail (Phelps et al., 2004:1).
One more definition of the term viral marketing is gives by Justin Kirby and Paul Marsden, “Viral marketing describes any strategy that encourages individuals to pass on a marketing message to others creating the potential for exponential growth in the messages’ exposure and influence. Like viruses, such strategies take advantage of rapid multiplication to explode the message to thousands, millions…” (Kirby & Marsden, 2006:88).
Recent investigations of the word-of-mouth phenomenon proved that it is very important in the purchase decisions and choice behavior of the customers in the following areas: household goods and food products, dental products and services, farming practices, voting, razor blades, automobiles, adoption of new products, and services (Lau & Ng, 2001). It is found that through the customers’ experience and word of mouth marketing early adopters can drive the initial sales growth (Pizzano, 2011).
THE MAJOR VIRAL MARKETING CONCEPTS AND THEIR APPLICATION
As viral marketing can be regarded as a special marketing technique used for advertising different products and services via the Internet, viral marketing establishes its marketing goals and helps to increase the level of sales (Kraft & Martin, 2001). Today viral marketing is represented in different forms, including interactive video games, text messages, video clips, various images, e-books, and so on. That is why it is possible to say that there are several viral marketing concepts (Lee, 2007:1).
One of the viral marketing concepts includes free e-mail services via the Internet. This viral marketing concept is effectively used in today’s competitive environment. Free advertising helps to promote different services and products. That is why it is necessary to conclude that this type of viral marketing is used on a zero budget (Lee, 2007:1). Different articles and tutorials can be regarded as viral marketing, as they also promote different products and services. One more widely spread concept of viral marketing is the use of newsletters and ezines. It is known that newsletters are utilized to build content for different sites and can help to increase their visibility for the search engines (Lee, 2007:1). E-books are used as viral tools too. They can be created by means of definite software. Forum posting is one more type of viral marketing. Its major goal is to share useful information with other people. The above mentioned concepts of viral marketing can be successfully applied in today’s competitive environment and can help to develop business and “gain solid reputation” (Ciobanu, 2009:1).
THE BENEFITS OF VIRAL MARKETING
There are many different benefits of viral marketing which should be understood by all business owners (Trusov et al., 2009). It is known that the major benefits of viral marketing include but are not limited to the following ones: “increase link popularity, increase or improves targeted traffic, builds brand recognition, generates targeted leads, automates marketing efforts” (Phelps, 2007:1). Today there are hundreds of Internet marketing companies which provide the services in viral marketing (Alsop, 2011). That is why it is easy to evaluate the effectiveness of viral marketing techniques. As technology drives the economy, it is very important for any business to use viral marketing for product and service promotion. Viral marketing as electronic word of mouth is very powerful because it allows millions of customers from all over the world to learn about this or that product and to make purchase immediately (Dunn & Probstein, 2003; De Bruyn & Lilien, 2008). According to the opinion of experts, “the importance of word-of-mouth (WOM) communications is widely accepted in traditional marketing research… The Worn phenomenon has been transformed into various types of electronic WOM (eWOM). “8 With WOM, both good news and bad news was rapidly disseminated; eWOM spreads this good and bad news at an unprecedented rate and range” (Tomaiuolo, 2009:34). It is found that in most situations “not only did handling complaints lead to an increased intention to repurchase but that it decreased negative word of mouth and increased positive word of mouth, thus increasing the overall benefit to the firm or company” (Davodow, 2003:68).
