Are there any worthwhile Pokémon GO marketing applications for brands? Hell, Yes.

Like millions throughout the world I have been sucked into the hype surrounding what I now know as 'Puke-a-Mon Go'.  The web has been ‘paraflinched’ with articles lauding how the game targets ‘millennial’ aged zombies who can play Puke-a-Mon Go whilst walking recklessly across lanes of traffic or over cliffs.

In addition to brand sponsorship opportunities as described below, Puke-a-Mon Go boosts profitable in-game purchases. Not insignificant since Euromonitor International projects the 2016 global mobile in-game purchase market to grow some twenty per cent, reaching $29.8bn /£22.5bn..

Planet Earth – 7bn people – gotta catch ’em all

Puke-a-Mon Go quickly clocked up in excess of 30 million downloads.  At its peak, Candy Crush drew an audience of 20 million users. It even rivalled social network downloads.

There's no magic formula for going viral, but there are ways to boost your chances.

You’ve heard the success stories: A brand creates content that takes off unexpectedly and elevates its reach and influence dramatically. So how do you make it happen for yourself? There’s not a magic formula, but there are steps marketers can take to increase the chances of virality. My team at Alexa analyzed a series of websites that had posts take off like wildfire. We chose the sites we did because the publish date for the viral posts directly corresponded to a rise in the hosting site’s traffic numbers. We used Alexa's competitive intelligence tool to analyze each website’s traffic, global rank, and reach.

Analysis of Mic.com

Amy Poehler – described by one journalist as a “media darling and all-around-awesome lady” – is something of a feminist icon. It’s no surprise that millennials are enamored with the…

Social Media Marketing campaign successes and failures

Every internet savvy person knows the potential of 'going viral' with content spread via social media. It’s about resonating your content so that it becomes popular, is shared and showcases your brand's reputation to improve your chances of your content being prominent, and engages with the right audience. The infographic shares some examples of successful viral case studies and others which have flopped, along with their 'recipe for success'.

Thanks to BestMarketingDegrees.org for sharing their infographic and commentary with us. It's a resource guide for students, looking  to follow a career in marketing and provides articles and graphics related to the latest development in the field of marketing.

What does research show are the emotions that content must create to encouraging sharing?

Marketing has forever been about making people aware of one’s brand, as a precursor to making them actually desire it. Since the very concept of branding and proactive selling (marketing) began back in the late 19th century, the goal has always been the same, even if the methods have changed beyond all recognition; connect with people whom you feel are likely to relate to whatever product or service it is you are offering, and make them want it. With this in mind, marketing has been, is and always will be about relating to your audience and whether this is done online, offline, through mainstream or non-mainstream avenues, is largely irrelevant; whatever succeeds in triggering a collective positive emotion in one’s target audience, is always going to be the correct approach. Remove all the jargon and fancy marketing terminology,…

5 reasons why your content marketing campaign may fail and ideas to make content more 'viral'

We know from our research into Managing Content Marketing that one of the main challenges for marketers at the moment is selecting relevant content which will become viral and shared. Creating sharable, viral content is a challenge, so we thought this infographic is useful since it reminds us of the basics that we sometimes forget, as we focus on finding and curating content. There are 5 practical steps on improving reach from this infographic shared on Business2Community. 1.  Highlight emotional appeal. Positive engaging content will need to 'trigger emotions' to make people laugh, be inspired or amazed. Use this in your headlines and copy sharing the content asset. 2. Create shareable content. Shareable content makes the sharer look good - it needs to be useful or entertaining. 3. Timing. Share at the right time when your audiences are most likely to…

Including the 5 reasons your content ISN'T Going Viral...

Since its inception, the Internet has opened new doors for growing a business by sharing viral content. Today business owners are naturally still keen that they "go viral" to increase their awareness. Content marketing offers opportunities to do this through the range of content marketing formats  we have available to us.

What is viral marketing?

Viral internet marketing is not to be confused with ordinary online marketing. Neither is any viral content considered marketing. It isn't enough for something to spread rapidly. As it spreads, it should help get your company noticed.

Marketing guru, Seth Godin, emphasizes that true viral marketing “must market your business in a tangible and useful way.” Now that you know the difference, the next step is to find out how marketing becomes viral.

Why does content become viral?

If we're honest, there is no…

Generate a buzz with your marketing content by making it viral

Getting your content to "go viral" must appeal to every digital marketer, so I thought it would be worth sharing this recent viral video on successful viral marketing plus some tips on different types of viral "hooks". The video talks about the history of online viral video and goes into detail about why and how they happen, as well as the impact viral videos are having on mainstream culture.

Lisa Romagnoli, Assistant Producer, Off Book says:

"whether rooted in comedy, spectacle, schadenfreude, cuteness, politics, performance, or deep meaning, the idea of viral videos, and the huge audiences they generate, have forever changed the values and potential impact of video online".

Six viral marketing hooks

I also noticed an interesting …

What is the true meaning of online influence?

We hear a lot about influence now, it’s a commonplace term when we’re talking about social media marketing. With so many tools available to help us understand what that means and what to do - tools such as Klout, Kred, PeerIndex, and Radian6 – what does influence really mean to us, as individuals and brands? And, what about all of those tools that claim to be able to help us leverage it?

The new report

Brian Solis (now Altimeter Group’s principal analyst) has released a free report to help us understand the tools available, what they do and how we might best make used of them when marketing to influential people. He’s done this through interviews and software demos with vendors, detailed reviews of 17 services providers, a review of 6 brands that have publicly piloted digital influence programs and a final quantitative study of…
Smartblog commented this week that being a great WOM (word-of-mouth) marketer requires an understanding of the basics that motivate people to talk about you and share your brand story. They highlight 3 ways, I've listed them below and added an example to each: You. "€œThe "€˜You"€™ reason people talk is all about the goods "€” you"€™re doing or selling something and people want to talk about it"€. A great example would be Apple who do little to fuel WOM except launch great products. There"€™s an industry of Apple blogs! It"€™s about creating or doing something remarkable, like iPhone, to start WOM working for you. Me. Though it applies to a smaller sub-set, "€œthis one"€™s about that feeling of being smart, important or helpful we get when we offer a recommendation or pass something along"€. Connecting people and providing a service, and maybe monetising that. A good example might be key influencers or…