Viral marketing + incentives = Increased Holiday Sales

According to Word of Mouth Marketing Association, viral marketing and incentives were the major factors in online retail sales this holiday season. Previous surveys have shown that a staggering number of customers turn to friends, colleagues, etc. for advice about possible purchases. This year incentives offered by retailers, most in the form of free shipping, has played a major role in increased sales, as well. Has the importance of incentives reflected savvy shopping by the customers- getting the best deal for their money, or has it been due to the idea of "getting something for nothing?" The word "free" tends to have great power in today's society.

Whatever the reason, it appears that the optimism of companies about holiday sales, early in the season, has most likely proven true. In fact, to draw customers to their web sites, over 97% of online retailers invested in search engine marketing, 73% in comparison shopping engines, and many in other unconventional online marketing strategies.

Easy Viral Marketing

According to Womnibus Weekly #2.09, Levi's jeans has begun a viral marketing campaign in which customers are encouraged to make their own customized advertisements by adding their own photos and text to a commercial on Levi's web site. This campaign, created by Personiva, has been done before with other companies, but the unique part of this one is that the customer is encouraged to email their customized ad to their friends. As an incentive for doing this, the customer is given free shipping on any purchase of $75 or more at Levi's e-commerce site, when their ad is viewed by three or more people.

This sounds like a great idea to me. Letting individuals add their own creativity to an ad is a way of getting the public involved, but adding the incentive to share their creation and the product sounds like marketing at its easiest. More companies should jump on this idea, I think.

"Are Paid Downloads Dead"

Paul Resnikoff's article, "Are Paid Downloads Dead," in the Oct. 6, Digital Music News Daily Snapshot is indeed worrisome to me, a new participant in a digital music venture. Since the business model for music2work2 is based on digital distribution and sales, paid downloads are a major part of the life-blood of the business. With the price of downloads so low now, I don't know how they can be much lower and prohibiting all P2P sharing would seem to me to be futile, as well as detrimental to viral marketing or advertising.

I realize there are other ways for music2work2 to survive, and hopefully building a fan base will mean that people who really appreciate the music and concept of music2work2 would always be willing to pay for the product.  But, if you are in the beginning stage of a business venture of which customers paying to download your music is the basic premise, Resnikoff's title is a pretty scary thought.