An example of a failed viral campaign from a few years ago is when a vacuum cleaner maker offered 2 free transatlantic flights with every cleaner purchased. Back in those days flights would have cost close on $600 a person and the cleaner range started at $200 – it was a no-brainer.

Friends and families all told each other and it didn’t take long for the manufacturer to be millions of dollars in the soup.

The viral aspect worked, but the campaign failed – BIG TIME. They hadn’t thought it through enough.

But for those people who can’t identify a home run in advance, the scattergun approach of throwing lots of viral campaigns into the mix to get one that works is a popular way to work.

I don’t see that going away any time soon. It’s too popular and, in its own way, too easy. You can be wrong most of the time and still fall across something that just works.

Over at my blog, Sublime Products, I’m about to start testing a focused viral campaign and report on the results.

Since it’s in a fairly popular niche with lots of competition it will be interesting to see what happens – and how long it takes.

http://www.milliondollarhomepage.com/

Thanks,
Jeff