"Viral" marketing requests - how...

Jason -- I think you're absolutely on the right track here. The very first thing you have to do is define viral. Viral is a goal, not a tactic. Asking the client what their campaign goals are is crucial. You can even ask them "what would be viral success for you?". Get as detailed as possible (400 pass alongs, 50 comments, etc.).

Content that has the goal of becoming viral needs to hit a few key requirements no matter what.

• Uniqueness - viral only usually happens once. Subservient chicken was great, but tell me one of the copycats who followed it up. You can't. Viral happens once and it's done. You have to be the first.
  
• Resonance - things that go viral resonate with their audience so much that they feel a need to share
• Needs to be easy to spread - should be email-friendly, embeddable, IM-friendly, etc.

I hope this helps. If a client still doesn't get it, doesn't have goals or won't listen then you should run the other way. They'll never be satisfied, the product will suffer and they'll take you down with them.

I think you absolutely hit the nail on the head, especially with the goals of becoming viral. Unfortunately I see a lot of clients bandwagoning onto "viral" content without really being aware of what it means - and in some circles, "viral" has simply become a synonym for "a little video we want to post on YouTube and spam to blogs and expect to get 500,000 views." I was recently asked to provide ROI numbers for a particularly number-driven client for a potential viral video, and the client wasn't amused when I opened the conversation (somewhat cheekily) with "I expect somewhere between 10 and 1,000,000 hits" even though it's hard to predict with any more accuracy than that.

If it's OK, I think I may pass those key requirements on to other members of my team - the uniqueness factor especially. To your point, there was only one subservient chicken; the next step is coming up with something  new and exciting.

Jason -- Absolutely. Pass it along to anybody you want. Honestly, the part that matters (beyond the impressions) is the engagement that a piece of content creates with your brand. So if something is watched 1,000,000 times and only 10 of those people know who you are and act on it, you have to ask if it's worth it. Alternatively, if something is seen 10 times and the same number know who you are and act on it, your outcome is better.

Agreed, and this is something I've struggled with communicating to traditional marketers / PR people. They're used to ROI = number of impressions that they don't stop to consider the quality or target of those impressions. 100 emotionally-invested individuals in your target audience are "worth" far more than 50,000 people who don't care about your product any day, especially if those 100 people in turn write about your product or somehow inform other like-minded, emotionally invested individuals about it.

Thanks for the feedback! I'm really liking this site - it's like a massive roundtable discussion for us.

Countdown until we all get a pitch from a PR person trying to sell us something... :)

I agree completely with this comment, It's all about content and goals, not a guaranteed outcome.

I get a lot of clients asking about top rankings in Google as a campaign rather than as a long term goal and as soon as I hear it I know exactly what the next hour of my life will look like. It will be Online Marketing 101.

If after you have educated the client, reassessed their expectations and better explained how content and conversational marketing works, if they still are pestering you for that viral video concept, let them know that there are plenty of companies that will make them unfounded promises and take their money in a heart beat and that fortunately for them, you are not one of those companies.

At that point, you might be able to have a more value centric conversation to see what kinds of things you can do for them to help facilitate conversation and build awareness within their online marketplace.

If they still won't refocus their approach, they most likely wouldn't have been a good client anyway and you wouldn't enjoy working with them. Life is just too short to work with assholes.

Make it clear that there is no guarantee that the created marketing media will reach viral 'critical mass', that it is a high risk marketing strategy that should not be the main thrust of an overall campaign - if it takes off it can become so, but to rely on it as the mainstay is not wise.

Contract for production of the video and initial seeding distribution and promotion (tip: heyspread is a good timesaver) with perhaps bonuses at certain view levels/landmarks.

The annoying thing I find currently is that many people that want viral devices have an unrealistic production budget when compared with what they'd happily pay for a 10 second TV ad or other traditional media.

Just say no. Many requests come from less than desirable sources. If it is easy than it is not worth the effort.