SES Session: Igniting Viral Campaigns

A slew of SES Chicago attendees sat in on the session – Igniting Viral Campaigns – to learn how they just might create the next Burger King Chicken Campaign, in which Burger King was able to increase chicken sandwich sales with a website and a subservient chicken.

Maybe we’re not all looking to sell more chicken sandwiches, but we are looking to take a message and make it viral.

Each panelist provided insight on what they believe to be the keys to making content buzzworthy.

Bill Hanekamp, CEO, The Well hammered home the importance of relevancy to session attendees.

According to Bill, we all need to ask ourselves the following question:
1. With all the content on our websites, does anyone care?

If you can answer yes to the question above, then you can move onto the 4 fundamental elements of creating buzzworthy content which include:
1. Entertaining
2. Relevancy
3. Timeliness
4. Exclusivity

Ed Kim, Chief Executive Officer, Red Bricks Media suggested we all start with a little research into who our users are before creating content for them.

Ed suggests:
1. Identify and profile the users who you expect to interact with/pass on your content
2. Understand the tools their using to share content
3. Create content that they think is buzzworthy

This is particularly important when working with a limited budget. Identify first what content your target responds to and on which online channels they are most likely to respond. This will allow you to hone your campaign and increase the likelihood of achieving your objectives.

In addition, Ed refers to the 6-8 Buttons of Buzz – those items which are most likely to become viral – of which he shared 4:
1. The remarkable
2. The outrageous
3. The hilarious
4. Of Value

Fionn Downhill, CEO & President, Elixir Systems wrapped up the session by helping small to medium businesses understand how they can tap into viral marketing with little to no cost.

Listed below are both types of content that can be buzzworthy and tools to promote that content:
Content
1. Articles
2. Whitepapers

Techniques/Tools
1. RSS Feeds
4. Add links to social bookmarks into the page
5. Add ‘email this page to a friend’ functionality
6. Social media groups and networking
7. Find the Influencers

No matter which approach you take, it seems all would agree that to produce a buzzworthy campaign, you must start with content that your target audience finds relevant, unique and easy to share.

What are you doing to create viral or buzzworthy content?

Check out more photos from SES Chicago.