Viral Marketing on a local scale.

My media sales reps will disagree with me on this one, but the fact of the matter seems to be that the face of marketing is changing. Or rather, it’s in a change-or-die situation. The noise level has increased to a breaking point and technology has made people saavy to a point where marketing is ineffective and even scoffed at by most demographics. Today’s current success stories are using new forms of marketing, creating “brand tribes” and taking advantage of viral marketing both online and in the real world. Snakes on a Plane, Starbucks, even Pabst Blue Ribbon are making waves without using traditional advertising channels.

But does this apply to local advertising in a smaller setting? Of course it does. Our airwaves in Winona are just as overloaded with bad ads, on a per captia basis, as everybody else’s. I can’t promise a business in an overcrowded industry instant placement on Google’s first page for any given keyword. But I can help them get their name talked about in the coffeehouses, bars, co-ops, grocery stores, etc. I can get word on the street to work in their favor, and I can do it quickly. I found very quickly that a couple of well placed, well written and well timed press releases are far more effective than a couple of months of paid advertising in the newspaper. And it’s free press.

How does the internet apply, then? Take social networking as an example. Like any major city, it divides itself into smaller burroughs and neighborhoods. Getting in with a couple of relevant people can help you break into an entire network specific to your demographic. And a letter from one of your mypace friends is far more intrusive, and therefore potentially effective, than a radio or television ad. And it’s far easier to link to relative content from within a web based initiative than it is through other intrusive media. Especially radio, where it’s usually heard at work or in the car, and unless you have a very catchy URI, most people have forgotten your address by the time they sit down at a computer.

It’s no longer simply a matter of running a strong message with enough frequency. The old channels are being overloaded and bypassed. The small business has to find new ways to communicate, and technology provides not only new mediums, but new methods of targeting your customer. Properly done, a campaign can now hit exactly the right people. A branding strategy that includes viral marketing can initiate both name recognition and a call to action in very little time, even –if not especially– on a local scale.