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A guy asked my “Why marketing?”, as we were talking about viral marketing. “Why not advertising?” A very good question indeed…

I found an explanation of the two as follows:

Advertising: The paid, public, non-personal announcement of a persuasive message by an identified sponsor; the non-personal presentation or promotion by a firm of its products to its existing and potential customers.

Marketing: The systematic planning, implementation and control of a mix of business activities intended to bring together buyers and sellers for the mutually advantageous exchange or transfer of products.

The best way to distinguish between advertising and marketing is to think of marketing as a pie, inside that pie you have slices of advertising, market research, media planning, public relations, product pricing, distribution, customer support, sales strategy, and community involvement. Advertising only equals one piece of the pie in the strategy. All of these elements must not only work independently but they also must work together towards the bigger goal. Marketing is a process that takes time and can involve hours of research for a marketing plan to be effective. Think of marketing as everything that an organization does to facilitate an exchange between company and consumer.

This explanation broadens up the understanding, but it also puts into focus that the term “viral advertising” would be the strategy, but would probably not cover the carefully crafted campaign. Before the users are invited to engage with a campaign it had been seeded.

A viral video is not just put on the internet in order for people to find and spread it. It is being carefully places where it is most likely to be picked up by the group of people that are potential consumers of the brand, or the ones that are most likely to initiate spreading. The video is on purpose created so that it appears as if it is a natural reflection of everyday life (maybe enhanced in quality by the usage of a specific brand). But it is carefully crafted, performed by actors and mobilized by influential people and networks in order for the story to be staged right.

All this work is often rendered invisible when talking about the video and the reception of it. But I think that by changing the term from advertising to marketing it becomes clear that there is a lot more to it than just the advertisement and the people engaging with it. This puts into focus “The systematic planning and implementation“  in making viral marketing.

Another aspect that caught my attention was “control” since; when a video is being spread it is carefully monitord by professionals.  Often, in order to create awareness, the brand is not immediately revealed. Instead a small video, that provides the user with a story, is being distributed through the Internet. The video is on purpose created so that it appears as if it is a real story, but balancing of the edge between appearing as fake and real. This technique creates a sense of mystique, an ambiguity or a doubt in the viewers, that ideally should result in a discussion concerning the content as well as (as soon as the brand is revealed) the brand behind it. Often it is the users’ discussions, concerning whether something is real or not, as well as their creative contributions, that provide the campaign with a momentum thereby ensuring the first round of attention. Consequently, people share the videos with their friends in order to hear their opinions as well as formulating their own.

However, it is crucial to remember that the brand should be a part of this discussion. To initiate a successful campaign is great, but if the content is not being related with the specific brand is a waste of money for the company who hoped for brand awareness. But it is equally important not to over represent a brands visual appearance. This can potentially annoy the users and hinder that the content will appear to be authentic and real. This has turned out to be a challenging balance for many brands, but it also emphasize the need for control and monitoring while the story is being discussed, in order to decide when and it what way to reveal the brand behind the campaign. thus, control is a crusial part of managing to create a sucessful viral campaign.

That last part of the definition of marketing is “of a mix of business activities intended to bring together buyers and sellers for the mutually advantageous exchange or transfer of products“ Often we talk about a mix since viral marketing is not only about videos, but about being seen wherever people are. Creating awareness of a brand can be seen as cooperating. The reason viral marketing can succeed and the reason people voluntarily spread the word is because the users see their interests fulfilled too when engaging. They might not do it directly because they want to create brand awareness, but even though they do it to create identity or to strengthen their social network; they still have an interest that is compatible to the one of the people who wants to create brand awareness. Thus it can be said to be a mutually advantageous exchange.

And that, my dear readers, is my thoughts after having shared a glass of red wine with a man who asked a very simple question.

Dina/Live blogging from 4S (Society for Social Studies of Science) in Washington DC