Every so many years there is a new buzzword that emerges in industry. Some of them stay and linger on for a while and others fade out before the sun sets for the day. Today, viral marketing seems to be the buzzword especially amongst internet marketing circles and web site marketing gurus. But what is viral marketing and is it worth pursuing is a topic worth exploring. As in everything, there is a lot of myth and misleading information about viral marketing that one needs to stay away from. We shall explore briefly in this article, viral marketing and marketing for success from the stand point of internet marketing.

Viral marketing is a term given to the phenomenon wherein there is an explosive growth in the gaining of customers and potential customers. From an internet standpoint, this is the exponential growth of traffic to your web site or blog. Be it known that traffic to your site does not guarantee income just like traffic to your brick and mortar store does not guarantee sales. Conversely, however, without traffic there can be no sale or income. Hence traffic IS important and hence proper web site promotion and marketing is essential. However, viral marketing is the end result of a marketing campaign and not the means of a marketing campaign. Put differently, one cannot set out on a viral marketing campaign. One can set out, however, on a brilliant marketing campaign that could result in a viral marketing result. In other words, you cannot sell your product or services exponentially by design. The result of your marketing efforts may result in exponential growth of traffic to your web site. The basic premise of any marketing campaign in the internet world is that by following the laid out strategy, traffic to your site should grow. Web site traffic can grow in two ways. One is slowly and over time and the other is virally and exponentially very quickly. The question then becomes is viral growth worth pursuing. The answer depends a lot on what is being peddled. If your website deals with a fast fleeting product that could become obsolete very quickly, then you do not have the time for slow and steady growth. Viral growth subsides just as fast as it rises. On the other hand, if it is knowledge based goods or services or other things that will not get obsolete very quickly, then slow and steady growth of traffic is what one should pursue. Steadily grown traffic stands the test of time and will produce revenue in the long haul as opposed to bringing immediate results. There are a lot of website owners that want the traffic quickly to reach high levels even though they may have non obsolescence type sites. That comes basically because of lack of patience. Lack of patience in any business be in on line or off line is not a good characteristic of a marketing professional. Given time, one has to steadily grow traffic on to their web sites by link building, article marketing, on line advertising and so on and get the word out gradually rather than go after buzzwords and sizzle. A case in point is the pet rock craze in the USA several decades ago that faded away shortly thereafter. Or how about the one hit wonders of the music world that make one hit song, it rises to the top of the charts and a few years later, the music band is nowhere to be found. Compare this with the Beatles or the Rolling Stones in the music business, or Southwest Airlines in the transportation business or IBM or Microsoft in the computer business. Patient marketing as opposed to viral marketing is a better alternative for all web sites that do not have obsolescence issues.

Source: http://articlewonders.com