Viral Marketing Wants You!

September 12, 2002 8:57 AM

Viral Marketing Wants You! Do you want to hype the new season of your tv show? Recruit fans to post what you want them to post in the places you tell them to. Courtesy of the Hype Council. Sure to hit Metafilter soon!
posted by danhon (18 comments total)

Viral marketing doesn't work.
Tell everyone you know.
posted by Mwongozi at 8:58 AM on September 12, 2002

Other campaigns and clients the Hype Council has worked on.
posted by danhon at 8:58 AM on September 12, 2002

They said that you get exclusive access to stuff that only the alias street team gets access to. Maybe they are talking about naked photos? I'm joining just in case. By the way, what channel is that show on? I've never watched it, just seen the commercials with the hot chic (c'mon naked pics, c'mon!)
posted by Mushkelley at 9:01 AM on September 12, 2002

But wait- I thought Avril Lavigne was popular because of her amazing talent!
posted by InfidelZombie at 9:07 AM on September 12, 2002

"There can be no hope.... without HYPE!!!"

First time I've wanted a hopeless life...
posted by GhostintheMachine at 9:17 AM on September 12, 2002

This is a more malignant form of a type of marketing that game companies have been doing for a while: providing "fan site" graphic packs. For example, the Sims kit on this page.

Of course, the fan site kit is sort of a nice thing (esp. when compared to the lawyer-happy attacks that used to meet fan sites), and this call for message board spamming isn't.
posted by malphigian at 9:21 AM on September 12, 2002

Other campaigns and clients the Hype Council has worked on.
Um, Deepak Chopra?

I enjoyed the first few episodes of Alias (the first especially -- written by JJ Abrams while listening obsessively to the Run Lola Run soundtrack: very obvious Lola influence).

I thought the series fell just off a bit after that, but kudos to Alias for its use of Gina Torres of B-TV fame (Raimi's Hercules, Cleopatra 2025).

No, I'm not on the viral payroll.
posted by Shane at 9:28 AM on September 12, 2002

The Hype Council's acronym is "THC." It seems to me they are quite proud of this, too.
posted by Hankins at 9:32 AM on September 12, 2002

F*cking bastards! I do some work for RCA/BMG, and the Hype Council lists on their client page an artist they've never worked for.

Street/E-teams do work. And it's not scum marketing; we just merely ask fans to tell everyone they know about their favorite artist. For instance, we tell our e-teams to use banners to link back to the artist's site and to mention the artist if they're active on a music site, etc. We don't tell these kids to spam or post to sites they're not truly members of, and we are sure not to reward kids that do.

It's how artists like John Mayer and Guster got where they are. And it's how some political campaigns are winning their elections. (Al Gore and John McCain had really active E-teams.)
posted by jennak at 9:34 AM on September 12, 2002

I remember when "viral marketing" was called "word-of-mouth advertising."

In one way, this doesn't seem any worse than encouraging a fan club with promo items in the hopes that the fans will "spread the word" amongst their friends and acquaintances. On the other hand, this "call for message board spamming" as malphigian puts it almost seems insidious - spam from a distributed source is that much harder to block.

On the third hand, maybe I should give the people who join this effort the benefit of the doubt that they will only "preach the word" to groups to which they already belong, rather than just spewing their message willy-nilly to whatever community they run across. Perhaps having actual fans do the legwork will end up being a little more subtle than having a marketing shill do it who is paid to get results.
posted by SpaceBass at 9:40 AM on September 12, 2002

The phrase 'online tastemakers' made me cringe.
posted by Fabulon7 at 9:48 AM on September 12, 2002

That's it. I'm naming my next business Hype Council Flats.
posted by octobersurprise at 9:58 AM on September 12, 2002

There was apparantly a shortlived competition being run by Ubisoft, encouraging people to promote the game Shadowbane on the forums of direct competitors. To Ubisoft's credit, the competition got pulled as soon as senior management got wind of it.

I'm guessing we gonna see a lot more of this. On the other hand I heard this great band the other ...
posted by arha at 10:07 AM on September 12, 2002

similar concerns mentioned last week ...
posted by whatnot at 10:53 AM on September 12, 2002

I remember when "viral marketing" was called "word-of-mouth advertising."

"Word of mouth" is what happens when genuine fans bring up whatever it is that they like without prompting/payment from the owner of the object of affection. It's a natural part of being social. The whole "viral marketing" stigma came about when people started getting paid to talk about certain beer brands in bars and whatnot, paid to act like they were in long distance commercials. A normal, socially valid thing was hacked into yet another empty zombie of corporate marketing.

It's a part of the general trend to pave over the real human social environment with the parking lots and billboards of the corporate world. I.e. that thing America does to make that chunk of the world that still has actual culture and humanity hate us. More than oil tycoons and arms industry barons, it's America's corporate marketing departments that are dragging us down in world opinion. It's been around since the tobacco industry co-opted the women's lib movement with their "torches of liberty".
posted by badstone at 11:26 AM on September 12, 2002

There's a review/expose type thing here. Feel free to check out the rest of the site, too. 'S funny.
posted by redsparkler at 3:40 PM on September 12, 2002

I see no problem with this form of marketing .
posted by ?! at 5:26 PM on September 12, 2002

redsparkler:

I just came from the article you linked to, and was going to mention it, but you've beat me to it. The piece is worth a look.
posted by guidedbychris at 12:16 AM on September 13, 2002