If you build it will they come? Once a Broadband Service Provider (BSP) has completed construction of its high-speed Internet infrastructure, unleashing the sales and marketing team is the next step to building a business where stock options actually have value. To avoid the fate of the growing list of "dot-gone" BSPs - and most recently Winstar - customers must be added both efficiently and expeditiously.

Approximately 50% of all households are not yet Net-connected, and most BSPs employ online sales and marketing tactics since it helps ensure that the audience of prospects is pre-qualified. But relying on opt in email lists and creating a sales acquisition website are yesterday's sales and marketing tactics. Are these necessary components of an integrated marketing plan? Of course! But it's no way for a best of class BSP to rise above the clutter of an overwhelming number of websites and the millions of emails that zip around in cyberspace. With cynicism at an all time high and consumers that are exhausted by the endless barrage of banner ads, how can companies use the power of the Internet to increase sales while reducing their cost per sale? Viral marketing - or a strategy that encourages individuals to pass along the marketing message to others thereby creating the potential of exponential growth - is such a solution; and properly executed, it can become a BSP's least expensive and most effective sales channel.

Viral marketing, or using the Net to create a "buzz" or "word of mouth" about a product includes four important elements:

* It invites the receiver to pass along something interesting, useful, or downright "cool" along to a friend, co-worker, or family member. Trust is an essential element of viral marketing. Since viral marketing often relies on friends passing it along to other friends, it must be credible, trustworthy, and without a downside. When most Netizens received an unsolicited email, a "delete without opening" action frequently occurs. However, if the email is from a friend, the odds that the email will be read and acted upon increase one hundred fold. One tactic that helps enhance the effectiveness of the viral email is to personalize the message to the target, such as using the name of the sender and receiver in the body of the text. The value of the "pass along" should be something that is entertaining, has utility, or is cool in its uniqueness. Otherwise there won't be a compelling incentive to send pass it along to others. It should be relevant to the BSP's core product and consistent with the brand, to make certain that message and offer reinforce the product being marketed. Consequently, it's important that the value propositions of the viral marketing offer directly or indirectly tie in to the broadband product being sold. More about an example of a band relevant "pass along" tactic later.
* Encourages an impulse decision - if Netizens are required to think twice about passing along the message, they probably won't. If there's a catch or an obligation, chances will increase that the message will dead-end with the first recipient. As an example, the company's privacy policy should be specified so that the sender will be confident that he's not sending his friends and family members to an email list purgatory. Referrals aren't opt-ins so BSPs shouldn't consider the email addresses that are collected to be opt-in permission for additional mailings. In fact, nothing kills a viral marketing campaign faster or more efficiently than the ill will generated by an overreaching company that spams Netizens that were referred by friends. The last component in creating an effective program is that the marketer must design the program so that it's easy for the receiver to pass along the message. A one-click "email this to a friend" button is such a tactic.
* Design matters - the collateral marketing piece and offer must be clear, simple, and not confusing. How important is the design of a viral marketing's collateral material? Consider the confusion surrounding the placement of the ballot punch holes in the Florida election ballot. Okay, enough said.
* Track and analyze the results of each campaign. Since different viral marketing offers will produce different results, it's important to carefully track and analyze the results of each program. The first item to track is to determine who are passing along the viral messages - this is important for future campaigns because tracking will establish a database of "high advocacy" opinion leaders that are receptive to specific types of viral offers. Next, the BSP will be able to determine how many individuals receive the offer in total, and how many of them eventually become customers. This information will help determine the success of the offer and effectiveness of the collateral material. Finally and of equal importance, the BSP can track the churn associated with customers obtained by each viral marketing campaign. If customers that respond to a viral marketing campaign churn less frequently than the average of the entire customer base, it will positively impact the return on investment of this type of marketing campaign. After realizing a 5% response on a direct mail piece, a marketer once said, "I know that 95% of my marketing expenditures were wasted - but I just don't know which 95%." Tracking and analysis will minimize this problem.

Viral marketing has a spectacular track record of successful product launches, thereby generating significant wealth to its company's investors. Products, such as ICQ, HotMail, GeoCities, RealPlayer, and WinAmp are some of the more famous examples. And an example of the cool factor, who hasn't been emailed the "Dancing Baby" or some version of Budweiser's "Whassup?!" Viral marketing catapulted The Blair Witch Project, a movie that cost tens of thousands of dollars to produce, into a product that generated hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue. Other examples are detailed at www.viralmarketer.com/vmcases.html.

Viral marketing also has its history of dismal failures - which were often caused by companies that provided enticing incentives for Netizens to indiscriminately spam as many people as possible. Not only did some of these poorly executed viral marketing programs fail to generate sales and were therefore "expensive," but they also both generated ill will for the company sponsoring the program and caused them to lose control over their marketing message and their brand. Most of the ill conceived viral marketing programs were done with products that few have heard about and by many companies are no longer doing business on the Web. They died with hardly even a whimper. Frequently, the programs failed because they were either not compelling and not passed along; or they offered such a rich reward that Netizens were distracted from the product or service being marketed and focused on forwarded the message to everyone and anyone so they could win points, credits, or cash. In situations that generate much motion without movement, the company's product and message becomes lost in the din.

How does a BSP use viral market to motivate consumers as a sales and lead generation channel?

The four elements described above should be carefully considered, most of which can be used as a checklist and easily followed. However, one element of viral marketing is more of an art than a science. The choice of a useful, interesting, or cool "pass along" requires creativity and "out of the box" thinking. Most viral marketing programs give away valuable services or products to attract attention and encourage the "pass along" phenomenon. It's synergistic if the "pass along" is linked to the BSP's broadband product - and the possibilities of an integrated viral marketing offers are limited only by the marketing team's imagination.

As one example and depending upon the target market segment and service area, the BSP could embed a tool that measures a prospect's dialup Internet access speed and then demonstrates how broadband will improve life by offering a relevant call to action. A "free" web cam can be used as the call to action and could permit an office worker or business traveler to enjoy virtual visits with their family members when they are miles (or thousands of miles) away from their home. If a picture is worth a thousand words, the BSP can embed a video that simulates a streaming video of a child's playroom or nursery. Market segmentation and a marketing database can help BSP fine tune a viral marketing offer. As an example, how much more compelling would a web cam be if the prospect occasionally has a baby sitter take care of children while he or she is at work?

Reward participating customers with a month of free service or an extra web cam if their referral results in an installed customer. Since the "pass along" is a critical element of viral marketing, marketing departments often find that the most creative offers can be ascertained by talking with existing customers and conducting focus groups with broadband prospects.

An effortless transfer to others is another important element of successful viral marketing programs. If the medium that transmits the marketing message is an email as in the example above, then it will be easy to transfer and replicate. Both www.recommend-it.com and www.send-a-link.com are two useful sites to visit when developing viral customer acquisition tactics, both providing webmasters examples of the HTML code necessary to establish a campaign and offering various referral tactics.

If you build it, an effective viral marketing program will help ensure that they will come. A viral marketing referral is often viewed by prospects as a recommendation from a trusted friend, thus significantly increasing the chance it will be read and acted upon. In a Net-empowered world, the most expensive element of a viral marketing program is the offer, which is merely a variable expense. Since viral marketing prospects subscribe based upon a friend's recommendation, these new customers are often more loyal and more forgiving than those attracted by more conventional marketing tactics. So what's the Net result?

Viral marketing creates a buzz and breaks through the din of competing marketing offers and the clutter on the Web with a lower cost per sale. Many of the most successful BSPs include viral marketing as a sales channel to meet their customer acquisition and cost per sale objectives. Viral marketing - it's a tactic that BSPs should consider using when adding customers along the road to profitability.