Attention Conservation Notice: The following post contains a long post on controversy in the field of viral marketing and a long (30 min) video case study on viral video marketing presented by Pam O’Neal Mickelson. It presents advice on what to do and what not to do when it comes to producing and distributing a viral marketing campaign.

Viral video marketing has become a hotbed of controversy these days! Who would have believed that videos like Netcosm, Mr. Happy Crack, Benny Lava, and Tay Zonday could be tainted by heated debates over the validity of viral marketing and the techniques used by some to promote their campaigns?

Still the debate rages: Many B2B Marketers think viral marketing is like “lightening in a bottle.” They advise there is no simple formula and you cannot possibly orchestrate such a campaign because both content and timing are so critical to viral success. Others, will argue that they can concoct a viral campaign for anyone and will go to just about any lengths to do so.

While most will agree that content and timing are both crucial, I do believe that almost every B2B Marketer has a successful viral or Word of Mouth campaign in them. And, I also believe that they don’t have to resort to trickery or deceit to attract tens of thousands of viewers for their YouTube video. In fact, I believe the more authentic you are, the stronger the Word of Mouth effect. Let me explain.

The B2B viral video campaign NetQoS ran earlier in 2007 is a case study in how to package relevant and compelling content and get the word out to the right audience using Social Media. We used entertaining content that was compelling to our target audience, played down production value and branding, and then got the word out to the people who cared – technology professionals. We didn’t trick viewers into YouTube with headlines like “Stolen NASCAR” just to boost our numbers. By taking this high road we were able to generate more than 66,000 views, and importantly almost 2,000 leads and a half a million dollars in pipeline.

Unfortunately, not all B2B Marketers are using a transparent or authentic approach. A recent widely criticized Tech Crunch post written by Dan Ackerman Greenberg advising marketers to pay for blog coverage and trick viewers into viewing videos has triggered a firestorm of controversy that threatens to ruin the discipline for the rest of us. Much like spammers ruined email marketing.

Greenberg kicks off his post with this inauspicious intro: “Over the past year, I have run clandestine marketing campaigns meant to ensure that promotional videos become truly viral, as these examples have become in the extreme.” He might as well have run an ad inviting people to bash him. Or was that his intent? This is almost as bad as the sales letter I received from a company offering to post “laudatory comments” on our video postings or blog articles in an effort to build a following. I felt like I needed to take a shower after reading that letter and this post! (As you’ll read later I was not the only one.)

Greenberg also advised “So how do we get the first 50,000 views we need to get our videos onto the Most Viewed list?

• Blogs: We reach out to individuals who run relevant blogs and actually pay them to post our embedded videos. Sounds a little bit like cheating/PayPerPost, but it’s effective and it’s not against any rules.
• Forums: We start new threads and embed our videos. Sometimes, this means kickstarting the conversations by setting up multiple accounts on each forum and posting back and forth between a few different users. Yes, it’s tedious and time-consuming, but if we get enough people working on it, it can have a tremendous effect.
• MySpace: Plenty of users allow you to embed YouTube videos right in the comments section of their MySpace pages. We take advantage of this.
• Facebook: Share, share, share. We’ve taken Dave McClure’s advice and built a sizeable presence on Facebook, so sharing a video with our entire friends list can have a real impact. Other ideas include creating an event that announces the video launch and inviting friends, writing a note and tagging friends, or posting the video on Facebook Video with a link back to the original YouTube video.
• Email lists: Send the video to an email list. Depending on the size of the list (and the recipients’ willingness to receive links to YouTube videos), this can be a very effective strategy.
• Friends: Make sure everyone we know watches the video and try to get them to email it out to their friends, or at least share it on Facebook.

As you can imagine, Greenberg’s post was slammed big time for advocating “techniques including writing fake sensational titles and creating controversy by having arguments in the comments of a video using multiple YouTube accounts.” I can’t help but notice, however, that while Greenberg may be unpopular with the readers of Tech Crunch, he is apparently very popular among advertisers. A look at both the quantity and the prominence of his clients shows that there is huge demand and high stakes around viral marketing.

Viral video, much like televised infotainment, remains one of the best ways to broadcast your brand and message to a very large audience. Combine it with a blog or other social media component, and it can be an ingenious way to build a large following. And, unlike televised infotainment, it doesn’t come with a multi-million dollar price tag. The NetQoS viral video project, for example, cost only $6,500 to produce and will likely generate a 6,000+% ROI. Importantly, viral campaigns come with the added bonus of Word of Mouth cache. Viewers are guaranteed to tune in when the content has been recommended by a friend or colleague, or when the buzz has reached a level that demands their attention.

It’s easy to see why companies such as Greenberg’s firm are in high demand. And, while what he does may feel unethical and deceptive, is it really so different from the infotainment that we call reality TV? I mean, wasn’t The Apprentice just one long commercial for Burger King and Yahoo? Isn’t Project Runway a great promotional vehicle for Banana Republic and Bitten by Sarah Jessica Parker? Aren’t these all examples of Marketing disguised as entertainment? Aren’t we, as viewers, tricked into tuning in to these hour-long commercials by slickly produced teasers of apprentices battling to the finish or snarky fashion designers back stabbing each other to get ahead?

In an increasingly marketing-averse world, tricking your audience into tuning in may seem the only way to get your message out. But this is extremely short sighted. If you’re not looking at viral marketing with a long term perspective, you are over looking one of the most valuable aspects of this approach – the ability to quickly and inexpensively build a community of interest. The Word of Mouth aspect of viral marketing gives Marketers a powerful way to attract a following of media, blogerati, influencers, and–most importantly–buyers.

As this video case study of the NetQoS network monitoring campaign illustrates, just about anyone can be successful with viral marketing if they take an authentic, transparent, relevant and entertaining approach. Look at the fantastic job Dr. Pepper did with the Cherry Chocolate Rain viral video or this clever Symantec video. It may not always guarantee a million views, but it will earn you respect and a loyal following over the long term.

In the next B2B Lead post I’ll enumerate the 20 ideas that made the NetQoS campaign a success leading to a Marketing Sherpa Viral Marketing Hall of Fame inclusion. I’ll also present some of the visuals that might have been difficult to see on this video.

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