Has Viral Email Caught a Cold?

Posted by Matt Davies on February 15th, 2007.

Creative designer and founder of Attitude Design. View our Graphic Design Portfolio.

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Lets cut to the chase. Lets talk about a Fad which really started with the wide spread use of email applications in the early 00’s. I think it was about 2002 when “viral” became the latest buzz word. I’m talking of course about “viral marketing”. To simplify things I am only talking here in the context of emails.

The Idea

As we all probably know, the basic concept is that if people like the content of a email they will send it to a friend. You send out, for example a newsletter, hoping that your clients/associates might forward it on to their contacts. Those contacts may forward it on again etc etc and so this “spreads” the awareness of your site like a virus.

The Situation

Many large companies have utilised this form of marketing and if well thought through can be very productive. However if not well through through the receiver could be left with a negative view of your company or service. This type of marketing can do more harm than good.

Also there are now strict legal requirements to consider (see www.out-law.com). Before undertaking anything like email viral it is well worth researching the legal side of what you are about to do.

With email viewers raising their level of security on spam mail, it is becoming harder for things like pictures and large html emails to dodge the filters. Most email programs have pictures switched to “off” as default and as a result viral emails are becoming ineffective.

In fact all the factor mentioned above seem to place more reasons to not go down the viral marketing route than to go down it!

The Question

The question I wish to ask everyone is this: Do viral marketing emails have a future?

With the take off of RSS and content driven sites the focus seems to have moved away from things like viral marketing. Have you found that clients aren’t asking for viral as much as they used to? Do you enjoy receiving viral marketing emails? In short, dear reader, has viral email caught a deadly cold?

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I think that that your view of viral emails is spot on. Many get filtered and marked as junk.

But viral marketing still has its place in my view. Mini viral sites still attract many viewers because people have simply forwarded the link onto others. It’s just the way that we view the content that has changed.

To answer your question, viral email is dead in my opinion. Viral content (minisites/youtube videos) is not.

Nice title. ;)

Andrew Faulkner
February 15th, 2007
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It’s not dead, but it should be, in my opinion. If I want a service, I’ll look for it, I don’t want ads in my mail.

Ezekiel Bruni
February 15th, 2007
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Andy, mini sites are a great tactic to employ in support of product launches and to get people to send on links by their own initiative. Something that is funny, shocking, or extremely clever will always attract visitors. I think content is key - almost over the design nowadays.

@ Ezekiel. You seem to dislike viral emails ;-) - have you ever received one that you liked? Maybe a sale or something? Has anybody? Some times I get emails from say Staples to announce a sale and if I am actively thinking about buying something I look at it, but I have to admit that I rarely get people forwarding me emails because they are “cool”. I might get a personal mail to check out a mini site – but in terms of sending me information I think that this type of content is better left on a site. I think we need to make a distinction between email “announcements” and “marketing” email. There is a difference:

An email announcement would be “hey we are having a sale” designed to inform.
A marketing email (true viral in my view) is designed to be sent on – eg “isn’t this picture funny – send it to you mates and win a competition”.

I think the term “viral” is applied to both of these examples – in regards to an email announcement I think a simple email would suffice – not some big clunky thing with loads of pictures. In regards to a viral emails they can work (although I admit I have no examples to hand!) Does anybody else?

Matt Davies
February 16th, 2007
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Viral marketing emails may have a future (particularly in certain populations) however they don’t have a future with me. I find email marketing personally invasive and I’m not presently in a position to be too apt to buy impulsively,anyway.

Nevertheless, I think that viral email marketing can create front of mind awareness in the consumer who might be given to impulsively pick a vendor for his or her next order of office supplies, for example.

Even though I don’t open unsolicited mail or mail from people I don’t know personally, I have received one item which wasn’t selling anything, it was just a fun tool to put a cropped portrait atop the body of a dancing elf.

Nothing to buy and cute to look at…and therefore cute to send to others who could get a laugh and then try out the tool for themselves with a photo that they had stored on their computer. That works. Inasmuch as it gets spread virally and if people play with it enough they even remember the name of the company that “released” the “virus”. It’s subliminal. Nobody is saying “buy this from me.” And in fact they are offering nothing to sell.

Email marketing that is pushing product per se is probably much less often opened and even less often forwarded to multiple recipients. It’s simply treated as junk mail for the most part.

I dropped by to thank the template designers/developers and I read this post. Also I noticed the “Monetize your website” banner and was wondering if someone could point me in the right direction. I need to display such a banner on my website however even though it show up in the “visual” WYSIWYG mode, after being input in the “code”, it doesn’t show up in the actual published post. I’d appreciate the pointer. Oh and please delete this part of my post which is totally not on point regarding the projected lifetime of this viral marketing bug going around.

Niamaat
February 20th, 2007
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Niamaat,

I think that the type of email you described (the Christmas Elf) is still a good example of viral emailing. You want to pass it around.

Andrew Faulkner
February 20th, 2007
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That xmas elf is/was great! I agree that did work but on the other hand you have to admit there aren’t many other examples of “good” viral emails.

The elf was a “marketing” style which didn’t actually sell anything but its brand. People sent it around for entertainment. If viral does have a future it will be in this regard. Brand awareness associated with fun rather than the negatively perceived information emails.

Matt Davies
February 21st, 2007
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I agree, email software no longer accomodates viral email, it just doesnt let enough mail through to be a viable form of marketing anymore. And what’s more, people often dismiss foreign lookin mail before exploring it. The whole concept needs to be re considered and revised

H. Roberts
February 21st, 2007
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And what’s more, people often dismiss foreign lookin mail before exploring it.

I think that this is the main reason that viral email is hard to start. It only works if the emails come from a friend or colleague. If it’s from a random person then one is less likely to read it.

Andrew Faulkner
February 22nd, 2007
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The to-be infected customers of viral e-mail seem to have become immune …

Johan
February 23rd, 2007
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I hate that e-mails, well I do not hate them if I asked for them, but mostly I didn’t ask for them.
(I got 954 unread messages in my hotmail box)
And yes indeed viral content isn’t dead, only the stupid mail…

YPM
March 25th, 2007
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