Blog

Airlines are loving Twitter.

Just for fun, we built a site to track what Airlines are doing on Twitter.  Using the Twitter API and Google Graphs, we can monitor how many followers airlines have, as well as what they're tweeting.



http://airlinesontwitter.com/

We chat to Bruce Clay about the future of SEO, Google and Social Networks.
Bruce Clay runs one of the largest SEO companies in the world today.
Watch the video

Here we chat to Rand Fishkin, SEO Moz founder, about the future of Google, Social Media and Social Networking
Watch the video...

We interviewed Dennis Yu from Blitz Local, a few weeks ago at SMX Sydney, about the monetisation of Social Media campaigns.
Watch the video.
Some really interesting comments in here...! 

We interview Sydney locals about their use of Social Media and Social Networking sites
 

Sexy use of interactive technologies for a Viral Campaign.

In this campaign Mentos are making use of some great filmwork, to draw the user into the viral experience. 

Some casual searching on Google Insights gave this interesting fact. The number of people searching for the term “social networking sites” is really starting to take off.

Take a look at this graph from Google.

That is an exciting graph. In the last year it appears that has doubled. And in the last two years that amount of searches have more than quadrupled.

Not only is this happening for searches for Web 2.0 companies but for buyouts of smaller Web 2.0 companies as well.

For example just a week ago twitter, a microblogging website, with no income, got an offer for $500 million and turned it down.

Additionally businesses seem to be getting more and more interested in social networking for their business. This article from the August Newsweek shows businesses how they can have social marketing being a marketing tool.

The increasing traffic, high values, and personal and business importance are just going to prove that Web 2.0 is here to stay.

SHIFT Interactive is a Web 2.0 design agency in Sydney Australia. We specialise in harnessing what the Version 2 web technology provides including:

• Viral marketing Sydney Australia
• Flash Games Sydney Australia
• Corporate Blogging Sydney Australia
• Viral Video Campaigns Sydney Australia
• Web 2.0 Sydney Australia
• Social Media Sydney Australia
• Social Networking Sydney Australia

Viral marketing and viral advertising refer to marketing techniques that use social media and social networks to produce increases in brand awareness and product sales through digital viral processes, analogous to the spread of pathological and computer viruses.

It can be word-of-mouth delivered or enhanced by the network effects of the Internet.  Viral marketing is a marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message voluntarily.  Viral promotions may take the form of video clips, corporate blogging, interactive Flash games, advergames, ebooks, brandable software, images, or even text messages. 

Using Viral Marketing can be an incredibly powerful technique to increase exposure for your company. The term was coined by a Harvard Business School professor, Jeffrey Rayport, in an article for Fast Company called "The Virus of Marketing" in December 1996.

The very nature of the internet actually encourages viral marketing techniques - eyegrabbing graphics and animations, and animations will engage a user with your Viral.

And the fact that everything is connected on the web, one corporate blog post, one photo, video or article can spread like a virus.  SO, if you create a campaign targeted to this specific end, your virus can become a very positive thing for your company!

Create something like a Flash Game to engage your user and encourage them to play again and again, then forward that game to their friends, and you've created your viral campaign, something that spreads through the veins of the communication paths of the internet.

Some Typical examples of Viral Marketing avenues and techniques:

+ Social Media channels, such as DIGG, Mixx, and Reddit
+ Social Network sites, such as mySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn
+ Viral Flash Games
+ Email Campaigns
+ Advertising Campaigns and games
+ Interactive Multimedia campaigns, using SMS, Telephony and Internet

These are all classic Web 2.0 techniques - every effective campaign will harness all the potential of the Web 2.0 world.