Computer maker Lenovo spread the word about its new notebook with a titillating scene aimed at legions of male computer nerds.

Released during the 2008 holiday season, a JC Penney sketch warned men to buy jewelry for the women in their lives if they wanted to avoid the doghouse.

One of the videos became a viral sensation, getting millions of views and attracting praise for creativity, and the other was panned as a sophomoric flop.

Which is which? More importantly, why? In the brave new world of viral marketing, this fine line between success and failure remains mysterious.

Lenovo created its video in-house, depicting two harried employees discussing the company's new portable workstation. One cubicle dweller tells the story of a late-night work session with a fellow female employee. The conversation turns to the stuff of geek urban legends, with the attractive co-worker stripping off articles of clothing. Through deft editing, there's not much to see, but one's imagination fills in the blanks.

The video touts the gee-whiz aspects of the new workstation, but the amateur production and frat-boy humor earned Lenovo some negative coverage from influential tech bloggers. Erica Ogg, writing on Cnet.com's Crave blog, called the video "lame." She said that while the humor wasn't particularly shocking, the video "makes clear one thing: Lenovo's talents lie in selling huge volumes of ThinkPads to business customers, and notably not in making a smart, hip Internet video."

For the 2008 holiday season, JC Penney worked with advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi to produce "Beware of the Doghouse," a video with its own Web site and Facebook application. According to Quinton Crenshaw, a spokesperson for the retailer, the Web site logged more than 7 million visitors and more than 14 million video views in one month.

"The video definitely took on a life of its own," he said.

And that's the beauty of viral marketing. Whether it's a video or an online coupon, an effective viral marketing campaign spreads beyond the control of its makers.

However, a marketing misstep can take on a life of its own as offended customers, activists, and commentators create a backlash that can wind up on the evening news or in the corporate boardroom.

story continues below... advertisement
		The Best Retail Customer Experiences 2009 Find out which retailers consumers crowned their favorites in five different categories across eight different retail segments. Get authoritative analysis from members of the Retail Customer Experience Advisory Panel on why these retailers are succeeding. And learn which retail technologies win over customers — and which ones don't matter.     Order your copy today!

Although viral marketing is still an elusive science, successful campaigns avoid common mistakes that can make a company seem tone deaf at best and, at worse, damage their brand.

Mistake No. 1: Not knowing your audience

Marketing is marketing, be it viral or otherwise, and the same rules apply. Know to whom you're talking and why.

Jumping unannounced into the online world with a blunt message is akin to a blowhard hijacking a conversation at a party, cautions Todd Defren, principal of Shift Communications and blogger for PR-Squared.com.

"If you spend six months listening and engaging with people, it will become much more obvious to the company what types of campaigns are going to make sense," Defren said. "The campaigns that fail haven't figured out what the audience is going to care about."

Find out where your customers already spend time online and engage them there, recommends Victor Chen, author of "Bookmercial Marketing" and a branding consultant. Consumers are already on Facebook, Twitter, Yelp and other social networking sites and communities, and they're talking about their experiences with various brands.

"People online have a powerful voice and brands that ignore it (do so) at their peril," he said. "A retailer's attitude should be if you can't beat them, join them."

Lay groundwork for a successful viral campaign by becoming a trusted member of a community beforehand, Defren says. Build the relationships first, then start the marketing.

"To become a community member, show yourself to be deferential, respectful, funny and human, and then whatever you come out with is more likely to get a favorable review, even if it's not necessarily the best content," he said.

JC Penny launched its Doghouse campaign based on the success of previous viral campaigns targeted to the teen market.

"If those are the customers you're marketing to, you have to be out there," Crenshaw said. "It's important for us to be in their face."

Mistake No 2: Keeping control

It's not viral until the sender loses control of it. That can be hard for retailers such as JC Penney that traditionally keep a tight rein on their brand image. But in this case, losing control of the message means success.

"Any viral campaign is a risk," Crenshaw said. "No matter what, it goes beyond your control."

Once a video or other message goes viral, people share it with friends, talk it about it on blogs and social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace, as well as Twitter and other microblogging sites. People may even make parodies or add their own soundtrack or commentaries on YouTube.

One way to involve consumers is to have them create or vote on content. Internet registrar GoDaddy.com asked consumers to vote on the ending for its Super Bowl commercial. Doritos asked consumers to create ads for the big game as well. Involvement helps create a sense of community with consumers.

"That way the bloggers who would have criticized the campaign become part of the process," Chen said. "Traditional advertising and marketing people are not used to letting consumer have input. They like to control the message and cram it down the consumer"s throat."

Mistake No. 3: Getting offended

Hollywood agents used to say, "Any publicity is good publicity, as long as they spell the name right." When a campaign truly goes viral, companies must be ready to swallow some negative responses in the rough-and-tumble online environment, where consumers type words they'd never say in person.

"In an uncontrolled environment, we knew we would get some folks who didn't find our video to be as humorous as other people did," Crenshaw said.

A thick skin is standard equipment these days. Bloggers and the media may question the motives behind the campaign and challenge the competency of anyone who disagrees. The company's reaction, as well as the inflammatory commentary, will live forever in cyberspace.

"Will a company be respectful and prompt in their responses, or will they be defensive and have the issue gather more steam?" said Defren. "Either way, the next time someone does a search on the brand they'll see that response."

Mistake No. 4: Faking it

The collective private investigating capability of the blogosphere is very efficient and very brutal.

In the early days of viral videos, companies set up actors as real people, talking about their lives and their experiences with products. When viewers found out the stories they'd followed were actually scripted commercials, the backlash was fast and furious.

"The collective private investigating capability of the blogosphere is very efficient and very brutal," Chen said. "The easiest way to have a successful viral campaign is to make it authentic and real. People can tell, especially online, what's real and what's fake."

For the Doghouse video, JC Penney opted for TV-quality production values. On the other hand, one of the criticisms of the Lenovo video was the low-budget nature of the production that clashed with the high-tech nature of the brand.

One way around that is to have consumer-generated content.

"If you can involve your customers in the process, that works well," Chen said. "Having an ad agency pretend to be customers and do viral videos always back fires."

Mistake No. 5: Lacking a solid strategy

In developing the Doghouse campaign, JC Penney built on solid consumer research that says most engagements take place during the holidays, and men look for guidance in buying gifts that will keep them out of the doghouse with their wives.

"We launched it as a creative way to generate awareness about our fine jewelry assortment, and we wanted to do it in a way that would create awareness about JC Penney as a whole," Crenshaw said.

Meanwhile, Lenovo's mildly racy video was branded NSFW, or Not Safe For Work, by some bloggers, which meant its intended audience shouldn't view it while on the job. However, the video did get credit for actually showing off the product's considerable attributes, such as a slide-out secondary screen.

Blogger Ogg commented, "This product is entirely remarkable on its own merits, and requires no suggestive video to be noticed."

Of course, even JC Penney's successful video drew its share of detractors, who felt it demeaned women, men and even doghouses. But the few negative comments didn't outshine the success.

"We had a lot of people saying the video was hilarious and passing it on, and we think the value of that is quite priceless," Crenshaw said.

Humor seems to be key to most successful viral campaigns, but it also has to be relevant to the audience.

"A lot of advertising folks forget the relevant part," Chen said. "If a campaign is funny but completely unrelated, it doesn't do anything for sales and probably damages the brand a little bit."

Finding that balance can make or break a campaign.

"If a video is not funny, it doesn't go viral, but if it goes viral but it's not relevant, it doesn't do anything for the bottom line," Chen said. "If it can be funny and entertaining and it's relevant, then that's a home run."