In any business venture, the amount of customers is what always keeps the business alive. No matter how good the product maybe if it is not attracting a significant amount of patrons, then it is tantamount to being unsuccessful. True, whatever the industry maybe, strength of marketing is key to making the business last long-term. Any marketing strategy may not target the entire audience at once. In fact, it is probably impossible to reach all potential customers directly. Instead, what has been proven to be a very powerful tool more than anything is word-of-mouth, now popularly termed as buzz marketing. Not only does it save the business owner time, effort, and monetary investment as it usually happens spontaneously, it is undoubtedly the most credible compared to the rest. Several researches show that information communicated via buzz marketing is more likely to be believed as an honest one over those other promotional methods which are conventional and formal. This is mainly the reason why, in this technology-driven world, such concept on buzz marketing is being employed by website owners to increase traffic to their sites. What really is important is to generate as much attention and interest as possible from a variety of audiences located anywhere in the world. In line with the credibility factor that buzz marketing brings, several website owners resort to hiring people who are only tasked to create online buzz about the site. So how does these buzz marketing guys go about with their jobs? Basically, their main goal is to penetrate into the web social network and spread the information there. There are various sites that are commonly visited for social purposes and these are often what buzz marketing guys frequently visit. Examples are various chat rooms, Friendster, blogs, community forums, employment search websites, online stores, and many others. For instance, buzz marketing guys would go around several forums starting threads about topics that may directly or indirectly link to the website. Some guys explicitly write down the site as a recommendation for others to visit while citing briefly his personal experience of going through it. Others prefer more subtle and implicit methods and begin the thread by making a controversy or curiosity out of the website. For example, some would quote certain parts of the website and ask others what they think about it, sounding like it is a mere inquiry on his part. Others may write down interesting statements such as a commentary on a certain website, drawing the rest to the site to actually see where the commentary is coming from. Through the years, this kind of strategy has been effective since, nowadays, the World Wide Web is undoubtedly becoming a primary refuge for those seeking to have any social involvement or participation. Other buzz marketing guys prefer to exert efforts on a targeted basis. One way is to read certain blogs that may have any relation to the promoted website, and post comments urging the blog owner to actually visit the website. If the blog owner becomes satisfied with what he has seen in the website, more often than not, he will write down a relevant post and the chain of buzz goes on and on. There are still many other ways of creating buzz over the internet and, therefore, increasing traffic. Whatever the methods maybe, these buzz marketing guys remain focused on their goal of reaching more and more people by tapping into their curiosity and giving them satisfaction so that in effect, they will voluntary, and perhaps unconsciously, help in the task of marketing to others. No doubt, this basic principle of buzz marketing is still very much relevant in this technology-driven world. |