When it comes to an online marketing strategy, every company dreams of going ‘viral’. Whether it’s a youtube video or an entire marketing campaign, organizations hope that the online community will do the mass marketing for them…for free. Some content goes viral without even intending to, while other companies will do everything possible to include components for viral success, with the result being nothing more than a handful of tweets.
This success story is an original one though. The XX released their second album on September 3 but instead of the traditional radio release, record stores, itunes, and as much mainstream publicity as possible, they only released it to one person. The unique part, however, is that it was released through a web app that visually tracked the streaming of the album across the globe. So as that single fan shared it with a few of his/her friends, and they shared it with a few of theirs, everyone could see in real time where this album was going.
There are hundreds of articles written about how to make your content go viral and it seems as though company’s like Smartwater have read them all. But the simple honest truth is it just has to be something new, creative and original…something that has never been done before. People didn’t facebook/tweet/email The XX’s album because the music was great, they did it because the story behind it was unique and awesome. They didn’t share the music, they shared the experience of being a part of the visual network unfolding on the map in front of them.
Just as, after the invention of the camera, artists started painting about the act of painting, The XX sent their album viral by utilizing the concept of viral marketing itself.