Detailed Proposal

Detailed Proposal: Advertising

How successful are viral marketing techniques at creating interest and publicity for a product?

Teacher approval granted.

Principal Texts:

• Cloverfield (2008); film, teaser/viral marketing campaign, internet used heavily in promotion, 'drip-drip' of information
• 'Gorilla' - Cadbury's Dairy Milk (2007); widespread internet popularisation
• 28 Weeks Later (2007); film, viral advertising, stealth aspects, unusual campaign
• 'Subservient Chicken' - Burger King (2004); interactive viral marketing campaign, popular yet unsuccesful at promoting product
• The Blair Witch Project (1999); film, viral marketing campaign, internet used heavily in promotion
• Mentos (2007); consumer produced videos created more publicity than the company had themselves
• 'Colour Like No Other' - Sony Bravia (2007); extremely popular series of videos spread over the internet as well as being shown on TV
• 'Evolution' and 'Onslaught' - Dove (2008); widely spread viral videos, successful for contreversial subject matter

I chose this topic as it is both relevant in the industry at this time and relevant from a consumer perspective. It's also interesting to discover the lengths at which corporations now go to create hype for their product.

The audience for this study would be varied, reflecting each individual campaigns' target audience.

Media Theories;
Audience - how the audience reacts/their opinions to marketing campaigns.
Institution - institutional benefits of newer advertising techniques.
Forms and Conventions - to what extent do newer forms of advertising rely on 'breaking the mould'
Representations - how are institutions, and to a lesser degree products, portrayed in campaigns

Potential research sources (secondary);

• 'Connected Marketing: The Viral, Buzz and Word of Mouth Revolution' - Book; Justin Kirby and Paul Marsden
• 'Word of Mouth Advertising Online & Off: How to Spark Buzz, Excitement, and Free Publicity for Your Business or Organisation with Little or No Money' - Book; Lynn Thorne
• 'Guerrilla Marketing, 4th edition: Easy and Inexpensive Strategies for Making Big Profits from Your Small Business' - Book; Jay Conrad Levinson
• 'The New Rules of Marketing and PR: How to Use News Releases, Blogs, Podcasting, Viral Marketing and Online Media to Reach Buyers Directly' - Book; David Meerman Scott
• GoViral.com; website which covers viral marketing campaigns that are currently active
• YouTube; website used as a platform for various strategies, large contributor to 'word-of-mouth' spreading
• Hanso Foundation; website that took centrestage in the 'Lost' Alternate Reality Game

Potential research sources (primary);

• 'Dexter' Ad. Campaign experiment - active testing of a viral campaign with reactions recorded in the form of a questionnaire.
• Focus Group - collection of advertisements from both the internet and television shown to a focus group, reactions and opinions recorded
• Textual Analysis - analysis of a few campaigns including adverts/teaser/guerrilla/ARG examples