WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.799 Okay, picture this. It's June 2023. You're on 00:00:03.799 --> 00:00:05.700 your couch. Maybe it's a Tuesday night, long 00:00:05.700 --> 00:00:08.720 day. You pull out your phone. You get that blue 00:00:08.720 --> 00:00:10.660 light on your face and you just start scrolling. 00:00:10.839 --> 00:00:13.679 The classic doom scroll. The classic doom scroll. 00:00:13.980 --> 00:00:17.379 You're on TikTok, maybe Instagram Reels. You're 00:00:17.379 --> 00:00:19.379 just minding your own business, you know, looking 00:00:19.379 --> 00:00:21.719 for a good lasagna recipe or maybe one of those 00:00:21.719 --> 00:00:24.920 oddly satisfying power washing videos. Oh, I 00:00:24.920 --> 00:00:28.140 love those. So soothing. Right. The algorithm. 00:00:28.760 --> 00:00:30.920 Usually knows what you need. Usually. But then 00:00:30.920 --> 00:00:33.280 all of a sudden it throws you this massive curveball. 00:00:33.479 --> 00:00:37.259 You see a teenager and they're holding this bright 00:00:37.259 --> 00:00:40.539 purple milkshake. Super vibrant, like almost 00:00:40.539 --> 00:00:43.320 radioactive purple. Exactly. They look at the 00:00:43.320 --> 00:00:45.159 camera. They give that classic innocent social 00:00:45.159 --> 00:00:47.359 media smile. They take a sip and they go, happy 00:00:47.359 --> 00:00:49.359 birthday, Grimace. And that's when it all goes 00:00:49.359 --> 00:00:51.340 wrong. The music just cuts. The camera starts 00:00:51.340 --> 00:00:53.960 shaking like crazy. And the next shot is something 00:00:53.960 --> 00:00:55.719 straight out of a found footage horror movie. 00:00:56.159 --> 00:00:58.119 Like, think the Blair Witch Project. Yeah, a 00:00:58.119 --> 00:01:01.299 total tunnel shift. That same teenager is now 00:01:01.299 --> 00:01:03.520 lying on the ground. Maybe they're, I don't know, 00:01:03.600 --> 00:01:06.379 draped over a park bench in a playground at night 00:01:06.379 --> 00:01:10.159 or slumped in some grimy alleyway. And they are 00:01:10.159 --> 00:01:13.370 just... Absolutely drenched. Drenched in this 00:01:13.370 --> 00:01:15.890 purple goo. It looks like a crime scene. A very, 00:01:15.930 --> 00:01:18.609 very purple crime scene. It really does. They're 00:01:18.609 --> 00:01:21.989 pretending to be dead or like possessed. Some 00:01:21.989 --> 00:01:24.209 of them are foaming at the mouth with this purple 00:01:24.209 --> 00:01:27.150 sludge. The whole vibe is that something terrible, 00:01:27.310 --> 00:01:29.370 something supernatural just happened to them. 00:01:29.450 --> 00:01:31.670 All from a fast food milkshake. All because of 00:01:31.670 --> 00:01:33.590 the milkshake. Yeah. And this was the grimmest 00:01:33.590 --> 00:01:36.450 shake trend. And it wasn't just a few weird art 00:01:36.450 --> 00:01:39.319 kids doing this. This was a tidal wave. It was 00:01:39.319 --> 00:01:41.900 absolutely everywhere. Millions and millions 00:01:41.900 --> 00:01:43.939 of views. People were basically creating these 00:01:43.939 --> 00:01:46.780 little high production mini horror films where 00:01:46.780 --> 00:01:49.540 the main villain was a McDonald's beverage. Which 00:01:49.540 --> 00:01:51.939 is, I mean, it's a bizarre image to start with, 00:01:51.980 --> 00:01:54.379 I totally admit. It sounds like a total fever 00:01:54.379 --> 00:01:57.200 dream. Right. But it's actually the perfect, 00:01:57.319 --> 00:02:00.180 and I mean perfect, entry point for this whole 00:02:00.180 --> 00:02:02.239 stack of research we have on the desk today. 00:02:02.439 --> 00:02:04.900 Because here's the kicker about that whole purple 00:02:04.900 --> 00:02:06.780 goo incident that you really have to understand. 00:02:07.159 --> 00:02:10.129 What's that? McDonald's didn't pitch that. No. 00:02:10.169 --> 00:02:12.949 Right. They didn't have a marketing team sit 00:02:12.949 --> 00:02:15.969 in a boardroom in Chicago looking at a PowerPoint 00:02:15.969 --> 00:02:18.870 and say, hey, got a great idea. Yeah. Let's have 00:02:18.870 --> 00:02:21.050 our customers pretend our new product just killed 00:02:21.050 --> 00:02:23.090 them. Exactly. I mean, can you imagine if an 00:02:23.090 --> 00:02:25.310 ad agency actually pitched that? They'd be fired 00:02:25.310 --> 00:02:28.629 on the spot. Come drink our new shake. It's fatal. 00:02:28.930 --> 00:02:31.900 Yeah. It's a. That's traditionally considered 00:02:31.900 --> 00:02:34.560 a PR nightmare. It's the opposite of good PR. 00:02:34.680 --> 00:02:36.639 It's the exact opposite of what you want. You 00:02:36.639 --> 00:02:39.219 want people to drink the shake and smile, not 00:02:39.219 --> 00:02:41.419 drink the shake and start convulsing on the pavement. 00:02:41.560 --> 00:02:44.340 And yet, look at what happened. This is the whole 00:02:44.340 --> 00:02:47.180 paradox we're digging into today. McDonald's 00:02:47.180 --> 00:02:50.780 completely inadvertently benefited from it. Massively. 00:02:50.780 --> 00:02:53.300 Sales shot up. Sales were boosted in a huge way. 00:02:53.479 --> 00:02:55.900 And they stayed high right up until the promotion 00:02:55.900 --> 00:02:59.340 ended on June 29th. The company even had to acknowledge 00:02:59.340 --> 00:03:02.150 it eventually. What did they say? They posted 00:03:02.150 --> 00:03:04.650 on Twitter as the character Grimace and said, 00:03:04.770 --> 00:03:07.969 me pretending I don't see the Grimace shape trend. 00:03:08.310 --> 00:03:10.949 They just sort of leaned into the chaos. And 00:03:10.949 --> 00:03:13.229 that right there, that's it. That's the beautiful, 00:03:13.389 --> 00:03:16.629 chaotic, and let's be honest, sometimes terrifying 00:03:16.629 --> 00:03:18.889 world of viral marketing. It's totally unpredictable. 00:03:19.250 --> 00:03:23.099 It's messy. And when it works. Boy, does it work 00:03:23.099 --> 00:03:25.560 better than almost anything else. It really does. 00:03:25.680 --> 00:03:27.620 So for this deep dive, we're going to unpack 00:03:27.620 --> 00:03:30.319 exactly what that mechanism is. We're not just 00:03:30.319 --> 00:03:32.900 looking at funny videos or memes today. No, we're 00:03:32.900 --> 00:03:35.300 looking at the purple goo of the marketing world. 00:03:35.379 --> 00:03:37.180 We're going to look at the psychology behind 00:03:37.180 --> 00:03:39.400 why we share this stuff, the history of where 00:03:39.400 --> 00:03:42.639 this whole idea even came from. And spoiler alert, 00:03:42.740 --> 00:03:46.830 it involves the 90s and... Failed Australian 00:03:46.830 --> 00:03:49.430 pop stars. I can't wait to get to that. And the 00:03:49.430 --> 00:03:52.110 actual nuts and bolts mechanics of how an idea 00:03:52.110 --> 00:03:54.990 can infect an entire population. I love that 00:03:54.990 --> 00:03:57.669 word you used in the notes there. Infect. Because 00:03:57.669 --> 00:03:59.629 that's really at the core of the whole definition, 00:03:59.710 --> 00:04:01.530 isn't it? It sounds a little clinical for something 00:04:01.530 --> 00:04:03.849 that involves, you know, cat videos and milkshakes. 00:04:04.129 --> 00:04:06.669 Oh, it is clinical. The terminology is borrowed 00:04:06.669 --> 00:04:09.909 literally from epidemiology. If we're going to 00:04:09.909 --> 00:04:14.000 define viral marketing strictly, you know. Based 00:04:14.000 --> 00:04:15.819 on the literature we've got here, we're talking 00:04:15.819 --> 00:04:18.019 about a business strategy that uses existing 00:04:18.019 --> 00:04:20.600 social networks to promote a product. Okay. But 00:04:20.600 --> 00:04:24.139 the name is literal. It refers to how consumers 00:04:24.139 --> 00:04:26.819 spread information about a product to other people 00:04:26.819 --> 00:04:29.939 in the exact same way that a biological virus 00:04:29.939 --> 00:04:32.600 spreads from one host to another. So wait, in 00:04:32.600 --> 00:04:35.180 this analogy, the product, the milkshake, the 00:04:35.180 --> 00:04:37.639 funny video, whatever it is, that's the pathogen. 00:04:37.720 --> 00:04:39.899 Yes, the product is the pathogen. And you, the 00:04:39.899 --> 00:04:41.939 listener, and me, and everyone scrolling on their 00:04:41.939 --> 00:04:43.509 phones, we are the pathogen. As a host. As a 00:04:43.509 --> 00:04:45.629 host. Okay, that makes me feel a little bit used, 00:04:45.709 --> 00:04:47.310 but I get it. Well, it's all about something 00:04:47.310 --> 00:04:50.089 called propagativity. Propagativity. That is 00:04:50.089 --> 00:04:52.470 a mouthful. It's the technical term. It measures 00:04:52.470 --> 00:04:55.089 how easily consumers can redistribute content. 00:04:55.410 --> 00:04:58.050 See, the goal isn't to just broadcast a message 00:04:58.050 --> 00:05:00.730 to a million people from one central tower, like 00:05:00.730 --> 00:05:03.110 a Super Bowl ad. Right. The goal is to create 00:05:03.110 --> 00:05:05.370 a message that appeals to individuals who have 00:05:05.370 --> 00:05:08.269 high social networking potential. They call it 00:05:08.269 --> 00:05:12.639 SMP. SMP. Okay. Break that down for me. High 00:05:12.639 --> 00:05:16.519 social networking potential. So this just means 00:05:16.519 --> 00:05:18.839 people who talk to a lot of other people, people 00:05:18.839 --> 00:05:21.459 with a lot of friends. Exactly. You want to infect 00:05:21.459 --> 00:05:23.740 the people who are most likely to infect other 00:05:23.740 --> 00:05:26.139 people. You're basically outsourcing your entire 00:05:26.139 --> 00:05:28.519 distribution network to the audience. You are 00:05:28.519 --> 00:05:31.360 making them do the work for you. For free. For 00:05:31.360 --> 00:05:34.540 free. Which sounds incredible for the company's 00:05:34.540 --> 00:05:36.560 balance sheet. For sure. You don't have to pay 00:05:36.560 --> 00:05:38.220 for the airtime if I'm putting it on my Instagram 00:05:38.220 --> 00:05:40.540 story for nothing. Precisely. But there's a catch, 00:05:40.680 --> 00:05:43.480 and it's a big one. When you outsource your distribution 00:05:43.480 --> 00:05:46.500 to the audience, you also outsource the narrative. 00:05:46.819 --> 00:05:49.819 And that's when the audience decides your product 00:05:49.819 --> 00:05:52.759 is a lethal popel sludge. That's the risk, the 00:05:52.759 --> 00:05:54.800 mutation of the virus. But as we're going to 00:05:54.800 --> 00:05:57.639 see, that high risk often leads to an incredibly 00:05:57.639 --> 00:06:00.300 high reward. Okay, so before we get into the 00:06:00.300 --> 00:06:02.680 psychology of why on earth we behave like this, 00:06:02.740 --> 00:06:04.600 let's rewind a bit. Because while the Grimace 00:06:04.600 --> 00:06:08.160 Shake feels very... Yeah, you know, very Gen 00:06:08.160 --> 00:06:13.220 Z, very 2023. Very TikTok. Very TikTok. But the 00:06:13.220 --> 00:06:15.959 actual concept of viral marketing didn't start 00:06:15.959 --> 00:06:18.839 there. It has roots that go back a few decades. 00:06:19.079 --> 00:06:21.360 Oh, yeah, it does. To really understand the theory, 00:06:21.480 --> 00:06:24.160 you have to go back to the 1990s. This was the 00:06:24.160 --> 00:06:27.360 era where this field of medics was really peaking 00:06:27.360 --> 00:06:29.579 in popularity. Medics? Okay. This is Richard 00:06:29.579 --> 00:06:31.699 Dawkins, right? From the book The Selfish Gene. 00:06:31.839 --> 00:06:34.699 That's the one. Dawkins actually coined the term 00:06:34.699 --> 00:06:37.480 meme. Way back in the 70s, but it was in the 00:06:37.480 --> 00:06:40.040 90s that it really caught fire as a way to understand 00:06:40.040 --> 00:06:42.800 culture. The theory is that ideas themselves, 00:06:43.259 --> 00:06:46.019 memes, behave like living organisms. Okay. They 00:06:46.019 --> 00:06:48.220 compete for survival in our brains and in our 00:06:48.220 --> 00:06:50.879 conversations, just like genes compete in the 00:06:50.879 --> 00:06:53.220 process of evolution. So like a catchy jingle 00:06:53.220 --> 00:06:55.519 is a strong gene. It survives because it's good 00:06:55.519 --> 00:06:57.879 at replicating itself? Exactly that. It creates 00:06:57.879 --> 00:06:59.779 a copy of itself in your brain. You start humming 00:06:59.779 --> 00:07:02.550 it. Then you hum it near a friend. Now, boom, 00:07:02.709 --> 00:07:05.490 it's in their brain. It has successfully reproduced. 00:07:05.490 --> 00:07:07.910 It's basically survival of the fittest, but for 00:07:07.910 --> 00:07:10.790 cash phrases and fashion trends and ideas. And 00:07:10.790 --> 00:07:12.350 of course, marketers looked at this and just 00:07:12.350 --> 00:07:15.399 saw dollar signs. Of course they did. In 1996, 00:07:15.759 --> 00:07:18.259 a guy named Jeffrey Rayport wrote a huge article 00:07:18.259 --> 00:07:20.639 for Fast Company called The Virus of Marketing. 00:07:21.000 --> 00:07:23.600 You had media critics like Douglas Rushkoff writing 00:07:23.600 --> 00:07:26.500 about media viruses. They were literally looking 00:07:26.500 --> 00:07:28.879 at biology textbooks and saying, hey, how can 00:07:28.879 --> 00:07:32.040 we do this in a magazine ad? They wanted to engineer 00:07:32.040 --> 00:07:34.209 a contagion. That's pretty much it. Yeah. They 00:07:34.209 --> 00:07:36.470 wanted to create something that was self -replicating. 00:07:36.649 --> 00:07:39.649 And if you want a really early and kind of weird 00:07:39.649 --> 00:07:41.930 example of this in the real world, this is before 00:07:41.930 --> 00:07:44.069 the Internet really got its hooks into us. Yeah. 00:07:44.189 --> 00:07:46.110 We have to talk about a guy named Marcus Montana. 00:07:46.810 --> 00:07:49.490 Marcus Montana. The name sounds like a movie 00:07:49.490 --> 00:07:51.910 star or maybe a character from an Australian 00:07:51.910 --> 00:07:54.829 soap opera like Neighbors or Home and Away. Well, 00:07:54.910 --> 00:07:58.149 he was an Australian pop singer or he tried to 00:07:58.149 --> 00:08:00.579 be. This is a great. Case study and just generating 00:08:00.579 --> 00:08:02.879 noise with kind of no substance behind it. In 00:08:02.879 --> 00:08:05.579 early 1989, people in Sydney started seeing these 00:08:05.579 --> 00:08:08.879 posters everywhere. Thousands of them. And all 00:08:08.879 --> 00:08:11.879 they said was, Marcus is coming. Marcus is coming. 00:08:11.959 --> 00:08:15.379 No picture of him. No buy his new album. No date. 00:08:15.839 --> 00:08:18.139 Absolutely no context at all. Just that phrase, 00:08:18.379 --> 00:08:20.980 Marcus is coming. That sounds almost ominous. 00:08:21.019 --> 00:08:23.259 Yeah. A little threatening. It does. And because 00:08:23.259 --> 00:08:27.100 we, as humans, are naturally curious creatures, 00:08:27.399 --> 00:08:30.579 we'd hate an information vacuum. It worked. It 00:08:30.579 --> 00:08:33.759 generated massive media interest. The whole community 00:08:33.759 --> 00:08:36.580 was talking about it at bus stops. Radio DJs 00:08:36.580 --> 00:08:38.799 were on the air asking, who is Marcus? What is 00:08:38.799 --> 00:08:41.419 coming? It was this huge mystery. It's that classic 00:08:41.419 --> 00:08:44.220 teaser campaign. It creates an information gap 00:08:44.220 --> 00:08:46.340 that your brain... is just desperate to close. 00:08:46.460 --> 00:08:48.200 You just have to know the answer. It is. And 00:08:48.200 --> 00:08:50.120 it was successful in a way. It made his musical 00:08:50.120 --> 00:08:52.679 debut a major talking point. When he finally 00:08:52.679 --> 00:08:55.779 arrived, everyone in Sydney knew his name. But, 00:08:55.860 --> 00:08:57.820 and here's the punchline and the big lesson, 00:08:58.019 --> 00:09:01.279 his music career was a complete and total failure. 00:09:01.500 --> 00:09:04.600 Ouch. So the virus spread, everyone caught the 00:09:04.600 --> 00:09:08.519 fever, but then the actual... disease was just 00:09:08.519 --> 00:09:11.559 like a mild cold the virus killed the host the 00:09:11.559 --> 00:09:13.759 marketing worked perfectly the product didn't 00:09:13.759 --> 00:09:16.639 and that's a really early crucial lesson in viral 00:09:16.639 --> 00:09:18.860 marketing you can get everyone talking about 00:09:18.860 --> 00:09:21.139 you you can spread the name but if the underlying 00:09:21.139 --> 00:09:24.659 host the product itself isn't strong the fame 00:09:24.659 --> 00:09:27.039 doesn't last it just evaporates it's like being 00:09:27.039 --> 00:09:28.960 famous for being famous but then you have nothing 00:09:28.960 --> 00:09:30.600 to say when they finally hand you the microphone 00:09:31.129 --> 00:09:33.210 That's a perfect way to put it. It was a holovirus. 00:09:33.409 --> 00:09:35.769 But then, a few years later, we get the blueprint. 00:09:36.070 --> 00:09:38.429 The one that actually worked. The one that every 00:09:38.429 --> 00:09:40.649 venture capitalist still dreams about today. 00:09:41.230 --> 00:09:45.830 We get Hotmail. Ah, yes. Hotmail. The OG of email 00:09:45.830 --> 00:09:48.500 services. I think I still have an old Hotmail 00:09:48.500 --> 00:09:50.360 account somewhere, probably just filled with 00:09:50.360 --> 00:09:52.980 newsletters I never read and some deeply embarrassing 00:09:52.980 --> 00:09:55.419 emails from high school. I think we all do. I 00:09:55.419 --> 00:09:58.379 have to remember, back in 96, 97, web -based 00:09:58.379 --> 00:10:01.720 email was revolutionary. Before Hotmail, your 00:10:01.720 --> 00:10:05.220 email was tied to your ISP. If you had AOL, you 00:10:05.220 --> 00:10:08.220 had an AOL address. If you changed your internet 00:10:08.220 --> 00:10:10.240 provider... You lost your email address. It was 00:10:10.240 --> 00:10:11.960 like your phone number being tied to your actual 00:10:11.960 --> 00:10:15.500 house. If you moved, you lost the number. Exactly. 00:10:15.700 --> 00:10:17.580 Hotmail was the first time you could take it 00:10:17.580 --> 00:10:19.779 with you. It was free. It was accessible from 00:10:19.779 --> 00:10:22.539 anywhere. But they were a startup. They didn't 00:10:22.539 --> 00:10:24.559 have a massive budget to tell everyone about 00:10:24.559 --> 00:10:27.080 this. They couldn't buy Super Bowl ads. So what 00:10:27.080 --> 00:10:29.279 was the strategy? How did they grow? Their growth 00:10:29.279 --> 00:10:32.600 strategy was, well, it was pure genius in its 00:10:32.600 --> 00:10:35.299 simplicity. It was actually defined by Tim Draper 00:10:35.299 --> 00:10:37.220 and Steve Jurvetson, the venture capitalists 00:10:37.220 --> 00:10:39.360 who were backing them. They realized they didn't 00:10:39.360 --> 00:10:42.519 need to buy billboards or TV ads. So what did 00:10:42.519 --> 00:10:44.360 they do? They just added a little tagline to 00:10:44.360 --> 00:10:47.419 the bottom of every single email sent by a Hotmail 00:10:47.419 --> 00:10:49.700 user. Oh, I remember this. Get your free email 00:10:49.700 --> 00:10:52.419 at Hotmail. That's it. So simple. Clickable. 00:10:52.909 --> 00:10:55.389 Every single time you sent an email to a friend 00:10:55.389 --> 00:10:58.070 or a colleague, you were advertising Hotmail 00:10:58.070 --> 00:11:01.070 to them. You became the salesperson. And because 00:11:01.070 --> 00:11:03.409 it came from a friend, you trusted it more. It 00:11:03.409 --> 00:11:06.149 wasn't spam. It wasn't a cold call. It was just 00:11:06.149 --> 00:11:08.710 there, part of the message. Correct. And the 00:11:08.710 --> 00:11:10.610 numbers, I mean, they're just staggering. In 00:11:10.610 --> 00:11:14.090 18 months, they signed up 12 million users. 12 00:11:14.090 --> 00:11:17.389 million in the late 90s. In the late 90s, Internet, 00:11:17.549 --> 00:11:19.830 that's basically the entire population of the 00:11:19.830 --> 00:11:22.269 web at the time. At its peak, they were getting 00:11:22.269 --> 00:11:27.409 270 ,000 new accounts a day. That's just wild. 00:11:27.549 --> 00:11:30.429 And the cost to acquire each new customer must 00:11:30.429 --> 00:11:34.149 have been, I mean, pennies. Almost zero. That 00:11:34.149 --> 00:11:36.690 is the virus at work. The users are the carriers. 00:11:37.049 --> 00:11:40.470 Every single email sent was like a sneeze just 00:11:40.470 --> 00:11:42.870 spreading the infection to a new person. Okay, 00:11:42.909 --> 00:11:44.690 that analogy is a little gross, but it's very 00:11:44.690 --> 00:11:48.419 accurate. So if that's the mechanism. Using people 00:11:48.419 --> 00:11:50.820 to carry the message for you, we have to ask 00:11:50.820 --> 00:11:53.340 the bigger question, why? Why do we do it? What 00:11:53.340 --> 00:11:55.600 is happening in our lizard brains that makes 00:11:55.600 --> 00:11:57.740 us click share? And this is where we get into 00:11:57.740 --> 00:11:59.519 the psychology of it all, which is, to me, the 00:11:59.519 --> 00:12:01.379 most fascinating part. There's actually a biological 00:12:01.379 --> 00:12:03.620 component to this. It's not just a social habit. 00:12:03.700 --> 00:12:05.879 It's physiological. Biological. You mean like 00:12:05.879 --> 00:12:08.320 a physical reaction in your body? Yes. There's 00:12:08.320 --> 00:12:10.659 a concept called frisson. Frisson. Okay, that's 00:12:10.659 --> 00:12:12.399 a fancy word. It sounds French. Break that down 00:12:12.399 --> 00:12:16.100 for us. It is French. It means shiver. It's that 00:12:16.100 --> 00:12:18.299 primitive feeling of excitement. You know, the 00:12:18.299 --> 00:12:20.340 chills, your heart rate increases. You get that 00:12:20.340 --> 00:12:22.779 full body shiver. Professor Brent Coker from 00:12:22.779 --> 00:12:25.159 the University of Melbourne describes it as a 00:12:25.159 --> 00:12:27.559 primitive response that immerses the viewer on 00:12:27.559 --> 00:12:30.399 a much deeper level. Is that like ASMR or that 00:12:30.399 --> 00:12:32.360 feeling you get when you hear a really great 00:12:32.360 --> 00:12:35.159 key change in a song or when the beat drops in 00:12:35.159 --> 00:12:37.519 a dance track? That's exactly it. Or the jump 00:12:37.519 --> 00:12:40.200 scare in a horror movie. Or seeing an incredible 00:12:40.200 --> 00:12:43.269 athlete do something that seems impossible. It's 00:12:43.269 --> 00:12:45.990 a moment of high arousal and viral marketing 00:12:45.990 --> 00:12:49.210 taps directly into that. How so? If a piece of 00:12:49.210 --> 00:12:52.250 content can trigger that physical response, that 00:12:52.250 --> 00:12:55.389 little jolt of adrenaline or awe, you are so 00:12:55.389 --> 00:12:58.129 much more likely to share it. It completely bypasses 00:12:58.129 --> 00:12:59.789 your logical brain and hits you right in the 00:12:59.789 --> 00:13:02.070 emotional core. So it's almost like the content 00:13:02.070 --> 00:13:04.269 is hacking our nervous system. Yeah. It creates 00:13:04.269 --> 00:13:06.549 a feeling and then we want someone else to feel 00:13:06.549 --> 00:13:09.570 it too. I felt this. Now you need to feel this. 00:13:09.980 --> 00:13:13.080 In a way, yes. We share to process the emotion. 00:13:13.519 --> 00:13:15.919 We want someone else to validate that feeling 00:13:15.919 --> 00:13:18.519 we just had. And to break down exactly how to 00:13:18.519 --> 00:13:20.600 hack that system, we have to look at the work 00:13:20.600 --> 00:13:22.879 of Jonah Berger. He's a professor at the Wharton 00:13:22.879 --> 00:13:24.940 School, wrote a book called Contagious, and he 00:13:24.940 --> 00:13:29.340 developed a model called STEPPS. STEPPS. S -T 00:13:29.340 --> 00:13:32.059 -E -P -S. An acronym. An acronym for the six 00:13:32.059 --> 00:13:35.720 key drivers of virality. Okay, let's unpack STEPPS. 00:13:35.820 --> 00:13:38.480 What's the first S? The first S is for social 00:13:38.480 --> 00:13:41.049 currency. And this basically asks one question. 00:13:41.309 --> 00:13:45.090 Does sharing this make me look good? Ah, the 00:13:45.090 --> 00:13:47.149 vanity metric. Look how smart I am. Look how 00:13:47.149 --> 00:13:49.529 funny I am. Look how cool I am. It is vanity, 00:13:49.590 --> 00:13:52.049 but it's also about status. We share things that 00:13:52.049 --> 00:13:54.529 make us look like insiders. If I share a secret 00:13:54.529 --> 00:13:57.929 menu item at a cool restaurant or a bit of breaking 00:13:57.929 --> 00:14:00.190 news before anyone else has seen it, I gain social 00:14:00.190 --> 00:14:02.610 currency. I'm the person who knows the cool thing. 00:14:02.690 --> 00:14:05.090 I have value to my tribe because I have valuable 00:14:05.090 --> 00:14:07.309 information. Right. Look at me. I'm a tastemaker. 00:14:08.059 --> 00:14:10.759 It feeds the ego. If I share a hilarious meme, 00:14:11.000 --> 00:14:13.340 I get the credit for being funny, even though 00:14:13.340 --> 00:14:15.639 I didn't actually make it. Exactly. You're curating 00:14:15.639 --> 00:14:19.759 your own identity. Okay, so next up is T. T is 00:14:19.759 --> 00:14:23.860 for? Triggers. This is all about being top of 00:14:23.860 --> 00:14:27.600 mind. As Berger puts it, top of mind means tip 00:14:27.600 --> 00:14:30.299 of tongue. Okay, give me an example of a trigger. 00:14:30.500 --> 00:14:33.179 Peanut butter. Jelly. Exactly. You didn't even 00:14:33.179 --> 00:14:35.039 have to think about it. Peanut butter is a trigger 00:14:35.039 --> 00:14:37.299 for jelly. If your product can be linked to a 00:14:37.299 --> 00:14:39.480 common environmental trigger, people will think 00:14:39.480 --> 00:14:41.200 of it more often and they'll talk about it more 00:14:41.200 --> 00:14:44.019 often. Think about the classic Kit Kat and coffee 00:14:44.019 --> 00:14:46.429 campaign. Oh, right. Have a break. Have a Kit 00:14:46.429 --> 00:14:48.909 Kat. Precisely. They linked their candy bar to 00:14:48.909 --> 00:14:51.309 the very concept of taking a break or having 00:14:51.309 --> 00:14:53.809 a cup of coffee. So now every time you take a 00:14:53.809 --> 00:14:57.009 coffee break, your brain quietly whispers Kit 00:14:57.009 --> 00:14:59.129 Kat in the background. You don't even realize 00:14:59.129 --> 00:15:01.669 it's happening. The environment itself is advertising 00:15:01.669 --> 00:15:05.080 the product to you. That is. incredibly manipulative 00:15:05.080 --> 00:15:07.419 and also brilliant so you want to attach your 00:15:07.419 --> 00:15:09.379 brand to something people already do every single 00:15:09.379 --> 00:15:11.799 day yes if you can attach your brand to waking 00:15:11.799 --> 00:15:16.740 up or lunch time or even rainy days you win okay 00:15:16.740 --> 00:15:20.200 next is e e has to be for emotion emotion and 00:15:20.200 --> 00:15:23.159 this is a huge one the key phrase here is when 00:15:23.159 --> 00:15:26.740 people care they share But, and this is important, 00:15:26.960 --> 00:15:29.639 not all emotions are created equal in the sharing 00:15:29.639 --> 00:15:32.200 economy. What do you mean? Berger found that 00:15:32.200 --> 00:15:34.840 high arousal emotions work best. And interestingly, 00:15:34.980 --> 00:15:39.879 positive emotions like joy, happiness, awe, excitement, 00:15:40.059 --> 00:15:42.320 they tend to share much better than negative 00:15:42.320 --> 00:15:44.720 ones. That's actually kind of comforting that 00:15:44.720 --> 00:15:47.399 we prefer spreading joy over misery. Generally. 00:15:47.460 --> 00:15:50.399 Generally, yeah. Now, high arousal negative emotions 00:15:50.399 --> 00:15:52.820 like anger or anxiety can work too. Think about 00:15:52.820 --> 00:15:55.360 political outrage or content that makes you furious 00:15:55.360 --> 00:15:58.440 that stuff spreads like wildfire. But sadness, 00:15:58.539 --> 00:16:01.259 not so much. Why not sadness? Sadness is a low 00:16:01.259 --> 00:16:03.039 arousal emotion. It makes you want to withdraw, 00:16:03.299 --> 00:16:05.440 curl up in a blanket, and be alone. It doesn't 00:16:05.440 --> 00:16:07.059 make you want to jump on Facebook and tell everyone. 00:16:07.279 --> 00:16:09.899 That makes total sense. Sad ads just make me 00:16:09.899 --> 00:16:12.299 want to change the channel. Or look away. I don't 00:16:12.299 --> 00:16:13.820 immediately run to tell my friends about the 00:16:13.820 --> 00:16:16.370 sad puppy commercial. You mute it. Exactly. OK, 00:16:16.450 --> 00:16:19.649 so we have S -T -E. Now, the first P. First P. 00:16:19.710 --> 00:16:22.230 Public. This is the idea that imitation requires 00:16:22.230 --> 00:16:25.590 visibility. The easier something is to see, the 00:16:25.590 --> 00:16:27.870 more likely people are to imitate it. The perfect 00:16:27.870 --> 00:16:30.750 example is the white Apple iPod headphones from 00:16:30.750 --> 00:16:33.690 the early 2000s. Oh, iconic. Yeah. You knew someone 00:16:33.690 --> 00:16:36.070 had an iPod just from the white cords, even if 00:16:36.070 --> 00:16:38.210 the actual device was deep in their pocket. Exactly. 00:16:38.269 --> 00:16:41.159 Most headphones back then were black. By making 00:16:41.159 --> 00:16:44.399 them white, Apple made the private act of listening 00:16:44.399 --> 00:16:47.220 to music a public statement. They turned every 00:16:47.220 --> 00:16:49.580 single user into a walking billboard for their 00:16:49.580 --> 00:16:52.539 product. If your product is invisible, it can't 00:16:52.539 --> 00:16:54.740 go viral. You have to find a way to make the 00:16:54.740 --> 00:16:57.120 private public. So if I have a great software 00:16:57.120 --> 00:16:59.580 product but nobody can see me using it, it just 00:16:59.580 --> 00:17:02.200 dies. Basically, yeah. Okay, second P. Second 00:17:02.200 --> 00:17:05.609 P. Practical value. Is it actually useful? People 00:17:05.609 --> 00:17:08.109 love to help other people. If you send me a link 00:17:08.109 --> 00:17:10.630 to an article on top 10 ways to save money on 00:17:10.630 --> 00:17:14.650 your taxes or a video on how to peel garlic in 00:17:14.650 --> 00:17:16.930 10 seconds, I'm very likely to share that because 00:17:16.930 --> 00:17:19.009 I want to be helpful to my friends. That one 00:17:19.009 --> 00:17:21.049 ties back into social currency a bit, doesn't 00:17:21.049 --> 00:17:22.990 it? Being the helpful friend is a status thing. 00:17:23.150 --> 00:17:25.789 They absolutely overlap. Look how useful this 00:17:25.789 --> 00:17:27.509 information is that I found for you. It makes 00:17:27.509 --> 00:17:31.630 me look like a good, valuable resource. And finally. 00:17:32.240 --> 00:17:35.779 The last S stories. The narrative. The Trojan 00:17:35.779 --> 00:17:38.339 horse. You don't just share a fact. You share 00:17:38.339 --> 00:17:41.079 a story that carries the message inside it. Facts 00:17:41.079 --> 00:17:43.539 are boring. Stories are sticky. The story of 00:17:43.539 --> 00:17:46.119 the Grimace Shake isn't McDonald's has a new 00:17:46.119 --> 00:17:49.539 purple drink. The story is this drink is killing 00:17:49.539 --> 00:17:53.019 people in hilarious ways. The product is just 00:17:53.019 --> 00:17:55.140 along for the ride inside that narrative. So 00:17:55.140 --> 00:17:57.539 if you can hit all of those, social currency, 00:17:57.680 --> 00:18:01.069 triggers, emotion, public. practical value in 00:18:01.069 --> 00:18:03.750 stories, you've got yourself a viral hit. You've 00:18:03.750 --> 00:18:06.250 got much, much higher probability of one. But 00:18:06.250 --> 00:18:08.089 there's another layer to the psychology here, 00:18:08.170 --> 00:18:10.289 which is this idea of social proof and psychological 00:18:10.289 --> 00:18:13.130 safety. Safety. Like, I feel safe sharing this. 00:18:13.190 --> 00:18:15.049 I'm not going to get canceled for it. Sort of, 00:18:15.049 --> 00:18:17.640 yeah. Researchers Fernandez and Sega found something 00:18:17.640 --> 00:18:19.779 really interesting. They found that consumers 00:18:19.779 --> 00:18:21.779 don't really care that much about product features. 00:18:21.859 --> 00:18:24.440 They care about emotional experiences. And when 00:18:24.440 --> 00:18:26.599 we see lots of other people engaging with content, 00:18:26.759 --> 00:18:28.799 it creates what they call a snowball effect. 00:18:29.140 --> 00:18:31.980 Monkey see, monkey do. Pretty much. It validates 00:18:31.980 --> 00:18:34.880 our own behavior. It reduces the perceived risk 00:18:34.880 --> 00:18:37.900 of joining in. If everyone else is doing the 00:18:37.900 --> 00:18:40.750 brim -a -shake trend. I feel safe doing it, too. 00:18:40.809 --> 00:18:42.789 I won't look stupid. I look like I'm part of 00:18:42.789 --> 00:18:44.890 the group if I'm the only person doing it. You 00:18:44.890 --> 00:18:47.170 look insane. You look totally insane. It's just 00:18:47.170 --> 00:18:50.470 a fundamental human need for belonging. We just 00:18:50.470 --> 00:18:52.650 want to belong. We don't want to be the weirdo 00:18:52.650 --> 00:18:55.990 standing all alone. We really do. And that deep 00:18:55.990 --> 00:18:58.349 need for belonging is an incredibly powerful 00:18:58.349 --> 00:19:01.690 engine for marketing. It drives the whole challenge 00:19:01.690 --> 00:19:04.450 culture we see on TikTok. Everyone doing the 00:19:04.450 --> 00:19:07.480 same dance is just a mass signal of. I belong 00:19:07.480 --> 00:19:10.119 to this group right now. Okay, so we know the 00:19:10.119 --> 00:19:12.700 history. We've got the psychology down. Now let's 00:19:12.700 --> 00:19:14.539 get into the nuts and bolts, the actual mechanics. 00:19:14.720 --> 00:19:16.940 How do you build the machine? If I have a product, 00:19:17.119 --> 00:19:19.420 I can't just cross my fingers and hope for a 00:19:19.420 --> 00:19:21.819 free song. No, you can't. I can't just hope people 00:19:21.819 --> 00:19:23.700 start hallucinating purple monsters when they 00:19:23.700 --> 00:19:27.680 drink my smoothie. No, you need a strategy. And 00:19:27.680 --> 00:19:30.160 Kaplan and Heinlein, two marketing professors, 00:19:30.599 --> 00:19:32.880 they break it down into three basic criteria. 00:19:33.380 --> 00:19:36.480 If you want viral marketing to work, you need... 00:19:36.910 --> 00:19:39.630 The right messenger, the right message, and the 00:19:39.630 --> 00:19:41.930 right environment. Let's start with the messenger. 00:19:42.450 --> 00:19:44.990 It's not just about getting anyone to share it, 00:19:45.009 --> 00:19:47.869 right? My grandma sharing my post is very nice 00:19:47.869 --> 00:19:50.710 of her. She's very sweet. But it's probably not 00:19:50.710 --> 00:19:52.329 going to break the internet. No offense to your 00:19:52.329 --> 00:19:54.269 grandma, but probably not. Unless your grandma 00:19:54.269 --> 00:19:57.029 was Betty White. rest her soul you need specific 00:19:57.029 --> 00:20:00.289 types of connectors and this draws really heavily 00:20:00.289 --> 00:20:02.329 on malcolm gladwell's work in the tipping point 00:20:02.329 --> 00:20:05.230 they identify three main types of messengers 00:20:05.230 --> 00:20:08.650 first you have the market mavens the mavens okay 00:20:08.650 --> 00:20:11.259 so these are the experts The nerds. They are 00:20:11.259 --> 00:20:13.200 the information specialists. They have their 00:20:13.200 --> 00:20:14.599 finger on the pulse of the market. They're the 00:20:14.599 --> 00:20:16.079 ones who read the trade journals. They know all 00:20:16.079 --> 00:20:18.099 the specs. They are the first to know about the 00:20:18.099 --> 00:20:20.359 new gadget or the hot new band. They're the ones 00:20:20.359 --> 00:20:22.579 who transmit the message to their immediate niche 00:20:22.579 --> 00:20:25.119 network. They actually read the ingredients label. 00:20:25.359 --> 00:20:27.859 Okay. But they usually have pretty small niche 00:20:27.859 --> 00:20:30.670 circles. So who spreads it next? Then you get 00:20:30.670 --> 00:20:33.410 the social hubs. These are the connectors. These 00:20:33.410 --> 00:20:35.609 are the people with thousands of friends. They 00:20:35.609 --> 00:20:38.230 bridge the gap between all these different subcultures. 00:20:38.250 --> 00:20:40.710 They know the surfers and they know the bankers 00:20:40.710 --> 00:20:43.509 and they know the artists. They take what the 00:20:43.509 --> 00:20:46.549 maven found and they broadcast it far and wide. 00:20:46.789 --> 00:20:48.869 So the maven says, hey, this thing is good. And 00:20:48.869 --> 00:20:50.630 the hub says, hey, everyone, look at this thing. 00:20:50.849 --> 00:20:54.000 Exactly. And then you have the third type. The 00:20:54.000 --> 00:20:56.700 salespeople. The salespeople. These are the amplifiers. 00:20:56.819 --> 00:20:58.880 They are the ones who make the message persuasive. 00:20:58.880 --> 00:21:01.480 They explain why it matters. They're the charismatic 00:21:01.480 --> 00:21:03.740 ones who convince you that you need it. So the 00:21:03.740 --> 00:21:05.859 maven finds it, the salesperson hypes it up, 00:21:05.859 --> 00:21:07.700 and the hub spreads it out. It's like a little 00:21:07.700 --> 00:21:09.859 relay race. You need all three legs of that race 00:21:09.859 --> 00:21:12.400 to actually win. Exactly. If you just have the 00:21:12.400 --> 00:21:14.779 hub, they might be spreading bad information. 00:21:14.980 --> 00:21:17.200 If you just have the maven, nobody hears about 00:21:17.200 --> 00:21:19.380 it. Then, of course, you have the message. It 00:21:19.380 --> 00:21:22.240 has to be memorable, and it needs to have a must 00:21:22.240 --> 00:21:25.009 -see. element. It needs to be interesting enough 00:21:25.009 --> 00:21:27.690 to be passed on. And finally, the environment. 00:21:28.410 --> 00:21:32.329 Context and timing. Small environmental changes 00:21:32.329 --> 00:21:36.170 can yield huge results. If Oreo had tweeted their 00:21:36.170 --> 00:21:38.950 famous dunk in the dark tweet two days after 00:21:38.950 --> 00:21:40.970 the Super Bowl blackout, nobody would have cared. 00:21:41.089 --> 00:21:43.109 And we will get to that Oreo story in detail 00:21:43.109 --> 00:21:46.049 later. But the point is, the environment was 00:21:46.049 --> 00:21:48.990 the blackout itself. Yes. They capitalized on 00:21:48.990 --> 00:21:52.730 that specific moment. Timing is absolutely everything. 00:21:52.829 --> 00:21:55.490 You cannot force a viral moment to happen in 00:21:55.490 --> 00:21:57.549 a dead environment. And to get even more granular 00:21:57.549 --> 00:21:59.369 with this, there's a framework called the seven 00:21:59.369 --> 00:22:03.049 eyes by Piriwatt and Tripopsicle. That's a lot 00:22:03.049 --> 00:22:05.210 of eyes. It is a lot of eyes, but they are really 00:22:05.210 --> 00:22:06.910 comprehensive. Let's just run through them quickly 00:22:06.910 --> 00:22:08.609 because they show how much nuance there really 00:22:08.609 --> 00:22:12.069 is here. Okay. All right. First up. Invisibility. 00:22:12.069 --> 00:22:14.549 Invisibility. That sounds really counterintuitive 00:22:14.549 --> 00:22:16.750 for marketing. Don't you want to be visible? 00:22:17.269 --> 00:22:19.869 Well, ideally, it shouldn't feel like an ad. 00:22:19.990 --> 00:22:22.509 The more distant it feels from traditional advertising, 00:22:22.769 --> 00:22:24.789 the more likely people are to trust it and share 00:22:24.789 --> 00:22:28.130 it. If it screams, buy me now, people just tune 00:22:28.130 --> 00:22:30.250 out. It needs to fly under the radar as pure 00:22:30.250 --> 00:22:33.170 entertainment. Ah, so it's masking its true nature. 00:22:33.329 --> 00:22:37.920 A bit sneaky. Exactly. Next is identity. It has 00:22:37.920 --> 00:22:41.140 to match the sharer's desired self -image. Yeah. 00:22:41.279 --> 00:22:43.720 Again, this goes back to social currency. Does 00:22:43.720 --> 00:22:46.000 sharing this fit the person I want to be online? 00:22:46.259 --> 00:22:49.220 Right. Makes sense. Then innovation. It has to 00:22:49.220 --> 00:22:52.160 surprise or use humor. It has to deviate from 00:22:52.160 --> 00:22:54.900 the norm. It has to be weird, like the purple 00:22:54.900 --> 00:22:57.920 goo. Yeah, if it's normal, it's just invisible 00:22:57.920 --> 00:23:00.269 in the bad way. Insight. This one's interesting. 00:23:00.349 --> 00:23:03.390 It has to confirm the viewer's emotions. It needs 00:23:03.390 --> 00:23:05.150 to elicit a feeling that makes the viewer go, 00:23:05.269 --> 00:23:08.329 yes, that is exactly how I feel. Relatability. 00:23:08.490 --> 00:23:10.970 It's funny because it's true feeling. Exactly. 00:23:11.190 --> 00:23:13.690 Then instantaneity. We talked about this. Tying 00:23:13.690 --> 00:23:16.230 into current trends. Timeliness. Being in the 00:23:16.230 --> 00:23:18.910 moment. Yeah, the Oreo tweet. Integration. This 00:23:18.910 --> 00:23:20.650 one is super important for the business side. 00:23:20.769 --> 00:23:23.069 It has to feed consumers into other marketing 00:23:23.069 --> 00:23:24.750 avenues. You don't just want views on TikTok. 00:23:24.990 --> 00:23:26.789 You want engagement that leads somewhere else. 00:23:27.309 --> 00:23:30.589 A follow. A click. Don't just get the click, 00:23:30.630 --> 00:23:32.829 get the customer. And finally, interactivity, 00:23:32.890 --> 00:23:35.390 closing that gap between the brand and the viewer. 00:23:35.529 --> 00:23:37.829 It needs to feel like a dialogue, not a monologue. 00:23:38.210 --> 00:23:40.690 You know, that interactivity piece feels like 00:23:40.690 --> 00:23:42.650 the thing that has changed the most in recent 00:23:42.650 --> 00:23:45.569 years, because now we're not just talking about 00:23:45.569 --> 00:23:47.769 companies talking to people. We're talking about 00:23:47.769 --> 00:23:49.650 people talking to people. We're talking about 00:23:49.650 --> 00:23:52.390 the influencer economy. Oh, this is a massive 00:23:52.390 --> 00:23:55.589 shift. I mean, the data is clear. people prefer 00:23:55.589 --> 00:23:58.390 interacting with humans over interacting with 00:23:58.390 --> 00:24:00.410 logos. Well, yeah, that makes sense. I'd much 00:24:00.410 --> 00:24:02.250 rather have a conversation with a person than 00:24:02.250 --> 00:24:04.390 with a corporate signboard. A logo doesn't have 00:24:04.390 --> 00:24:06.549 feelings. A logo doesn't have a skincare routine 00:24:06.549 --> 00:24:09.789 I can copy. Exactly. And something like 69 % 00:24:09.789 --> 00:24:11.710 of marketing departments are now working with 00:24:11.710 --> 00:24:15.109 celebrities or influencers. But the very definition 00:24:15.109 --> 00:24:18.509 of celebrity has completely changed. It's not 00:24:18.509 --> 00:24:20.730 just movie stars and athletes anymore. Not at 00:24:20.730 --> 00:24:24.559 all. We're seeing this huge shift away from traditional 00:24:24.559 --> 00:24:28.680 celebs, actors, singers, and towards social media 00:24:28.680 --> 00:24:31.880 stars. People like the YouTuber Zoella or the 00:24:31.880 --> 00:24:34.859 Instagrammer Amy Song. So why the shift? Is it 00:24:34.859 --> 00:24:37.079 just because they're cheaper to hire than, say, 00:24:37.160 --> 00:24:39.839 Brad Pitt? Cost is definitely part of it, for 00:24:39.839 --> 00:24:56.900 sure. But trust is the much bigger factor. It's 00:24:56.900 --> 00:24:59.440 that whole... parasocial relationship thing. 00:24:59.519 --> 00:25:01.200 You feel like you know them because you see them 00:25:01.200 --> 00:25:03.119 in their bedroom. You see them without makeup 00:25:03.119 --> 00:25:05.420 on. You see them walking their dog. It feels 00:25:05.420 --> 00:25:08.579 authentic. And that value exchange is huge on 00:25:08.579 --> 00:25:11.460 all sides. For companies, they get instant high 00:25:11.460 --> 00:25:14.299 credibility. Look at Coca -Cola's Share a Coke 00:25:14.299 --> 00:25:16.279 campaign. Oh, yeah, where they put all the names 00:25:16.279 --> 00:25:20.130 on the bottles. Yes. That single campaign. totally 00:25:20.130 --> 00:25:22.210 changed the perception of Coke among millennials. 00:25:22.609 --> 00:25:25.549 Before that, Coke was seen as a parent's drink. 00:25:25.710 --> 00:25:28.490 It was what your dad drank at a barbecue. By 00:25:28.490 --> 00:25:30.750 making it personal and shareable, they increased 00:25:30.750 --> 00:25:34.690 sales by 11 % and their market share by 1 .6%. 00:25:35.019 --> 00:25:36.579 Just by letting people find their own name on 00:25:36.579 --> 00:25:39.579 a bottle, it personalized a completely mass -produced 00:25:39.579 --> 00:25:42.740 product. And for the influencers, it is huge 00:25:42.740 --> 00:25:45.960 business. Amy Song was reportedly earning $500 00:25:45.960 --> 00:25:48.940 ,000 a month with Laura Mercier. Wait, wait, 00:25:48.940 --> 00:25:52.250 back up. Half a million dollars a month. That 00:25:52.250 --> 00:25:54.670 was the report. Yes. OK, I am definitely in the 00:25:54.670 --> 00:25:56.529 wrong line of work. I need to start posting some 00:25:56.529 --> 00:25:58.809 outfit of the day pictures immediately. It's 00:25:58.809 --> 00:26:01.109 incredibly lucrative. And for us, the consumers, 00:26:01.289 --> 00:26:03.529 influencers help solve the paradox of choice. 00:26:04.130 --> 00:26:06.549 We are just overwhelmed with options for everything. 00:26:06.920 --> 00:26:09.539 There are a thousand types of face cream. There 00:26:09.539 --> 00:26:11.819 are a million video games to play. Decision fatigue 00:26:11.819 --> 00:26:14.859 is real. It is. And influencers act as filters. 00:26:15.079 --> 00:26:18.039 We outsource our decision making to them to reduce 00:26:18.039 --> 00:26:20.619 that fatigue and the perceived risk. It's like, 00:26:20.680 --> 00:26:22.859 well, if Amy's song likes it, it must be good. 00:26:23.019 --> 00:26:25.519 It's a mental shortcut for our brains. I trust 00:26:25.519 --> 00:26:27.839 her, so I'll trust the product. It just reduces 00:26:27.839 --> 00:26:30.420 the cognitive load of having to shop. Precisely. 00:26:30.539 --> 00:26:33.440 We're lazy and influencers do the homework for 00:26:33.440 --> 00:26:35.460 us. All right. Let's get into the Hall of Fame. 00:26:35.769 --> 00:26:38.029 We've mentioned a few of these already, but I 00:26:38.029 --> 00:26:40.630 want to really dive into some of the absolute 00:26:40.630 --> 00:26:43.410 best, most legendary examples of viral marketing. 00:26:43.509 --> 00:26:45.829 The ones that really set the standard. You mentioned 00:26:45.829 --> 00:26:47.809 Hotmail earlier, but let's talk about Dollar 00:26:47.809 --> 00:26:51.369 Shave Club. Oh, a total classic. 2012. This video 00:26:51.369 --> 00:26:53.509 is legendary in marketing circles. I remember 00:26:53.509 --> 00:26:56.390 this video so vividly. The founder, Michael Dubin, 00:26:56.430 --> 00:26:58.150 just walking through this warehouse. It was so 00:26:58.150 --> 00:27:01.029 funny, so irreverent. He's hacking through packing 00:27:01.029 --> 00:27:03.329 tape with a machete. There's a guy in a bear 00:27:03.329 --> 00:27:05.690 suit dancing in the background. missing a putt 00:27:05.690 --> 00:27:07.890 on a putting green. And it was so cheap. That 00:27:07.890 --> 00:27:12.829 video cost only $4 ,500 to make. $4 ,500. That 00:27:12.829 --> 00:27:15.529 is nothing in advertising budget terms. You can't 00:27:15.529 --> 00:27:17.710 even buy a catered lunch for a big ad agency 00:27:17.710 --> 00:27:20.170 for that kind of money. It's pocket change. Yeah. 00:27:20.289 --> 00:27:23.309 But the result, 12 ,000 signups in the first 00:27:23.309 --> 00:27:27.690 48 hours. By 2015, that video had 21 million 00:27:27.690 --> 00:27:30.950 views. And eventually, Unilever bought the company 00:27:30.950 --> 00:27:34.440 for a billion dollars. From a forty five hundred 00:27:34.440 --> 00:27:37.140 dollar video to a billion dollar acquisition, 00:27:37.440 --> 00:27:41.079 that is the definition of leverage. So why did 00:27:41.079 --> 00:27:43.940 it work so well? Humor and that out of nowhere 00:27:43.940 --> 00:27:48.119 quality was innovative. It didn't look or feel 00:27:48.119 --> 00:27:50.539 like a razor commercial. Usually razor commercials 00:27:50.539 --> 00:27:53.579 are these slow motion shots of water splashing 00:27:53.579 --> 00:27:56.720 on a perfectly chiseled face with futuristic 00:27:56.720 --> 00:27:59.339 graphics of blades cutting hairs. And a deep, 00:27:59.339 --> 00:28:02.279 serious voice saying the closest shave ever. 00:28:02.359 --> 00:28:04.660 Right. This is just a funny guy making jokes 00:28:04.660 --> 00:28:06.819 in a dusty warehouse. It completely broke the 00:28:06.819 --> 00:28:08.900 pattern. It felt authentic. It felt like a real 00:28:08.900 --> 00:28:11.160 person talking to you, not a corporation. It 00:28:11.160 --> 00:28:13.200 respected your intelligence by making you laugh 00:28:13.200 --> 00:28:15.200 instead of just shouting features at you. Then 00:28:15.200 --> 00:28:17.119 we have the Oreo power outage that we touched 00:28:17.119 --> 00:28:20.299 on earlier. Super Bowl 2013. Okay, set the scene 00:28:20.299 --> 00:28:23.200 for us. It is the Super Bowl. The Baltimore Ravens 00:28:23.200 --> 00:28:25.900 versus the San Francisco 49ers. It is the biggest 00:28:25.900 --> 00:28:28.759 advertising stage in the entire world. Companies 00:28:28.759 --> 00:28:31.259 are paying millions of dollars for a 30 -second 00:28:31.259 --> 00:28:34.730 TV spot. And then suddenly, the power goes out 00:28:34.730 --> 00:28:36.670 at the Mercedes -Benz Stadium. The lights just 00:28:36.670 --> 00:28:39.470 go down. The game stops for 34 minutes. Everyone 00:28:39.470 --> 00:28:41.809 is freaking out. The broadcasters are scrambling 00:28:41.809 --> 00:28:44.789 to fill time. The players are just on the field 00:28:44.789 --> 00:28:47.730 stretching. And Oreo's social media team is ready. 00:28:48.390 --> 00:28:50.910 They had what they called a war room set up, 00:28:50.950 --> 00:28:53.829 a whole team of copywriters and artists ready 00:28:53.829 --> 00:28:56.630 to react to the game in real time. And within 00:28:56.630 --> 00:28:58.970 minutes of the blackout, they tweet an image. 00:28:59.329 --> 00:29:02.839 What was it? It was a single Oreo cookie. lit 00:29:02.839 --> 00:29:05.319 by a spotlight in the dark with the simple caption, 00:29:05.559 --> 00:29:08.200 you can still dunk in the dark. Newsjacking. 00:29:08.299 --> 00:29:11.019 That's the term for it. They hijacked the entire 00:29:11.019 --> 00:29:13.599 news cycle and it proved that instantaneity and 00:29:13.599 --> 00:29:16.220 cleverness can beat a high budget plan any day 00:29:16.220 --> 00:29:18.960 of the week. While other brands were just waiting 00:29:18.960 --> 00:29:22.440 for their $5 million TV spots to air, Oreo won 00:29:22.440 --> 00:29:24.559 the entire night with a tweet that cost them 00:29:24.559 --> 00:29:28.779 $0 to post. And it was retweeted, what, 15 ,000 00:29:28.779 --> 00:29:31.440 times almost instantly? It became the story of 00:29:31.440 --> 00:29:33.059 the Super Bowl that year, more than the game 00:29:33.059 --> 00:29:34.839 itself. And then there's the one that's become 00:29:34.839 --> 00:29:36.819 an annual tradition. It's practically a holiday 00:29:36.819 --> 00:29:39.259 at this point. Spotify -wrapped. This is just 00:29:39.259 --> 00:29:42.380 a data masterpiece. Every year, usually late 00:29:42.380 --> 00:29:44.660 November or early December, Spotify releases 00:29:44.660 --> 00:29:46.740 this compilation of your personal listening. 00:29:46.960 --> 00:29:49.500 Yeah, you listened to this song 400 times this 00:29:49.500 --> 00:29:54.000 year. You are in the top 0 .01 % of listeners 00:29:54.000 --> 00:29:56.579 for this artist. And people go nuts for it. In 00:29:56.579 --> 00:30:00.279 2021, 120 million users accessed their apps. 00:30:00.500 --> 00:30:02.940 So why do we love sharing our data so much in 00:30:02.940 --> 00:30:05.279 this one instance? Usually, we're terrified of 00:30:05.279 --> 00:30:07.779 big tech tracking us. We put tape over our webcams. 00:30:07.779 --> 00:30:10.940 We install ad blockers. But for Spotify, we literally 00:30:10.940 --> 00:30:13.420 post our own surveillance data on Instagram for 00:30:13.420 --> 00:30:16.240 the whole world to see. Because Spotify brilliantly 00:30:16.240 --> 00:30:19.359 turns that data. into social currency they take 00:30:19.359 --> 00:30:21.599 your listening habits they turn them into a colorful 00:30:21.599 --> 00:30:24.180 shareable badge of identity look how cool and 00:30:24.180 --> 00:30:27.000 unique my taste is or on the other side look 00:30:27.000 --> 00:30:28.900 how embarrassing my taste is isn't that funny 00:30:28.900 --> 00:30:31.220 it allows users to define themselves publicly 00:30:31.220 --> 00:30:34.640 it's the ultimate ego boost or ego check i am 00:30:34.640 --> 00:30:37.599 a sad girl pop listener or i am a viking metal 00:30:37.599 --> 00:30:40.259 enthusiast And it's so brilliant because the 00:30:40.259 --> 00:30:43.140 users are doing all the advertising. Every single 00:30:43.140 --> 00:30:46.380 Instagram story with a Spotify -wrapped graphic 00:30:46.380 --> 00:30:50.240 is a free ad for Spotify. And it triggers massive 00:30:50.240 --> 00:30:53.660 FOMO fear of missing out. Right. If you use Apple 00:30:53.660 --> 00:30:56.160 Music or Amazon Music, you don't get wrapped. 00:30:56.319 --> 00:30:58.640 You feel left out of the conversation. You feel 00:30:58.640 --> 00:31:00.380 like you're not part of the cultural moment. 00:31:00.539 --> 00:31:02.660 It's so powerful. It makes the product incredibly 00:31:02.660 --> 00:31:04.740 sticky. Okay, I want to talk about one that's 00:31:04.740 --> 00:31:07.460 a bit weirder, a bit more niche. The Ghostface 00:31:07.460 --> 00:31:10.359 real estate listing. This one just cracked me 00:31:10.359 --> 00:31:12.099 up when I read about it. This is such a great 00:31:12.099 --> 00:31:14.579 example of local viral marketing. This was back 00:31:14.579 --> 00:31:18.039 in 2019 in Lansing, Michigan. A realtor decides 00:31:18.039 --> 00:31:20.619 to get a little creative with a listing. A realtor 00:31:20.619 --> 00:31:23.039 named James Pyle is trying to sell this century 00:31:23.039 --> 00:31:25.700 -old home. It's a nice house, but the market's 00:31:25.700 --> 00:31:27.859 a bit slow. He wants to do something fun for 00:31:27.859 --> 00:31:30.180 the Halloween season, so he hires a photographer 00:31:30.180 --> 00:31:33.420 to take pictures of him dressed as Ghostface. 00:31:34.000 --> 00:31:36.500 The killer from the Scream movies. In the actual 00:31:36.500 --> 00:31:39.119 real estate listing photos. In the actual listing 00:31:39.119 --> 00:31:41.140 photos. But he's not, you know, killing anyone. 00:31:41.319 --> 00:31:43.200 He's just doing chores around the house. He's 00:31:43.200 --> 00:31:45.839 raking leaves in the backyard. He's carving pumpkins 00:31:45.839 --> 00:31:47.839 in the kitchen. He's peeking out from behind 00:31:47.839 --> 00:31:51.599 the curtains. In one, he's holding a sold sign. 00:31:51.880 --> 00:31:54.160 That is absolutely hilarious. Sir Gull was pretty 00:31:54.160 --> 00:31:56.720 modest. He told reporters he was hoping for maybe 00:31:56.720 --> 00:32:00.579 a thousand views. A normal listing in his area 00:32:00.579 --> 00:32:03.880 gets under 150. And what happened? It goes up 00:32:03.880 --> 00:32:06.640 on Zillow and Realtor .com. And within a few 00:32:06.640 --> 00:32:09.779 days, it had over 1 million views. A million 00:32:09.779 --> 00:32:12.779 views for a house listing in Lansing, Michigan. 00:32:13.039 --> 00:32:15.200 It was trending on Facebook. It got picked up 00:32:15.200 --> 00:32:17.619 by national news networks, Good Morning America, 00:32:17.880 --> 00:32:21.319 Fox News. The combined views exceeded 5 million 00:32:21.319 --> 00:32:24.299 in just five days. Okay, but did the house actually 00:32:24.299 --> 00:32:27.619 sell? It sold in four days. Or a cash offer. 00:32:27.720 --> 00:32:29.700 It became so popular they had to cancel the open 00:32:29.700 --> 00:32:31.619 house because too many people were showing up 00:32:31.619 --> 00:32:33.940 just to see the ghost face house. So he took 00:32:33.940 --> 00:32:35.819 something incredibly boring, a house listing, 00:32:36.000 --> 00:32:39.099 and he just injected innovation and humor into 00:32:39.099 --> 00:32:42.500 it. He added an identity element, that fun, spooky 00:32:42.500 --> 00:32:46.059 season vibe, and he made it incredibly public 00:32:46.059 --> 00:32:49.180 and shareable. It just ticks all the boxes. He 00:32:49.180 --> 00:32:51.359 took a commodity and he turned it into a story. 00:32:52.160 --> 00:32:54.140 It's not always a success story like that, is 00:32:54.140 --> 00:32:56.579 it? Sometimes you open that Pandora's box and 00:32:56.579 --> 00:32:58.759 something pretty nasty comes out. Viral marketing 00:32:58.759 --> 00:33:01.440 is incredibly risky. Once you release the virus, 00:33:01.579 --> 00:33:04.240 you lose all control of it. You cannot dictate 00:33:04.240 --> 00:33:07.559 how the host body, the public, is going to react 00:33:07.559 --> 00:33:09.359 to it. Let's talk about the Blendtec example. 00:33:09.900 --> 00:33:12.019 The Will It Blend series. This is a fascinating 00:33:12.019 --> 00:33:15.640 case of viral butt. Blendtec released these videos 00:33:15.640 --> 00:33:18.039 of their high -powered blender just destroying 00:33:18.039 --> 00:33:21.259 everything. Marbles, iPhones, glow sticks, garden 00:33:21.259 --> 00:33:23.579 rakes. Oh, I remember these. The host, Tom Dixon, 00:33:23.720 --> 00:33:26.039 in his little white lab coat. Don't breathe this 00:33:26.039 --> 00:33:29.460 smoke. The videos went massively viral, millions 00:33:29.460 --> 00:33:31.259 and millions of views. They were super entertaining. 00:33:31.480 --> 00:33:33.539 But when they actually analyzed the audience, 00:33:33.720 --> 00:33:36.099 they found it was largely teenage boys who just 00:33:36.099 --> 00:33:38.279 thought destruction was funny. And teenage boys 00:33:38.279 --> 00:33:41.640 do not buy $500 blenders. They buy video games 00:33:41.640 --> 00:33:44.279 and pizza rolls. Exactly. They were not the target 00:33:44.279 --> 00:33:46.460 market. So you had all this noise, all this brand 00:33:46.460 --> 00:33:49.039 awareness. But was it actually converting to 00:33:49.039 --> 00:33:51.980 sales effectively? Or was it just free entertainment? 00:33:53.160 --> 00:33:56.059 Virality without the right audience is just noise. 00:33:56.730 --> 00:33:58.869 It's a vanity metric. That's the targeting trap. 00:33:58.950 --> 00:34:01.589 Being famous isn't the same thing as being profitable. 00:34:01.750 --> 00:34:03.990 And then there's the risk of negative word of 00:34:03.990 --> 00:34:06.130 mouth. This is when people realize they're being 00:34:06.130 --> 00:34:09.159 played, right? Yes. The stealth marketing backlash. 00:34:09.760 --> 00:34:12.219 When people realize they are being marketed to 00:34:12.219 --> 00:34:14.199 without their knowledge, they feel deceived. 00:34:14.599 --> 00:34:17.260 The term viral marketing can actually become 00:34:17.260 --> 00:34:20.880 a pejorative, a bad word. If I find out that 00:34:20.880 --> 00:34:23.199 a funny viral video I loved was actually just 00:34:23.199 --> 00:34:25.599 a secret ad for a car insurance company, I feel 00:34:25.599 --> 00:34:27.460 betrayed. Yeah, we don't like feeling like we're 00:34:27.460 --> 00:34:30.480 puppets. No. And there's also a structural risk. 00:34:31.000 --> 00:34:33.219 A researcher named Duncan Watts did this work, 00:34:33.340 --> 00:34:35.619 showing that influence chains are actually really 00:34:35.619 --> 00:34:38.860 fragile. If a key influencer, that social hub 00:34:38.860 --> 00:34:41.019 we were talking about, refuses to pass the message 00:34:41.019 --> 00:34:43.800 along, the whole chain just breaks. It dies right 00:34:43.800 --> 00:34:46.420 there. So you're essentially betting. your entire 00:34:46.420 --> 00:34:49.739 campaign on these specific nodes in the network 00:34:49.739 --> 00:34:52.579 saying yes. And sometimes you just get regional 00:34:52.579 --> 00:34:54.880 mismatches. A video goes viral in a country where 00:34:54.880 --> 00:34:57.039 you don't even sell the product. You've just 00:34:57.039 --> 00:34:59.519 created a massive amount of demand that you have 00:34:59.519 --> 00:35:02.400 absolutely no way to fulfill. And that just creates 00:35:02.400 --> 00:35:06.320 frustration, not profit. Imagine 10 ,000 people 00:35:06.320 --> 00:35:09.900 wanting your product in Brazil and you only ship 00:35:09.900 --> 00:35:13.530 to Ohio. It's a real double -edged sword. When 00:35:13.530 --> 00:35:16.030 it cuts the right way, you get 12 million users 00:35:16.030 --> 00:35:18.969 in 18 months. When it cuts the wrong way, you 00:35:18.969 --> 00:35:21.010 just get angry customers or a bunch of teenagers 00:35:21.010 --> 00:35:23.650 laughing at your expensive blender. Precisely. 00:35:23.650 --> 00:35:26.090 It requires this incredibly delicate balance 00:35:26.090 --> 00:35:29.489 of psychology and mechanics and content. It's 00:35:29.489 --> 00:35:31.309 not something you can just make happen. You can 00:35:31.309 --> 00:35:33.530 only optimize the conditions for it. You can 00:35:33.530 --> 00:35:35.349 build the pile of wood and pour the gasoline, 00:35:35.510 --> 00:35:38.409 but you can't always control the spark. So what 00:35:38.409 --> 00:35:40.090 does this all mean for us? You know, people just 00:35:40.090 --> 00:35:41.849 scrolling through the feeds. We're not marketing 00:35:41.849 --> 00:35:43.570 directors. We're just the people clicking like 00:35:43.570 --> 00:35:45.849 and share. I think it means we just need to be 00:35:45.849 --> 00:35:48.349 more aware. We need to understand that when we 00:35:48.349 --> 00:35:51.250 feel that frisson, that jolt of excitement to 00:35:51.250 --> 00:35:54.570 share something, we are often responding to a 00:35:54.570 --> 00:35:57.090 very carefully engineered trigger. We're not 00:35:57.090 --> 00:35:59.110 just acting on impulse. We're acting on design. 00:35:59.690 --> 00:36:01.869 We are the unpaid employees for the brands we 00:36:01.869 --> 00:36:04.170 love. We are. We are the distribution network. 00:36:04.449 --> 00:36:06.530 We are the trucks delivering the goods to the 00:36:06.530 --> 00:36:08.650 next town. But we're the ones paying for the 00:36:08.650 --> 00:36:12.150 gas. So as we wrap up this deep dive into the 00:36:12.150 --> 00:36:14.150 infection of ideas, I kind of want to leave you 00:36:14.150 --> 00:36:16.650 with a final thought. We talked about those seven 00:36:16.650 --> 00:36:19.889 I's. And one of the most important ones was invisibility. 00:36:20.570 --> 00:36:23.329 The idea that the best marketing doesn't look 00:36:23.329 --> 00:36:25.599 like marketing at all. That's the ultimate goal 00:36:25.599 --> 00:36:28.059 for these campaigns. So as marketing gets better 00:36:28.059 --> 00:36:31.280 and better at being invisible, at blending seamlessly 00:36:31.280 --> 00:36:33.780 into our memes, our funny videos, our heartfelt 00:36:33.780 --> 00:36:37.679 stories, how much of our daily culture is actually 00:36:37.679 --> 00:36:40.719 just a commercial in disguise? That is the question, 00:36:40.800 --> 00:36:43.000 isn't it? Are we sharing stories because they 00:36:43.000 --> 00:36:45.340 genuinely matter to us or are we just helping 00:36:45.340 --> 00:36:47.460 someone sell a milkshake? Something to think 00:36:47.460 --> 00:36:48.880 about the next time you hit that share button. 00:36:49.099 --> 00:36:51.679 Thanks for diving deep with us. We'll catch you 00:36:51.679 --> 00:36:52.139 on the next wave.