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Hey again, today I'm going to be talking about viral ads. The viral ad, in my opinion, is probably the biggest revolution in the media advertising sector. I remember my first encounter with a viral ad. It left me perplexed, confused and somewhat amused. I had no idea at the time that this was a new, clever advertising medium that was soon to hit the mainstream.
Since the first viral ad, of an office worker attacking his computer, viral marketing has come a long way. With the popularisation of video sharing sites such as YouTube and Metacafe there is a chance that any user of these sites will encounter a viral each day. The effectiveness behind a well produced viral is that you won’t even know you have just seen an advertisement.
The proliferation of the viral ad has received much support with television shows such as Rude Tube dedicated to sharing different viral ads from across the internet. Being initially targeted towards an online community the ads frequently contain in-jokes and common internet memes. Targeting this specific audience increases the effectiveness of the ad. The specification of audience can be narrowed even further. Within the whole community of online users there are sub-communities of people who share similar interests; for example video gamers have their own groups. This allows users, as Sunstein, C said, to ‘choose your own programming’. This allows the ad to be even more specific in targeting its audience.
As the popularity of viral ads has increased the effectiveness has decreased. The most prominent reason is that the community of online users have grown accustomed to this method of advertising and many videos that are supposed to remain a hidden, almost, subliminal, are uncovered for what they are. There is also the commercialisation of certain sites such as YouTube, many videos are preceded with classic advertisements, which not only add to the crowd of advertisements and influences the community are subject to, but also fade the effectiveness of the intended promotion by the viral.
In order to better understand how viral marketing works and how they are constructed, I decided to have a go at producing my own viral. I discovered that in order to produce an effective viral ad I had to make it confusing and entertaining. In my experience the most effective videos have been the most puzzling.
My own experience with the viral ad has been an exciting and interesting one. I had fun creating it and others have fun viewing it. In a way it brings the online community together allowing the many different sub-communities to unite and share an experience. It also serves to bridge the gap between the consumer and marketer.


And for the moment you have all been waiting for, check out my viral add below.