VIRAL MARKETING IN HONG KONG MARKET - Le Point

Consumers tend to seek out and listen to word of mouth more when the purchase decision is risky and high involvement brands. Buying property is a high involvement process due to the high priced, more complex and more personally relevant. Nowadays, consumers not only go to see the model house, but also search information and rely on opinions coming from the videos, websites and forum. So, marketers should be aware of word of mouth and monitor it closely in Hong Kong property market.

Let’s see viral marketing in Hong Kong - property market example: Hong Kong Tseng Kwan O “Le Point” examination reports on I-Cable program.

Link to Le Point video 1




Link to Le Point video 2




Link to HKITALK
http://www.hkitalk.net/HKiTalk2/viewthread.php?tid=376525


Link to HKGOLDEN forum
http://forum4.hkgolden.com/view.aspx?message=1767712&page=5


Link to discussion
http://hongkong.asiaxpat.com/forums/hong-kong-property/threads/114098/hong-kong-property-prices/

WHY VIRAL MARKETING CANNOT WORK BETTER THAN TRADITIONAL WORD OF MOUTH STRATEGY IN HONG KONG?

Base on the definition that viral marketing is a strategy to amplify word of mouth in the digital channels (for example through email or social network), it seems that this strategy may be more useful in cities which fulfil 5 criteria,

1) They are well developed cities,
2) The cities have mature Internet infrastructure,
3) The local telephone charge are costly,
4) The citizens live far away from each other and
5) The citizens are frequent Internet users.

The basic requirement to achieve viral marketing is the existing of mature Internet infrastructure that most likely can be found in all well developed cities like Hong Kong, London, New York, etc. But in order to make viral marketing effective, the rest 4 criteria must also need to meet.

Should the citizens live close to each other, for example in Hong Kong, they may meet frequently easily without the need to communicate through Internet; if the telephone charge were low, for example in Hong Kong again, it would be more convenience for them to communicate through voice than typing; after all, if they are not frequent users of Internet which can be affected by population ageing issue directly, viral marketing will not able to work.

It is easy to understand why viral marketing cannot work better than real life word of mouth in Hong Kong, especially when the population ageing goes serious and major high Internet users are youngsters whose aims to use Internet are mainly playing online games or downloading different programs instead of for real communications or information search.

THE POWER OF VIRAL MARKETING

Let's hear the CEO tell you about the power of Viral Marketing and Web 2.0

You can't talk about Web 2.0 without talking about viral marketing. Viral marketing is the most powerful element of Web 2.0 marketing.Viral marketing refers to the marketing of a product naturally by word-of- mouth on internet communities such as social media websites. But viral marketing is much more than word-of-mouth marketing. Viral marketing can spread much more quickly and reach way more people than word-of-mouth can.

"Web 2.0 and the Power of Viral Marketing"

REAL CASE OF VIRAL MARKETING AND WOM

HydroActive sports drinks distribute the free sample and display the promotion material in the California Fitness center dancing class and mYoga Class.
To increase their reputation to the target customer.

Lucozade Extra promote the drinks in front of the campus, try to increase the exposure in the student area.

Ribena Promotion ambassador promote the drinks in the restaurant, through the image girl to make some noise in the market.

Sparkling Ribena have a promotion in the hot pot restaurant, through the game to share the fun and product to the public, according to this promotion there are obviously make a noise in youtube and market.

VIRAL MARKETING IN HONG KONG

In my opinion, viral marketing is no use in Hong Kong, because of our Chinese Culture, the credibility of forum also already lower lower then before.

Viral Marketing is equal to Word of mouth promotion, but is a marketing tactics in online version, this format already appeal in our market over many many years.

Base on the problem of credibility of viral marketing, I think the most efficient viral marketing effect is through our real friend and family member, they are have high credibility to do and share the message.

WORD OF MOUTH AND VIRAL MARKETING

Marketing agency use trial sampling program to create a word of mouth in the market, through distribute the product to the target user to increase the public awareness.
In fact, after the experience of the user, they willing to share their experience on the forum, it creates a viral marketing effect.

So, the word of mouth marketing promotions have a high relation with the viral marketing.

ADVANTAGE OF VIRAL MARKETING

Nowadays, there are many media tools to disposal the information in the mass market, therefore the consumer would shift away those information. It may include something they are interest.

Viral Marketing is a way to continuing change the preference of the consumer by word of mouth, although it has creating both positive and negative implications. For the advantage of Viral Marketing, it offers the opportunity to break through the clutter by providing a brand/ product experience and information to the target market. It allows to specific the target market and more effectively reach the audience.

Using Viral marketing to distribute information would be more effectively, such as article, video directories, blogs, forums, etc. to spread the information with the target audience. It can spread immediately.

It is unlike the traditional advantage technique. Viral marketing is focus with the material that consumers want to spread proactively and spend time to interact it.

By using the viral marketing, the people may pass the information to their friends that they are believed and interest. Therefore, it will be more trustful than the regular advertising.

Those are the some points about the advantage of performing “word of mouth” viral marketing. Do you have any point of it, share with us!