This isn't really a case of viral marketing as much as Compassion marketing, which is targeting a new market.
This would have been viral if instead of simply leaving keys on the ground, it encouraged you to "see if you can trick your friends" with the same set of keys, or a similar action element for you to push.
Mea culpa, but the point of the article still stands. I apologize for sidelining the conversation with a poor title.
To ask a (hopefully) better question, although I fear it may be too late for conversation in this thread- Is there a point where people start becoming less engaged in the world, because they're afraid that every action has a marketing angle behind it..
To quote Futurama-
LEELA: Didn't you have ads in the twentieth century?
FRY: Well, sure, but not in our dreams. Only on TV and radio... and in magazines... and movies, and at ballgames, and on buses, and milk cartons, and T-shirts, and bananas, and written in the sky. But not in dreams, no sirree.
I worry that as people get more and more used to seeing an ad behind every action, they'll stop caring about the actions, and stop investigating..
Look at the ATHF scare.. Imagine if that were more common, but if it were actually a fake bomb, as the Boston Police had suggested..
As you go to open it, it screams "BOO! Too bad you didn't have life insurance. Go to Omahalife.com to get some"
Tricks like Nissan's are better-described as just "left-field", not "viral". I don't see how leaving phony keyrings lying around encourages people to pass on a message.
Saying that people will stop caring about viral marketing is suggesting creativity is finite.
What has happened due to the YouTube revolution is that it is harder to be funny now. Notice it's just HARDER - not impossible. So while in the past year or two folks might have gotten around producing average stuff that became viral, the same level of creativity won't be viral in the future. I think that is the real point the article is trying to make.
I don't think he's asking how long until people stop caring about viral marketing, but how long until people stop caring in general, i.e. about humanity. I think the problem lies not in viral marketing itself, but in Nissan's implementation of viral marketing. I think that the methods of these different types of viral marketing are analogous to the goals of white hat and black hat hackers. A practice that may be generally good and clever can be thoroughly spoiled by those who take advantage of it for the wrong reasons.
I have to agree with the writer of this article, except I think it would be better to remove the "Viral" tag altogether. I think that marketing in general has gone too far. Certainly appealing to the generosity of people and then throwing it back in our faces is beginning to go too far, and I think the author of the article does a good job of thoroughly describing where Nissan went wrong, so I'll just shut up now.
This isn't really a case of viral marketing as much as Compassion marketing, which is targeting a new market.
This would have been viral if instead of simply leaving keys on the ground, it encouraged you to "see if you can trick your friends" with the same set of keys, or a similar action element for you to push.
Mea culpa, but the point of the article still stands. I apologize for sidelining the conversation with a poor title.
To ask a (hopefully) better question, although I fear it may be too late for conversation in this thread- Is there a point where people start becoming less engaged in the world, because they're afraid that every action has a marketing angle behind it..
To quote Futurama-
LEELA: Didn't you have ads in the twentieth century? FRY: Well, sure, but not in our dreams. Only on TV and radio... and in magazines... and movies, and at ballgames, and on buses, and milk cartons, and T-shirts, and bananas, and written in the sky. But not in dreams, no sirree.
I worry that as people get more and more used to seeing an ad behind every action, they'll stop caring about the actions, and stop investigating..
Look at the ATHF scare.. Imagine if that were more common, but if it were actually a fake bomb, as the Boston Police had suggested..
As you go to open it, it screams "BOO! Too bad you didn't have life insurance. Go to Omahalife.com to get some"