| 7 Tips to Ride Viral Buzz to Triple-Digit Revenue Growth eTail Masters of eCommerce Marketing Interview with Beth Ferreira, VP of Operations, Etsy Viral marketing is a great way to get your customers to refer like-minded people to your company - but it's difficult to maintain. Once a viral campaign runs its course, how do you keep the buzz going? Listen to a marketer from an online creative marketplace that spreads the word almost entirely with viral buzz. Discover the tips used to keep their members interested enough to continue referring their peers. Beth Ferreira, VP of Operations, Etsy, and her team consistently ride a wave of viral buzz. The team runs a low-advertising, high-effort marketing strategy that has kept interest booming in the handmade-goods marketplace for buyers and sellers. Ferreira works closely with Etsy sellers, sticking to core values and promoting discussion among them. Etsy has seen a more than 200% annual growth in its sales and member base since its 2005 inception, Ferreira says. Revenue in 2008 may quadruple last year. Here are seven strategies Ferreira and her team use to maintain viral buzz. Tip #1: Stay true to core values Etsy's seller and buyer base has a strong affinity for handmade goods and creativity. The company strives to maintain those core values in all its efforts, as you can see in the examples below. This builds strong ties with members, who suggest the service to like-minded peers. Striving for creativity also makes Etsy interesting and easier to talk about. Its unique applications for organizing products and presenting them to buyers help to boost its buzz. Tip #2: Approach challenges differently Selling products or promoting an event through best practices gives your company a solid foundation -- but nothing is case in stone. Etsy takes risks in its creative approaches to marketing, especially its merchandising. o Challenge: Getting consumers to products Many of Etsy's 2.4 million handmade products are one-of-a-kind. "Most people that come to the site don't really know what they're looking for, which poses a challenge," Ferreira says. Etsy offers highly-visual ways to browse products, in addition to standard categories and search features. - Shop by color: Shoppers can use an interactive color pallet to view products with desired colors. The pallet is a grid of multi-colored dots that expand and gradually fade when moused over, creating a visual experience. After a color is selected, a pile--not a list--of products appears. - Time machine: Images of the most-recently purchased products are organized into a vortex-like spiral. Clicking and dragging the images pulls them into view and reveals when they were sold. There is also another time machine, organized into a grid, that reveals the products most recently uploaded and soon to expire. - Treasuries: Users can organize a treasury of select items they like. Other users can comment on treasuries and offer suggestions. - Geo locator: An interactive globe highlights the location of the 100 most recently purchased items. When clicked, the globe reveals the items' images. Tip #3: Get more from your resources Etsy collects fees to list products and when they are sold, making its sellers a vital resource. Ferreira and her team provide tools for sellers to further their craft and their business and, in turn, help Etsy. Tools include: - Virtual labs: Live workshops and online classes on topics like store management and presentation. The lab also works as an interactive space where members can set up events, get their store critiqued by experts and stream live video how-tos. - Resources: Etsy provides an array of images members can use to spruce up their stores and profiles. Images displaying "on vacation" or "sale today" help with promotion. There are also printable flyers for promoting offline, and a directory of business-related links. - Teams: Members can organize themselves to collaborate on marketing, events, creation, promotion and more. o Cooperative advertising Ferreira and her team do not buy much print advertising, she says. When they do, they sell half of the ad to theirs sellers. For example, if they buy a full page ad in a magazine, half of the ad will feature 30 spots for sellers to display their goods for about $50 to $100 a spot. The other half promotes Etsy as a whole. Tip #4: Use external and internal social networks -- no preference Esty fans organize themselves in external social networks like Facebook and Ning, Ferreira says. They're particularly fond of the social image site Flickr, due to its visual nature. Etsy also has ways for users to interact on its own site, such as: - Chats - Forums - Teams: members can have profile pages, message each other and organize meetings - Virtual labs: as previously discussed Rather than focusing on either external or internal social networks, Etsy encourages its members to gather where they prefer. Ferreira and her team provide plenty of tools to interact on their site; they're happy if members connect elsewhere. Tip #5: Give them something to talk about Etsy's creative features are great for attracting new members. And Ferreira and her team have several ways to keep the conversation going: - Regularly updated, high-quality blog - 5 email newsletters - Partnerships with other blogs to trade content - Only buying online ads from blogs Blogs typically attract and host more conversations than traditional publications. When Ferriera and her team want to promote an event on their site, they'll buy display ads on blogs related to the topic and crafts in general. They only buy ads to promote events, and do not continually run ads, Ferreira says. Tip #6: Go where the audience is Etsy's core members regularly attend craft fairs. So Ferriera and her team do the same across the county to introduce their service to new sellers and buyers, and to maintain their presence in the industry. Keeping to Etsy's core values, Ferriera's team hands out handmade tote bags, lip balms and other goodies to their booth's visitors. They also bring sellers to the conference to talk to people about their goods and their experience with Etsy. Their conference signs are handmade and one-of-a-kind. "The challenge is that we don't have consistent branding, but everyone does notice that 'Hey, there's Etsy and their authentic and this is what they stand for.' It makes it pretty clear." Tip #7: Go for publicity Free press is great for generating buzz. This is the situation Ferreira and her team are in. Etsy's approach and values make an interesting story and its products are visually stimulating. Their pictures look great in print and their products look great on TV. They've been featured in a host of publications and television programs. Beth Ferreira spoke at eTail 2008 Links related to this article: Creative samples Sherpa Article: 'Pimped-Out' Microsite Triggers Viral Explosion http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=30777 Sherpa Article: Viral Email Nets 100% Response from Brand Champs http://www.marketingsherpa.com/article.php?ident=30752 New York Times: Handmade 2.0 http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/16/magazine/16Crafts-t.html?scp=1&sq=etsy&st=cse Etsy http://www.etsy.com/ | 
