The Twitter Effect
It’s 6 am, and I have a hankering for a Korean taco. I don’t even know what comprises such a food, but I want it. And I’m going straight to Twitter when I get to the office to check out why it’s all the rave and to locate the blessed taco truck that boasts such culinary mastery.
On Monday morning - which usually starts as a groggy blending of gunfire in Afghanistan while conversing with Hilary Clinton and Felipe Calderon about Cleveland State’s upset against Wake Forest, as NPR sputters out the radio trying to rouse me from sleep - I awoke to a news story convincing me to visit L.A. and track down a Korean BBQ taco truck that notifies its fans of its current location via Twitter. Kogi - the previously mentioned Korean taco restaurant on wheels - owes much thanks to viral Internet marketing.
Kogi’s cult followers continually check Twitter for the truck’s whereabouts and daily specials, and they often wait in line for hours to try the CIA top-chef’s blending of Korean kimchi flavors with Mexican spicy. They also post videos on You Tube and publish odes to Kogi on My Space. Click here to read the full story from NPR.
I recently attended a convention for one of our retail flooring clients, and their corporate marketing team held education sessions on Web 2.0 marketing. What does Facebook and Twitter mean to a 60 year-old second generation Carpet One owner who has advertised in traditional media for 50 years? Look at Kogi. The Kogi chef even admits that without Twitter he could still make great tacos, but he wouldn’t have anyone to sell them to.
I’m not posturing that my Carpet One owner should expect the dramatic increase in traffic that Kogi enjoys from online viral marketing. But I do think it’s worthy of some experimentation. For instance, the Carpet One owner could post a before-and-after video on You Tube of a customer’s home after installing her new Carpet One flooring. Our owner could start a Twitter profile and Facebook page for his business and ask his staff to follow them, as well as any of their friends and family and maybe acquaintances who bought flooring there. Throw links up on the Carpet One website to the video, Facebook and Twitter profiles, and have a sales manager start a blog that talks about your engagement online. The networking spawns organically, creating a sort of Twitter effect.
