The viral makes you aware : how is brand association affected by viral marketing through individual networks

Abstract: Nowadays the internet has become more and more important in today’s technology addicted society. Consumers of today use the internet as a tool to communicate, do shopping and search for information. Hence, the internet has become a convenient way for organizations to reach out to consumers in an easy and cheap way, specially through the tool viral marketing. In this paper we research the phenomenon brand awareness and brand association affected by viral marketing. This is done through two research questions: How does a commercial affect consumers to create a network Viral marketing campaign? And Why do consumers purchase a brand when they are reacting negatively on a commercial?.   To answer the research questions we chose a well discussed Swedish commercial from Apoliva as an example, especially since the commercial has received many negative reactions. Based on the commercial, we made a survey on the internet community site Facebook to measure how and why users reacted to the commercial and spread the reactions further; if and how their opinions changed toward the commercial and if and why consumers buy from the brand.   The conclusions we draw from the research questions are that consumers tend to buy a brand although they do not like the commercial related to the brand, since the commercial itself is not of importance and in most cases the consumers do not relate the commercial with the brand. Furthermore, consumers tend to discuss a commercial if it is not a mainstream commercial. Although consumers discuss with their network on the internet, most of the discussion tend to be mouth-to-mouth and the spreading of opinion on the internet is mostly to vent their feelings.