Marketing of fast moving consumer goods : a study of viral videos with forest-related products

Abstract: The traditional forest industry is facing a change. Not only is the forest industry changing, also the world is changing in terms of threats of the implementation of new trade barriers and how companies are using marketing. Viral marketing is one of the new marketing tools that could be a solution for strengthening customers’ weak connection to the forest sector’s products and their brands. This study aimed to identify content characteristics that could be useful for the forest industry in this new way of conducting marketing: viral videos. Three viral video ads were used as the study’s unit of analysis. From that, data was originated through two types of interviews. Thereafter, the collected information was analysed with a constant comparative analysis. The results showed that many attributes were present in the different viral videos. Finally, the study was able to conclude that multiple content characteristics were present in the viral video ads for low-involvement forest-related products that became viral.