So. Who wants to go first? And who wants to be last?
Seth Godin (sgodin@fastcompany.com), author of Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers Into Friends and Friends Into Customers (Simon & Schuster, 1999), is an idea merchant. For more information, visit the Ideavirus Web site (http://www.ideavirus.com) to get Godin's latest work -- for free!
What does it take to create a successful ideavirus? Follow these seven simple steps:
Make sure that your idea is virusworthy. If it's not worth talking about, it won't get talked about.
Identify the hive. To get the full benefit of an ideavirus, you'll need to infect more than half of your hive.
Expose your idea. Expose it to the right people, and do whatever you need to do to get those people deep into the experience of your idea as quickly as possible.
Create your sound bite. You've got to decide what you want the sneezers to say to the population. If you don't decide, they'll decide for you -- and say something less than optimal.
Give the sneezers the tools that they need to spread the virus. After you've got the sneezers, make it easy for them to spread your idea.
Have we chosen a hive that we're capable of dominating?
How smooth is the transfer of the ideavirus?
Have we built in multiple feedback loops so that we can alter the virus as it moves and grows?
Here's my five-point plan to turn this manifesto into an ideavirus:
Describe something important, cool, neat, and useful, and do it in compelling, clear, and exciting language.
Launch the virus to the largest possible audience of sneezers that I can find. In this case, that means the readership of Fast Company http://www.fastcompany.com/ideavirus.
Make it smooth and make it catchy. Post the entire manifesto at http://www.ideavirus.com . Include commentary from Jay Levinson, Tom Peters, Lester Wunderman, and others. Include the text of the entire book. Make it easy to send the book to a friend. Include my PowerPoint slides. Do it all for free.
Run ads to create an environment in which sneezers feel comfortable spreading the manifesto to others.
Maintain the virus as it grows by doing speaking engagements and by distributing the hard-copy version of the manifesto to appropriate sneezers.
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