when done creatively companies can trigger viral responses for example burger king created a buzz when it posted pictures of its month old moldy whopper in response to mcdonald s claim that its burgers don t decompose burger king asserts that it uses only fresh ingredients and no preservatives which should provide a better and healthier outcome for its customers its unappealing looking burger was visible proof of that claim 
viral marketing costs are a fraction of traditional advertising campaigns and advertising is essentially free when consumers infectiously share their positive experiences with a company s products and services with others because the internet allows content to be shared easily and quickly viral marketing can also trigger exponential and rapid growth however it is important to note that how quickly and easily content is shared is largely dependent on whether the company uses the right tools that make this possible sometimes viral marketing sparks a response counter to what was intended consumers tend to share negative news more often than positive news and studies show that people have a stronger emotional response to negative news negative buzz can be detrimental to business and sometimes hard to recover from 2the effects of viral marketing are hard to measure as it is difficult to determine if a lead or sale resulted from it and there is no consensus among businesses on how to measure its success if customers believe the viral campaign will compromise their privacy and security they will likely not share as a result the company s marketing mission fails and its reputation may be tarnished future viral marketing campaigns may be adversely affected by previous unsuccessful attempts wider reachfaster and exponential growthlower costsnegative word of mouthhard to measurelow virality