About
I am part of an artist group where our first assignment is to create a piece involving the tree closest to our house. Because I was not terribly excited about the tree closest to my house, so I chose a tree near to where I spend a lot of time. So… yeah, while I was thinking about my tree project, I overheard a tourist asking who the F**k was Sarah Marshall and what was up with the annoying signs (agreed). So, the two ideas merged.
What I know about viral marketing (as used with in advertising for the Forgetting Sarah Marshall movie) is that it’s a technique using “preexisting social networks to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives (such as product sales) through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of pathological and computer viruses. It can be word-of-mouth delivered or enhanced by the network effects of the Internet. Viral marketing is a marketing phenomenon that facilitates and encourages people to pass along a marketing message voluntarily.” wikipedia
I am most disturbed by the part I have placed in bold–that the message is passed along voluntarily, almost without us thinking about it. If I am doing anything during this week-long project, it is to continue the awareness that we are passing along marketing information by choice and that it is a choice whether or not we want to continue passing information along. My first hope is to create and/or add to the dialog individuals might be having about this marketing scheme and others like it. My second hope is that other individuals might craft their own urban interventions to create longterm dialog and awareness.
March 27, 2008 at 4:07 pm
When I saw your trees yesterday, I laughed out loud. I was walking alone down 24th, in a suit on my way to a meeting, and I think people though I was nuts.
Then I told a few friends about the trees – friends with whom I’d already had a conversation along the lines of “who the f**k is Sarah Marshall?”
But then at first I didn’t go to your website, because I was worried that it might point to the *actual* sarah marshall website; that the real Sarah Marshall people, as part of their viral marketing campaign, might have done these themselves to be super sneaky. I’m glad it wasn’t that, because your trees were awesome.
But also…it’s kind of ironic that your anti-viral still increased the amount of time I spent thinking about that movie…oh well.
Anyway, I’m still laughing inside. Keep up the good work!