Online infection through refer-a-friend script

Something is considered infectious if it has the capacity to be propagated to significant portion of population by simply starting with few individuals. In the natural world, viruses have this infectious trait. Although not alive in a biological sense, viruses are able to reproduce and propagate in exponential rate by hijacking the resources of their infected hosts. Online infection happens in a similar manner. Computer viruses self-replicate and propagate themselves by hijacking the digital resources of their computer hosts. This same basic principle of infection can be applied in online marketing by integrating a refer-a-friend script in the operation process of a website.

Promoting a website can be tedious and laborious if manually done. It is typically done through link building, content writing, forum posting, submitting to directories, blog posting, and other SEO techniques. All of these are indispensable techniques but there are also some components of marketing that can be done in automated manner. Using a refer-a-friend script in a website is one way of automating a marketing campaign. This script can provide convenience for the customers and visitors of a website by allowing them to send multiple invitations to their contact without necessarily listing all the email addresses. Some more sophisticated scripts are capable of extracting contact information from a single email account with the permission of the account owner.

In order for a refer-a-friend script to be really effective, a website must first be able to attract a significant traffic of visitors. A website must first be highly optimized for search engines. The visitors can potentially become customers, who in turn will attract other visitors and customers. Thus, the campaign can reach the status of viral infection. Instead of just a single campaigner for a website, other people will be involved. The customers and visitors themselves will become the marketers.


The commonality of refer-a-friend script

If you have recently have tried signing-up for any new internet services such as job search site, video uploading, online newsletter, or project management site, you probably have encountered referral forms that require you to enter your own email address or email addresses of some of your contacts. Most sites would require you to enter your own email account details. You will also be required to open you email to receive that confirmation of your subscription. You would then need to click a confirmation link or enter a confirmation code before your account will be created. This type of form utilizes a refer-a-friend script to send automatic email invitations to your email contacts.

Virtually all online services and new transactions require your email account details to be processed or availed. In most of these online services and transactions, you will need to use your email account details to set-up an account. The mandatory requirement of the email account details is a marketing strategy that utilizes a refer-a-friend script. Basically, the script is part of referral system that allows the websites to get referrals from their new subscribers. In this manner, leveraging is achieved. This means that new potential customers or subscribers will be generated through your referrals and also using your subscriber identity as the sender. This type of strategy was first successfully used by social networking sites.

Formerly, refer-a-friend script applications were used only by big online companies. However, these applications are now accessible even to ordinary individuals and start-up online companies. There are even online resources that offer free scripts that can be customized and copy-pasted. As long as the minimum server requirement is met, the scripts will function effectively in generating new potential customers or subscribers. If properly initiated, the entire process can be made fully automated.