“Clicking on the link increases my ‘influence’ and gives you the chance to have more of your own.”
At least that’s their premise.
When I first heard about Fast Company’s Influence Project nearly a month ago, I scoffed. Actually, I nearly choked. The concept of judging one’s online influence by seeing how many people they can get to click on their personalized link was never going to work.
It worked. Over 22,000 people have created profiles. At least 2 out of 3 of those people have generate clicks since upon clicking once I was in the 33rd percentile. Assuming that many up at the top of the list have generated hundreds, even thousands of clicks, let’s put the average at 50 clicks per profile.
That’s over a million visitors.
Laugh all you want. Blog about how silly the idea is. Tell your friends that popularity does not equal influence. Predict that 4chan will win in the end. It doesn’t matter.
People created accounts. More people clicked.
Heck, I created an account for “research” just now. A month late? I’m not worried. Even if I started on time, I could never put in the time to win the “prize” (which I’m still unclear about).
They will end up with millions of page views (not including the blogs and sites ripping on them, then linking to the project) and then get ripped on by marketing companies for doing it wrong.
Right or wrong, Fast Company won.
* * *
Read more about social media campaigns on this Social Media Blog.
About JD Rucker
If that method was at all possible with my business, I would have had lots more visitors than what I already have now…
That is an interesting way to gain visitors by getting numerous clicks to gain your Online Influence on anything…
I spotted all those links in my follower’s twitter streams and indeed was tempted at one stage to dig deeper, however after clicking on the link and examining further, I realised that it was a very clever marketing ploy by fast company to build buzz and revitalise their stale brand. Good Marketing Idea, I shall give them that much. Just not for me.
Timing is everything, I guess. Let’s just say it’s lucky time for Fast Company right now with their strategy. But I think, like any fad, this trick will soon fail. Clever marketing, yes. It’s funny how clicks can really have an impact on your influence on the Web.