Business 2.0 has an interesting article on how some companies are going from broke startups to multi-million dollar enterprises almost overnight on a shoestring budget and minimal employees. The article discusses how these clever entrepreneur used outsourced workers and free “Buzz Marketing” tactics such as exploiting blogs and online forums to beat much bigger rivals. I especially found interesting the list of companies/products that became successful due to being featured on high-traffic blog sites. Buzz Marketing, a trendy name for word-of-mouth advertising, has been a hot topic over the last few years as ad firms try to figure out how to get people talking about products and services without being sniffed out as blatant advertising. Some even go so far as to hire people who post in forums and chat rooms under the guise of fans, customers or just you average Joe asking questions to start a conversation about the product or service being promoted. Buzz Marketing (or “guerilla marketing” as I like to call it) can make your business a success at little to no cost. Just make sure that if you launch a campaign of this type, you keep you methods low key and relevant to the content of the sites you post on. Being seen as “trying” to advertise can not only wined up getting you no customers but can get you a bad reputation. Here’s an old but still good article on Buzz Marketing from BusinessWeek online.

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