Dealing with viral cycles

Embedding viral distribution tools in your products is the path to growth. Understanding virus loops and optimizing them can add much more distribution to your product than any new feature, advertising campaign, or code optimization.

For example, consider the growth rate of some Facebook applications from RockYou like “throw sheep to your friends”:



The graph shows that their application Horoscope gained 1.5 million users in 15 days! How did they do it? Understanding and using viral cycles, here is a bit of an interview with the CEO of RockYou:
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Viral cycles in most social networks are formed around the user who sets the widget on the page and invites friends to see it. Viral cycles on Facebook are generated in news feeds, mini-feeds and sending invites.

Horoscope sat on the tail of the viral cycle in mini-feeds. We did not expect that this would lead to such a rapid set of users.

Virus Cycle Metrics (v = e * i)

From the presentation of the CEO of RockYou on viral growth :

Viral growth graph

To determine the viral growth factor, the following equation is used (this is e = mc ^ 2 for viral growth):

v = e*i,
v -
e - - (y )
i - , (x )

Example:

i = 5 ( , )
e = 25% ( )
= 5*0.25 = 1.25

Viral factor 1.25 means that your viral cycle practically guarantees self-sustaining growth - and this is a very important acquisition ;-) Use the equation v = e * i to measure and develop your viral cycle.

Additional information on the topic

• Andrew Chen articles on viral marketing, game design and more. He is the most experienced blogger on these topics.
• Virus cycles of existing applications : a huge library of virus cycles.

I am in the process of mastering the tools of viral distribution and I think that this skill should be in the set of each hacker :))))