The news at the moment might be full of the “swine flu” that we’re told might become the next pandemic, but I wonder whether copywriter John Ritz might be doing the same thing in the marketing world – but in a good way. (I’m on about good old viral marketing, folks – but in 2009 style.)

You see, I just received a Twitter from Michel Fortin that said something like this…

@John_Ritz is giving away his popular website software Power Effects. Get it FREE: http://tinyurl.com/ctok3n (no opt-in required)

Quite frankly, I had no idea what Power Effects was, so I decided to click the link to find out. Turns out, it’s a pretty nifty piece of kit that enables you to create things like animated headlines, without having to know any technical stuff like Flash. (You can check it out here.)

However, here’s where I think John is really smart. He’s giving away Power Effects, but in order to receive the download link, you have to…

1. Follow @John_Ritz on Twitter

2. Re-Tweet this exact message:

RT @John_Ritz is giving away his popular website software Power Effects. Get it FREE: http://tinyurl.com/ctok3n (no opt-in required)

He says you must re-tweet the exact message above, with no changes, or this won’t work. He even provided a link which you can click, which pre-fills the message in for you, if you’re already signed in to Twitter.

Then, within about 10 minutes, he’ll send you a direct message via Twitter with the download link.

Now, I thought this was an incredibly smart method of utilizing Twitter as a viral marketing medium – it’s like the classic “recommend a friend” email, but without the risk of spam complaints, because those who are following you on Twitter have already “opted-in” as it were! And you don’t have the hassle of trying to figure out which 5 friends are going to be the poor suckers who receive your “recommend a friend” email.

Folks, in my opinion, John Ritz has done everything right to make his campaign go “viral”…

1. A truly great offer, i.e. great product, that he’s giving away,

2. A great viral marketing mechanism, in this case Twitter,

3. Minimum friction. He makes it super easy for you to re-tweet it. Basically, just copy and paste his message, and re-tweet. Even better, for those who are already logged in to Twitter, he provides a link which fills the message he requires you to send into the “What are you doing?” box automatically. All you have to do is press Update!

4. He’s reached the right “sneezers”, to use Seth Godin’s term. I got the re-tweet from Michel Fortin, who is one of the big sneezers in the Twitter and copywriting world. (And no, I don’t mean to imply he has swine flu! “Sneezers” is a metaphor used for one of those people who will pass on the marketing “virus” (the message) in a big way, because he has a big following on Twitter.)

So what does John Ritz get out of it? Well, he’ll be getting more followers on Twitter, and more users of his Power Effects. Plus, people like me will end up blogging about it, and re-tweeting the message to get hold of the product. Sure, he might not be making money directly from this, but he’s extending his reach and authority on the Internet, which will almost certainly make him more money in the future.

I don’t yet know how he is able to deliver the direct message (with the download link) automatically, within (he claims) the space of about 10 minutes. Obviously he is using some kind of software or script to do that, but I’m not sure what that is yet… I’ll do my best to find out and update this post when I know.

So then, what do you think of John Ritz’ strategy, and can you think of ways of improving it, or of ways you might implement something like this? Let’s discuss it in the comments below.