The viral coefficient is a mathematical formula that measures how many new users each existing user brings to a product service or content. It’s a key metric for viral marketing campaigns and products with built-in virality mechanics.
The formula for calculating viral coefficient is K = i × c where ‘i’ represents the number of invitations sent by each user and ‘c’ is the conversion rate of those invitations. A viral coefficient greater than 1 indicates viral growth as each user brings in more than one additional user resulting in exponential expansion.
For digital marketers understanding and optimizing viral coefficient involves improving both components: encouraging existing users to share more widely (increasing ‘i’) and making the onboarding process for new users as frictionless as possible (improving ‘c’).
Strategies to improve viral coefficient include implementing referral programs with incentives designing share-worthy content or experiences adding social sharing features and creating network effects where the product becomes more valuable as more people use it.
Michael Smith
-