After ten years or so Hotmail is still the best example of how effective viral software can be on the Internet.

Viral software is a computer program that offers great value to the end user, So much so that the user will take it upon himself to spread the good word to friends and business associates.

Hotmail offered a free web based email service that was unique at the time. A user could sign up for the service for free. Then when he/she used the free service to send emails a small advertisement was automatically placed at the end of each email message that highlighted the free service.

As emails were send across the Internet and people realized that they could get the neat email service for free Hotmail grew incredibly fast. Hotmail went for zero to over 31,000,000 users in about a year.

But how can you make money by providing a free service you might ask? Well, I can tell you that every time 31,000,000 users log into their account there are a lot of ways to monetize the huge amount of traffic that activity will bring.

So to summarize viral software and viral marketing is a way to gain a lot of exposure for yourself and your business by giving away something for free , usually a little software program, that has great perceived value to the consumer. Your consumers then become your best marketing force by telling their friends and associates about your program.

Cloaker Buzz is a good example of a successful viral software program. Cloaker Buzz hides or "cloaks" affiliate links. Those of you who are involved with affiliate marketing probably know that many affiliate links are long and ugly as well as being impossible to remember. With Cloaker Buzz you can create your own great looking link and have it redirect to your affiliate program link. The redirect happens so fast that few if any people visiting your site will even be aware that it is a redirect.

Another very useful use of Cloaker Buzz software is to stop link thief. With quite a few affiliate programs your affiliate ID is exposed in the browser of whoever is on your site. It is easy for link thieves to replace your ID with their own before purchasing an item. You have just lost a commission without even knowing about it. It is estimated by some affiliate gurus that up to 30% of your commissions may be stolen in this manner. Cloaker Buzz will stop this link thief.

That's great, you may be thinking, but how does Cloaker Buzz fit the definition of being viral software. Well, you can get a fully functioning copy of Cloaker Buzz for free. And because it works so well you will probably want to tell your friends about it. Or you might want to use it as a bonus for something else you are selling. There is the possibility that your little piece of free software will spread quickly across the net.

Fantastic, you might be thinking. But how will I benefit from all of this? Well , you can purchase the branding rights to Cloaker Buzz and build your own banners and text links into the software. Than as the use of Cloaker Buzz (you can even give it your own name) spreads you are in effect getting free advertising and promotion of your websites and deals.

People who use the software can use it without purchasing the branding rights. But when they do so it is your deals they they are promoting, not their own. If they do purchase the rebranding rights you get to keep 100% of the commission.

By giving away free software you can receive the benefit of a mass marketing campaign. This will not happen overnight but as the months roll by your little program will began to build. At some point there is the good chance that it will go viral and spread faster and faster across the Internet.

There is nothing like a successful viral marketing program to eventually bring loads of traffic to your web pages. Free is a word that Internet people like.