'All pregnancies must be approved'

"All pregnancies must be approved."

It's an ominous future that the Australian Interior Authority has planned for the country, but for now much of it remains a mystery.

No doubt, all will be revealed soon enough.

The recent emergence of signs, billboards and online ads outlining the fictional decrees of the futuristic Australian Interior Authority have internet forums abuzz with speculation over what it's all about.

It's a classic case of “discovery marketing”, according to Simon Dell of Brisbane marketing company TwoCents, where online communities try to home in on just what the campaign is selling. And once they figure it out, they'll be more likely to buy it.

“When you discover those things it's like being part of a secret club,” he said.

“Nobody else is part of the secret club because you've taken the steps to get in. It's that exclusivity. The irony is they are doing it in a massive way on billboards and things.

“Apple use it quite a lot. They want people to feel like they are part of an exclusive club, even though everyone has an iPhone.”

References to the year 2021 on the website linked to the campaign have many in online forums tipping the product will be a sci-fi film, television show or game.

The Orwellian dystopia depicted in the viral campaign also coincides with the tobacco industry's 'nanny state' campaign in Australia, and the company behind the advertisements has represented tobacco companies internationally.

However, the website is short on information, offering only a list of laws such as “all pregnancies must be approved”; “all public gatherings are strictly prohibited” and “holders of expired ID cards will be prosecuted”.

There is also a page to register you email account and phone number in order to report a citizen breaking one of the laws.

A phone number on billboards connects to an automated message asking that you leave your phone number so that your call can be returned.

Mr Dell said these were likely ploys for the company to collect contact details, so that emails and text messages could be sent to potential customers.

Calls to executives at the Melbourne office of Draftfcb, the marketing company to which the website is registered, were not returned today.

Mr Dell said such viral marketing could be effective if the target audience was carefully selected.

And he said discussions started in online forums could even have been started by the marketing company.

“The danger is that people try to manage viral marketing and the definition is that a virus moves under its own steam,” he said.

“You very rarely have control of getting a cold off somebody.

“You can do your best to manage it and direct it. But at the end of the day the success of viral marketing is based on the strength of the idea itself and the fact that you've seeded it in the right places.”

But they don't always go as planned.

Mr Dell said while viral marketing works well for technology and entertainment products, however some things simply fail to take hold.

“A lot of the companies fail miserably,” he said.

“Car companies tend to be ones that tend not to do well at viral marketing because not a huge amount of people get excited about a new Toyota or Honda.”