Potter fans may now have something else to focus their internet attention towards, other than making Twitter trending topics out of Ron Weasley and Luna Lovegood. A mysterious site has popped up called Pottermore and the only thing on it is “coming soon” and JK Rowling’s signature.

The site was unveiled by a Harry Potter scavenger hunt, where map coordinates were placed on various fan websites like The Leaky Cauldron. Nine were placed on these sites and the final one was tweeted out yesterday on the newly established Pottermore Twitter account.

The coordinates, once entered into the search box at secretstreetview.com, would reveal a photoshopped letter on some Harry Potter-themed site. The “M” in “PotterMore,” for example, was a reference to Manchester Station where JK Rowling first conceived the idea to write the beloved novels.

If you click on one of the owls on the Pottermore website, you will be directed to a YouTube page called “JK Rowling Announces.” It doesn’t say what, only contains a countdown clock that now reads about 6 days, 10 hours until her announcement. The poster profile says that fans will be able to watch her announcement exclusively on the YouTube channel.

So what in the mudblood could this site be? Rowling’s lawyers have said that it is not a new Harry Potter book. The Leaky Cauldron has this to say –

Speculation on the trademark information of Pottermore has also been making its way around the internet. The info, which was registered in 2009, says that Pottermore is trademarked for, among other things, multiple-user networks, online boards, digital audio, printed books, toys, retail stores, and more, and more, and more – in short, pretty much everything. We don’t feel this gives much direction one way or the other.

Right, that points simply to a giant fan site, possibly a Harry Potter themed social network? If Call of Duty can try it, so can Harry.

Gizmodo says that an anonymous tip told them something about a Harry Potter branded smartphone. Now wouldn’t that be interesting?

What do you think the new site will be? Something magical I’m sure. Are you excited about all new things Harry Potter? Don’t forget, this comes out very, very soon guys…

That’s because to even get in the door of the swanky looking alley entrance, you’ll need a verified Twitter account. As you all know, a verified Twitter account is the little blue check mark next to users’ names that is used to differentiate between celebrities’ real accounts and the many fake accounts that spring up. So unless you have one of those, you can’t get in the door.

Here’s the entrance:

If you click on the “sign in with verified Twitter” button, you’ll be redirected to allow access to your Twitter account. The site says that “granting permission simply confirms if you are a verified user and how many followers you have. Nothing else. Those who manage to gain entry will be listed inside.”

If you do not have a verified Twitter account and still try to get in, you’ll see this:

And the “slightly less discriminating destination” that you are directed to? The Olive Garden website.
Well played, exclusive site creators, well played.

So you can get in the door with a verified account, but once inside you will need to have an impressive number of followers to proceed any further. To access the next area, you’ll need 5,000 Twitter followers. To get through Door 3, 25,000 followers. Door 4 – 100,000. Door 5 500,000. Door 6 – 1 million. Door 7 – 5 million.

Currently, the only person to go through Door 6 has been Ryan Seacrest. On his website, he gives us a look into the more exclusive rooms that he has accessed. It looks like when you get to a door that requires more followers than you have to enter, it will tell you to “please remain here until you get more popular.”

Who are the minds behind this ultimate test in Twitter popularity and exclusivity? For one, New York based creative director Jeff Greenspan. You may know him as the guy behind another viral campaign Hipster Traps. Chained to various signs in the city, Greenspan placed PBR, American Spirit cigs, pink plastic sunglasses and fixie bike chains inside a bear trap – Hipster Trap, get it?

Also involved is Greenspan’s co-creator of Letterbombing.com Chris Baker. Letterbombing involves coordinated Facebook attacks where you and your friends reserve posts on another friend’s wall, change your profile pictures to letters, and spell anything you want down their wall.

Also responsible is Mike Lacher, who created On The Bro’D, a tumblr blog that features a line by line translation of Jack Kerouac’s On The Road and retold for Bros. Designer Doug Loffredo also helped on the site.

So who’s gonna bust through that 5 million follower door? It’s going to have to be someone like Oprah, Selena Gomez, Ashton Kutcher or maybe even Barack Obama. Do you think there is a room for those with 10 million + followers? That would only be a two-person party, as Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga are the only ones that could get it.

Talk about exclusive.

Now that production for The Dark Knight Rises (TDKR), the third installment of Nolan’s Batman series, is underway, the viral marketing has begun again, this time, making impressive use of Twitter and hashtags. Following the strategy of the first campaign, the TDKR marketing crew revealed the villain early on, and like the Ledger/Joker reveal, the initial image was obscured as individual pixels were peeled away.

The catalyst for the removal of these pixels was, of course, Twitter. Tweets that made use of the following hashtag — #thefirerises — resulted in another pixel being removed. This continued until the image was entirely visible, and it gave us our first look at one of the movie’s main adversaries, Bane. Played by Tom Hardy, Bane is one of the more popular members of Batman’s rogue’s gallery, and Nolan’s take on the character looks pretty damn good, much like Ledger and the Joker:

Click for a bigger image

Originally, if you clicked over [to TheDarkKnightRises.com], it was just a black image with some really weird chanting. A fan was able to look at the visual spectrum of that audio file and in it was…a Twitter Hashtag.

They even have an image of the audio file that the hashtag was deciphered out of:

Thoughts on the early returns of the newest Batman movie-related viral campaign? Is it too early to worked up? What about the Bane reveal? Like it? Hate it? Let us know in the comments.

SES New York is here again, and WebProNews is there to bring you reports and videos from the Big Apple. Enjoy our coverage this week.

Hanekamp said to give something to people that they can talk about. Build a microsite with content that entertains, is relevant, timely and exclusive. Get people to engage and get them involved.

In the old days you had to spend so much money on media, now you can pour it into content for people to pass along. He pointed out that viral is not predictable but to keep trying.

Ed Kim CEO, Red Bricks Media, spoke about identifying influencers in your community. You can identify influencers by using blogs, message boards, Wikipedia, video ads, podcasting and social networking.

Fionn Downhill, CEO and President, Exlir Systems, said companies want to use viral because people trust recommendations from consumers. The basic elements for success include giving away products or services, utilizing existing communications networks and using the resources of others.

Downhill said,"You cannot control viral marketing, but you can enable it and you need to enable it." Strategies for viral marketing include: blogs
-forums
-rss feeds-single most important thing you can do to enable your viral campaigns
-social bookmarking
-press releases-great way to get information out there (make sure its news, something people are interested in
-photo directories/images
-Facebook/MySpace
-videos
-article marketing
-ezines-have subscribers on there and pass on to a friend
-white papers
-Wikipedia- is a great place to put your name and brand

If you use blogging, have a strategy for how you are going to update and how you are going to link it to your viral campaign.

You can use YouTube to create simple, fun and quirky videos. Tell clients and friends and link from your Web site. You can also set up your own branded channel and optimize it. YouTube is easy and powerful.

Ways to measure your success include: RSS/newsletter subscriber’s
-social bookmarks
-comments on your blog
-links to your site by social media

-what blogs, forums etc are saying about you
-monitor referring links
-monitor brand/search saturation
-mood of conversation marketing
-tracking email usage
-Google and Yahoo alerts works for free

Conn Fishburn, Director of Social Media Strategy, Yahoo, said marketing today is a social dialogue. Brands and companies are part of the cultural fabric. Listen to you audience and become part of the story.

Always bring something of value, be good to your consumers and don’t take advantage of them. Think holistically, viral is here to stay.

In the session "Igniting Viral Campaigns" Bill Hanekamp, CEO of The Well got things started by saying, "I get really nervous in front of SEO people, because I’m a marketing guy."

He said the content you provide should be:
1. Entertaining
2. Relevant
3. Timely
4. Exclusive

Those are the key elements to making things buzzworthy.

The content that visitors provide are:
1. Engagement
2. Referrals (links)
"Marketing nirvana is reached when you do this perfect," he said.

Ed Kim, CEO, Red Bricks Media, pointed to Eric Jackson as a good example of the user generated revolution, because of the Yahoo shares he owns he was able to nominate himself to the Yahoo Board, which empowers other users.

Kim said consumers are often going directly to their communities to get advice and what they want. He said, "You should identify and influence the influencers!"

Fionn Downhill, CEO, Elixir Systems, said social media is the hot new buzzword among online marketers. She noted that a recent Nielsen Survey found that 78 percent of people trusted recommendations from consumers. That’s 15 percent higher than those who trusted the second source, which were newspapers.

She offered these free viral techniques:

1. RSS Feeds
2. Articles
3. White Papers
4. Adding links
5. Add email
6. Social Media (LinkedIn and Facebook)
7. Blogs
8. Forums

Video Anchor/Reporter Kara Ratliff contributed to this article