Who decides what internet product will be the next Wikipedia, Facebook, or Twitter? How do internet service-businesses grow from being a niche product to one that permeates and defines pop culture?. Could your product one day become a verb… just as “to Google” has entered the modern lexicon?

Guessing what will be the “Next Big Thing” is the most popular parlor game among the technologically hip. As an internet entrepreneur these people are your colleagues — those creating internet businesses or making their living designing the web infrastructure that support those businesses.

Earlier this month Silicon Valley held the TechCrunch 50 conference. Billed as the “Sundance Festival for Tech,” the purpose of the conference is to discover and showcase the most promising and innovative ideas in internet business. More specifically, it is to showcase them to an audience of venture capitalists, corporations, fellow entrepreneurs and press so that those businesses can get the capital and exposure they need to grow.

Of course not every internet firm is going to gain the fame or generate the profits of Google or MySpace… but while you’re dreaming, why not dream big? All of the internet companies that are ubiquitous today started out with a small base of users — just like yours. Through viral advertising those businesses increased their exposure until they eventually reached the “Tipping Point” (to use Malcolm Gladwell’s term) and became mainstream products.

Recently I wrote a friend of mine who started “twittering” two years ago to congratulate him on his tech savvy — while two years ago I’d never heard of it, Twitter is now quickly becoming mainstream and is even used by companies to provide immediate customer service. My friend told me that the way to seem tech savvy is to tell your friends about the coolest 10 tech ideas you run across in a year… two of the ten will probably survive and your friends will think you’re a genius techster for having picked them out.

So now comes the work for you… In order to be one of the ten companies techsters are talking about you have to get your product known to these people with tech influence. These are the people who tip off their friends and audiences to what will be the Next Big Thing. Find the sites where the tech savvy in your market sector are going for their news and tips. After you’ve done that, here are some tips to get your product and your business noticed on these sites:

1. Write a “press release” to the blog about your business. Put yourself on the blog authors’ radar screen. Write the “release” as if it’s a blog post on that blog so that if the writers are lazy they could just put up your text as their post.

2. Start commenting. Even if the blog doesn’t highlight your product right away, you can bring attention to it yourself by mentioning it in the comments. Don’t be too obnoxious in this, but while addressing the point made in the post or by other commenters see if you can’t also bring up your product.

3. Join the conversation. Your company needs to be represented where other internet entrepreneurs talk to each other. Keep up-to-date in tech chat rooms related to your business. Make sure your peers in your field know about your site and give them reasons to become excited about its product.

Of course, there is no reason why you, the entrepreneur, should be doing all this work yourself. That would be too much of a J.O.B. But using someone from your marketing team to focus on viral advertising efforts is a good use of manpower… You are multiplying your efforts by marketing your product in front of those who promote and utilize internet products and technologies.