Decoding the Popular Post Phenomenon: How To Create Viral Social Media
We spend hours scrolling through the millions of social media posts every day. How many of those posts go viral? Not many.
But inevitably, there will be a post before long that everyone sees because everyone shared it. It goes viral.
So, how can you increase the chances of your content going viral?
Although there’s no guaranteed formula to become an internet powerhouse, there are some things you can do to give your content the best chance.
In this article, we’ll discuss 10 ways to boost your content strategy game and deliver (potentially) viral social media content to your target audience.
What is viral content?
Social media users post over 95 million photos and videos on Instagram alone. Every. Day. However, as we said, most don’t go viral.
Viral social media content refers to content that, once posted, spreads exponentially fast (like a virus multiplying in a host – gross but accurate). It’s shared and reshared so many times the content’s popularity skyrockets until it becomes a commonplace reference in pop culture.
Like Baby Shark. Remember that? Everyone knew about Baby Shark – even people who didn’t have kids. That’s what it means to go viral.
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It’s not just about popularity. It’s about massive popularity in a short amount of time.
And that popularity doesn’t have to last.
Viral content today can be just as easily forgotten a week later. Social media is fickle.
So why bother trying to go viral? Well, with views come followers, and with followers come conversions, and that’s why businesses and brands care about creating viral content. So, before we get into the nitty-gritty, let’s look at what it takes to go viral on each social media platform.
How much engagement makes your social media posts viral?
According to research, there are thresholds to social media virality, even though there’s not a hard and fast answer for how many views or how much engagement you need to break through.
Digital Marketing Institute says 250,000 views is the minimum to consider social media content “mildly viral.” From there, once you hit the million mark, you’ve made it to “medium viral” status.
Finally, if you acquire five million views in less than a week, you’ve achieved full viral status, and the world is your oyster. Well, it could be if you take full advantage of all those eyeballs on your content.
Now it’s time to dig into exactly how to do just that.
How can you create viral social media content?
First, here’s a reality check.
There’s no way to guarantee a viral response to your content. What works one day for someone might not work for anyone else the next day.
It’s essential to continue experimenting, making adjustments, and trying new approaches with your marketing strategy. As you try different strategies to expand your reach, keep the following tips in mind.
Do your homework
It’s essential to understand your audience’s likes and dislikes, needs, and pain points. Research is the key to this.
When you know what resonates with them, your audience will be more likely to engage with and share your content.
Create a buyer persona to keep the details regarding your target audience’s interests organized. This simple form lists the most relevant information about your ideal customer, like their occupation, marital status, income level, favorite social media platforms, and more.
Keeping this information together in one place makes it easy to reference when creating your content. It allows you to ensure your content remains relevant to your ideal customers.
Start with baby steps
In the beginning, start small and keep your goals realistic. Don’t expect your first few posts to hit a million likes. While it’s not impossible, unrealistic expectations can make you feel like a failure when you don’t achieve them.
The key to creating viral social content is to remain consistent. Posting content regularly gives you a better chance of appearing in your followers’ feeds.
This improves your chances of getting a better reach, which, by extension, also increases the likelihood of better engagement and, thus, virality.
Hence, even if you don’t see any immediate results, maintain a social media content calendar in advance and post regularly. You can also use different scheduling tools to publish content efficiently on social media.
Build on your Unique Selling Point (USP)
A unique selling point that distinguishes you from competitors in your field can give you an edge. It’s the reason your customers choose you over the competition.
Weave your USP into your content as often as possible. Take Dollar Shave Club as the perfect example. Their USP is delivering a quality shave at a low cost.
They include their USP in their ads and in almost all of their content. Their very first ad campaign went viral as a result of a number of things (it’s simple, unexpectedly witty, and offers a product at least half the population can appreciate). So, it solidified their USP and provided a solid foothold for them in their market.
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If you want to follow in their footsteps, do what they did. Define your USP, use it in your content, and create content that resonates with your audience. Do that, and you might just achieve a viral social media post.
Create edutainment
Some of the most shareable content on social media is “edutainment.” It’s educational and entertaining. People value content that’s both – they want to enjoy what they’re reading or watching but appreciate learning something new at the same time.
Let’s return to Dollar Shave Club as our example. They’re famous for injecting humor into their ads, but they don’t neglect to educate their audience on basic beard care. This post in their Instagram feed is a perfect example of edutainment.
Chime in on trends and challenges
Trends and challenges are probably one of the easiest ways to create viral social media content. If you spot a trend that suits your brand’s style, go for it.
Your visibility increases exponentially if you hop on the bandwagon at the right time.
Some of the most popular social media challenges include the Ice Bucket Challenge (one of the earliest viral challenges), the Drop Challenge, the Flip the Switch Challenge, and many more. Just make sure any challenge you adopt is safe and aligns with your brand.
To stay trendy, keep an eye on trending songs, audio, and hashtags and use them in your content. To keep it unique, feel free to add your personal touch to it.
Post at the right time and on the right platform
Each social media platform has optimal days and times for posts to gain the most attention. You set your content up for success by posting at the right time.
Choosing the right platform is just as crucial. Your target audience may be active on LinkedIn and Facebook but not TikTok. In that case, investing time and effort into creating amazing TikTok videos wouldn’t make any sense.
This is where knowing your target audience comes into play. If you’re a B2B brand, you’ll probably want to focus your efforts on LinkedIn, X (formerly Twitter), and maybe Instagram and Facebook. However, if you market to young adults as a B2C brand, you’ll need to focus on Instagram and TikTok.
Like we said before, research your audience and always create your content with them in mind.
Optimize your content for the platform
You need to optimize your content for each platform to increase your chances of producing viral social media content. Optimization includes using hashtags, keywords, alt text, and more to improve the shareability and searchability of your content.
For example, when posting on Instagram, ideally, you want to include at least three to five popular and branded hashtags in your caption. Also, include alt text in each image to ensure optimal accessibility and improve your social media SEO.
Pro Tip: You can also create branded hashtags and encourage your followers to create user-generated content (UGC). When they create their own content and use your branded hashtag, your brand enjoys the extra exposure to their followers.
In contrast, when posting on LinkedIn, you should include about three targeted hashtags per post. Posts on LinkedIn can be short- or long-form text and sometimes include an image, video, or carousel.
Carousels are one of the most popular post types on LinkedIn and are a great way to offer the B2B audience a professional taste of edutainment. They’re also simple to create using Canva and post as a PDF document.
Sam Browne made a name for himself on LinkedIn by creating instructional carousels. Eventually, he put enough together to offer bundles of these valuable resources on his Gumroad store and now earns a respectable side income.
He’s added to his content library by doing podcasts and interviews with other content creators and giving tips on following his guides to success on LinkedIn. Sam Browne is a perfect example of following a social media trend (carousels on LinkedIn) and using it to your advantage to create viral social media.
Quality over quantity
Producing high-quality content regularly is more important than producing more frequent content that resonates less with your target audience. Ensure your content quality remains high regardless of which platforms you focus on.
Ways to maintain a consistent standard for your content include the following:
● Use proofreading tools like Grammarly or Writer to check for spelling and grammar errors
● Use tools like Hemingway to improve readability
● Stick to your brand style guide so your content remains consistent and reflects your brand values and mission.
Analyze and improve
The key to achieving and maintaining great results is tracking and analyzing those results, improving what doesn’t work, and doubling down on what does.
If one of your posts goes viral, look into why it happened. What made that post so appealing and shareable?
If the answers to those questions aren’t apparent, take polls and surveys of your audience and find out why they liked those posts. Finding out what your audience loves and why is essential to continued social media success.
Take the best characteristics of that post and apply them to future posts. Don’t just copy and paste. Use the same techniques and hold your posts to the same high standards your audience loves.
By monitoring your success, you’ll have more and more content that sees high engagement and has the potential to go viral.
Start creating your next viral post
Creating the next viral sensation is a tantalizing prospect for any marketer, but be careful what you wish for. While having a viral hit can bring incredible attention (and potential sales) to your brand, virality is fleeting. Consistency is how businesses succeed long-term.
By taking the advice in this article and applying it to your content strategy, you can improve your odds of viral success and overall success.
Remember to stay on top of trends and connect with your audience in meaningful ways. Create content that addresses their pain points and solves their problems while entertaining them.
The best content is content that your audience remembers, engages with, and shares. You’ve hit the jackpot when you find the formula to create that.
So, keep experimenting, testing, and posting. Analyze your results and try again. Your persistence will pay off, and your audience will thank you.