What’s a Viral Video?
- A viral video is any video that becomes popular after being passed from person to person, on the World Wide Web.
- The idea length of a viral video is generally between 15 seconds and 5 minutes.
- There is no algorithm to follow which would make a video go viral, but there are many strategic ways to maximise a video’s potential to go viral.
- Gangnam Style by Korean rapper Psy is YouTube’s most viewed video ever with more than 2.5 billion views to date.
- A viral video is not heavily branded. It is often funny, inspiring, or tugs a the heart strings. It generally tells a story.
Planning your viral marketing strategy
Create a viral marketing plan
- Making a viral video is not about luck.
- It is about implementing a strategic plan.
Move away from the “Hard Sell” and focus on emotion
- Do not overly brand your video
- Always aim to evoke an emotional response from your viewer.
Ensure other marketing efforts match up
- If your website or business offering is poor, a viral video won’t matter.
- You video might be very successful, but the video viewers won’t convert to customers if the quality of everything else doesn’t match up.
A framework for viral marketing
Shock your audience
- Take GoDaddy’s 2013 Super Bowl Ad “The Perfect Match” as an example.
- The brand spent millions to promote its website builder.
- Yet 1/2 of the video is centred on an uncomfortable kiss between a supermodel and a nerd.
- GoDaddy posted its highest sales day in its history and added 100,000 customers.
Go left of centre
- Take Blendtec’s will it blend? – iPad video.
- The company sells blenders.
- Instead of fruit and veg. It decided to blend an iPad.
- The pure nonsense nature of the concept, its cheesy music and slapstick comedy combined to make a video that has had 18 million+ views.
Do insanely practical tips
- Take Wendy Nguyen’s 25 Ways to Wear a Scarf in 4.5 Minutes!
- Wendy is a fashion blogger with a popular YouTube channel.
- She made the video to showcase every possible way to wear a scarf.
- The video has 13 million+ views.
Promote like a kardoshian
- Take Rebecca Black’s Friday music video.
- Unknown one-hit-wonder Rebecca Black made a video that amassed 95 million views.
- Initially it garnered very little interest but was covered on a TV show on Comedy Central and then tweeted by a popular blogger poking fun at it.
- Its complete cheese factor made it the incredibly successful music video we all love to hate.
Viral video tactics
- General Vs. Unusual
- Simplicity : Scare / Frighten
- Interesting Content : Pro Stunts
- Music : Shoot Reactions
- Humour : Reference Pop Culture
- Animals
- Parody / Remix / Mash-up
Sources from Oneproductions
