Should You Push To Go Viral?

Authors, promoters, marketers, and advertiser all look to get their stuff to go viral, and the more often more of us try to do this, the less often any of us succeeds.  As we each add to the trillions of FB posts, tweets, videos, blogs, press releases and digital communications circulating out there, we make it ever more challenging to have our voices heard.  But you can’t not try, and in order to have a chance of being seen, we are urged to put out even more content.  It’s a numbers game, right?  Throw enough against the wall and something’s gotta stick, maybe?  We hope!

“Creating content solely for the purpose of going viral should not be the objective of any brand marketer,” said an expert quoted in PR Week, the industry trade publication for public relations professionals.  I disagree.

The goal of your marketing is to build your brand, make connections, drive sales, have a positive message shared.  If you aren’t shooting to go viral, what are you aiming for?

No one can act under a formula for going viral, but there certainly are elements that would support something to go viral.  Going viral is not a dirty word.  Create content that’s honest, inspiring, entertaining and something that generates a strong response is what authors need to gun for.

Your blog post should be something that sticks out and says something that sticks out and says something with force.  Your videos should have striking visual elements.  Your tweets should be timely and targeted.  The list goes on.  Basically, measure all of your social media efforts through the filter of: Will this get passed onto other people?  If it’s not good enough to get your fans to disseminate with others and have your evangelists bring new people into the fold, then it won’t go viral and it won’t really do much of everything.

This doesn’t mean you have to create nonsense, like a naked woman playing the violin while two dogs mate and eat popcorn on your favorite couch, although such a video probably would circulate well.  You can do something witty, unique, personable, and resourceful.  Going viral doesn’t have to mean creating dumbed-down content or content with mere rainbows and firecrackers.

You can create terrific, engaging, and intelligent content that powerfully invites millions of readers, listeners, and viewers.  Shoot for going viral – even if you don’t make it, you’ll have improved your game and garnered more traffic thank if you just played it safe, boring or typical.

Authors have many ideas at their disposal.  That’s all you need to go viral – latch onto your best idea and go full throttle with it.  Go viral – or go home!

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Brian Feinblum’s views, opinions, and ideas expressed in this blog are his alone and not that of his employer. You can follow him on Twitter @theprexpert and email him at brianfeinblum@gmail.com. He feels more important when discussed in the third-person. This is copyrighted by BookMarketingBuzzBlog © 2015