"The
brain wants to have fun. If you keep thinking about that every day,
you’re always going to be interesting and relevant. The brain hates
boring and expected."
Linus Karlsson
Have
you ever planked? Maybe you’ve tested your fortitude with the cinnamon
challenge. How about grooving out with your favorite touchdown dance?
Don’t be ashamed, millions of people have and had a great time doing it.
These
examples are drawn from viral events and in marketing, catching a ride
on a phenomenon sweeping the globe is like winning the lottery – if it
is done properly. As for creating a viral event, that simply doesn’t
happen. Not consciously, anyways. Viral happenings come from out of
nowhere and organically attract a following. A video that has 6 million
views on
YouTube isn’t viral, unless of course those 6 million hits come
all at once.
Put
the idea of creating your own viral phenomenon out of your head –
statistically, you have a better chance of being hit by lightning twice
while a shark is nibbling on your toes.
Your best bet is to learn how to recognize a viral event and utilize it for your own benefits.
Trends such as 2016’s Pokémon Go
craze are not always as obvious as they appear. Viral happenings occur
overnight and last as long as the public’s attention is fixated on them.
The dance craze’s of the 1920s can be directly attributed to lower
prices in radios to spread the style, and television in its heyday
created more than its share of national fervor – elevating social
protest in the 60s, spreading pop culture through MTV in the 80s, and
redirecting a generation toward online communication in the 90s.
Today,
social media is the single most significant driver for culture. We are
constantly a short tweet or text away from investing our interest in one
another’s daily activities, catching up on breaking news, or winding
down with some streaming videos. The more interest an event garners, the
more it is transmitted, re-tweeted, liked, and shared until the
steamroller of popularity puts it on everyone’s radar. No matter how
disconnected they might be from the mainstream.
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Think
of a viral idea as a pebble that starts to roll from the mountaintop -
as it gains momentum, it bumps into and dislodges more pebbles, creating
a force that now can dislodge and start larger rocks to rolling
downhill. This momentum compounds until nothing in its way can go
undisturbed, continuing on until it comes to rest at the bottom. Your
message might not be that first pebble, but by keeping a watchful eye
you can certainly throw your weight into the avalanche as one of the
first.
Keeping
up with trends can be extremely beneficial to a small business as it
allows you to keep in touch with today’s common rhetoric. Consumers are
infectiously intrigued by popular trends, sometimes even more so than
their interest in the video, product or idea itself. By joining a
movement, they become part to something universal and wide sweeping,
feeding a deep-seeded desire to belong.
Political
candidates use this psychology of inclusion as an integral element in
their own marketing campaigns. Candidate X says, "WE Stand Together
Against Y,” and candidate Y says, “Only Together Can WE Change America.”
Both messages insinuate that not agreeing with the message makes the
voter an outcast - not cool.
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Trends
become trendier just because they are trending. In the marketing world,
this equates directly to traffic - traffic equals business, and
subsequently, money. When consumers are in constant contact through
social media apps, they discuss how and where they are retroactively
affecting the performance of these trends through likes, comments and
shares. The phenomenon of social media use goes back to our primal
search to feel good – when another social media user reacts, the
original poster’s endorphins go nuts, flooding their body with
serotonin.
Simple as can be.
The
first step in staying in tune with social media and that rock slide of
viral fervor is to become a permanent resident in the online social
sphere. Choose what platforms to subscribe to and keep at it with a
consistent message and plenty of interaction. When an event occurs that
you want to jump on board with, you will have a ready-built audience to
help carry your modified message outward.
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Primarily,
your strategy will revolve around a loose formula: four parts
interaction (socializing), one part calling to action, and one part
selling. For each of these elements, attach some indicator of the viral
event: mention it, share it, re-tweet it, takes pictures of it… simply
talk it up. Incorporate it any way you can along with your message
branding. A good example of this in practice is a tweet
we sent during
the Pokémon Go craze:
Rare
Pokémon captures with each free SMM consult. Contact us to book a
guided, downtown safari! #pokemon #gottacatchemall #consulting #smm
Whether
you blog about the viral phenomenon from an outsider’s point of view,
take pictures of others participating in the event to post on social
media, or directly participate and promote the heck out of yourself
doing it, being associated with a viral trend is simply good business.
Stay in the social media stream and jump on a viral happening as soon as you come across a good one.
It will definitely pay off.
