When it comes to social media, most businesses and brands are just like people – they long to “go viral.” They imagine fame, glory, sponsorships, free products and swimming pools full of 100-dollar bills. They sign up for all the social networks and start updating their Facebook pages, tweeting about what they had for lunch, and posting photos of their dogs on Instagram. When their posts fail to launch their brand into the stratosphere, they wonder what happened. “If a senior dog with a tilted head can get 1.7 million Instagram followers,” they wonder, “why can’t I?”
The truth is that “going viral,” – that is, having millions of online followers who click, like and share everything you post –isn’t a science or a code you can crack. Many times, it’s the totally unexpected things that end up going viral, a combination of being in the right place at the right time and dumb luck.
For example, let’s say you spend months creating a clever video for your business. You write a script, hire actors, plan every shot, edit it beautifully, and then post the finished masterpiece on YouTube. Maybe you get a few hundred views, and you feel pretty good about it. Your hard work is being rewarded.
Then, along comes Pizza Rat.
In case you missed it, Pizza Rat (also known as #pizzarat) took over the Internet for one whole evening a few weeks ago, thanks to a 14-second video of a rat dragging a piece of pizza down three steps in the New York City subway. As I write this, the video currently has more than 6 million views. It was retweeted by marketers, brands and journalists. It was written about in every online new source from Buzzfeed to NPR. It spawned memes, hashtags and spoof videos. It went viral with a capital V. All for a grainy, spontaneous 14-second video of a hungry rat.
So how did Pizza Rat go viral? And is there any hope for your content to get even a fraction of the attention that this rat received? I think so. Here are three things to keep in mind – about Pizza Rat and about social media in general – when crafting content for your business or brand.
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