We all hear about blog posts and other online content that goes “viral?” This is something that all bloggers want, yet it’s a challenge to actually accomplish this. What is viral content, and what exactly causes a blog post to go viral?
What is a Viral Blog Post?
A viral blog post is a post that’s shared by lots of people. With the explosion of social media, there is more and more potential for any type of content to go viral. Photos and videos are especially likely to go viral, and these can easily be incorporated into a blog post. These are the photos that get spread all over Facebook and the YouTube videos that get millions of hits. Moreover, a Viral content helps you to get many high-quality backlinks and your blog will be exposed to wider audience. Though the question is, what elements makes a Viral blog posts and I will unearth this question in this blog post:
What Makes Something Go Viral?
To be viral, a blog post has to strike a chord that many people can resonate with. Usually, viral content has one or more of these qualities:
- Funny
- Controversial
- Popular or Trendy Topic
- Useful & unique
Few blog posts have all of these features, but you really just need one or two of them. Funny or cute photos of pets and children are always popular. So are controversial topics, and in some cases this type of content is offensive or scary. An example of the latter is when there is a scare about an outbreak of the flu or some other disease and everyone is looking for information on how to treat or avoid it.
Rumors, which may be true or false, are also likely to get spread quickly. Just as a rumor can be repeated in an office or high school, on the internet it can spread across whole continents. For example, you will sometimes see viral posts about a celebrity’s death that turn out to be untrue. I don’t recommend that you plan this type of viral campaign, but I’m just mentioning it as an example of how things are spread online.
Blogging on Trendy Topics
Trendy is also an important quality that most viral posts contain. Some of the most popular items online are about celebrities, athletes, politicians and other well known people.
Sometimes trends are about things or events rather than people. Think of all the hype that surrounds a new product released by Apple or Microsoft. Events such as extreme weather, sporting events, elections and even holidays can be extremely trendy topics.
The 7 Secrets of Creating Viral Blog Posts
Is there a hidden secret to creating viral blog posts? Unfortunately, there is no one action you can take that will guarantee that your post goes viral. Yet if you follow certain rules, you can increase the chances.
1. Create Lots of Great Content
Remember that only a good blog post will usually go viral. So don’t expect that everything you write is going to be wildly popular. One of the tricks to creating viral content is to consistently post lots of quality posts. That increases your chances of having some of these posts go viral. Make sure you give a unique angle and article never miss out the personal touch. Specially, when we read blogs, we expect to read something based on personal experience or personal opinion, without this a Blog post is just another article.
2. Give Some Thought to Your Titles
The title of your blog post is extremely important, as this is what people will see first. It also has a lot to do with how the search engines index your post. Giving your post a catchy title greatly increases the chance of people sharing it.
- How to Write Post title for readers and search engines
- How to write headlines that work
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3. Combine Trendy With Original
You have little chance of having a blog post go viral if it’s on a subject hardly anyone knows or cares about. It’s fine to blog about your favorite obscure hobby, but don’t expect this type of content to be widely shared. Keep up with the news, Google Trends, popular magazines and do research on sites like Quora, Reddit to see what people are currently reading, watching and discussing.
While it helps to pick a popular topic, if you want your blog post to go viral you must have an original take on it. Don’t just repeat something you found somewhere else. Perhaps you can post a controversial opinion, citing evidence against what some experts claim.
- Controversial Marketing strategy for Instant traffic Boost
4. Use Images and Video
Images and video can help to make a blog post more popular. You might make a short video where you give your thoughts on a topic. Rather than just trying to spread the video, however, you can embed it into a blog post and make some relevant comments as well. Photos are also good for attracting people’s attention and making it more likely that they will share your post.
Infogrpahics are another great way to create viral blog posts and we have already shared how to make an infographic go viral. Though, you need to work on unique idea and create an infographic.
- Check out : 5 Secrets for Creating Viral Content
5. Leverage the Power of Social Media
While some blog posts may go viral without the creator making much of an effort, this is rare. The more you share your content, the more likely it is that it will spread. To do this, you must go out of your way to connect with people on social media and social bookmarking sites.
6. Study Viral Content
If you want to get a feel for what goes viral, pay attention. Every single day there are new viral videos, photos and blog posts. Go to various sites and see which posts and other content rises to the top. You don’t want to copy someone else’s content, but you can get valuable guidelines.
7. Decide What Kind of Attention You Want
Some content goes viral because it shocks, offends or misleads people. If you get famous for spreading this kind of material, you will be notorious rather than famous. If you want to be well known at any cost, you may be able to create some kind of controversy that gets widespread attention. However, if you’re trying to build good will or a positive reputation, you should be careful about what type of publicity you get.
Conclusion: Creating Viral Blog Posts
While it’s great to have the goal of writing viral blog posts, you should not expect everything you write to go viral. This only happens once in a while, and it’s impossible to predict exactly which posts will be the lucky ones. The best you can do is increase your chances by keeping the above tips in mind.
What kind of content from your blog usually goes viral? How’s your experience and if there is any tip you would like to share here? If you find this post useful, don’t forget to share it on Facebook and Twitter.
Rumors is the best thing I think you can add in your original blog post that will help to make it viral. And later when it goes viral, can specify the real thing. Although I also liked all other way you told. Thanx for this informative post.
Great information… especially about social power
Excellent post about how to write impressive content. It is useful for new blogger and experienced too. Thanks to share such topic. Keep it up !!!
Hi Jasmine,
Thanks for sharing the points,
I also believe that some time when you are sure that topic on which you are writing your viral post is definitely going to be liked by the internet audience than yes we should go for this and do some controversy.
And the points you have mentions are appropriate to attract the audience like-
-Attractive title.
-Using attractive images and videos
-Great content which will make the visitor share your article
etc.
Thank You
Shorya Bist
From Youthofest
I always believed viral videos are an outcome of coincidence than planning. But after reading this post, i have decided to follow the steps more intensely to make my blog posts viral. Lets hope for the best.