1. 10 Things That Make Content Go Viral
You polish off your blog post, sit back and hit the send button.
Next thing you know, emails start flooding into your inbox referencing your post.
Your Facebook share counter and Twitter tweet share counters start whizzing upwards.
You log onto Facebook and see that you’ve gotten hundreds of comments and you start seeing
references to your post all over the place.
Your blog post starts showing up on Stumbleupon and you check your Digg account and your
post has hundreds of votes.
You check your traffic stats and thousands of visitors are flooding onto your website and your
email optins are flying in.
BANG!
Your Content Has Gone Viral Baby!
It’s an amazing feeling when it happens.
And it can happen to YOU!
You just need to create content that people go crazy over and let the social networks do the
rest.
Think of it this way – - the social networks are viral engines that facilitate the sharing of content.
Think about it.
That’s exactly what Facebook and Twitter and other sites like Google +, Reddit, Digg and
Delicious.
They all allow people to share great content with others.
Now think of your content as the fuel that runs the engine.
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2. The better the fuel, the faster the engine runs.
So when you combine really viral-worthy content with the social networks, you’re going to
experience an explosion of traffic.
So I’m going to give you…
…10 Ways to Make Your Content Go Viral!
Here’s 10 types of content that usually go viral once you product it and submit it to the social
networks.
1. Shocking
Content that shocks people goes viral. That’s exactly why people like Howard Stern became so
popular. He’s not a great Disc Jockey. Instead, he shocks his audience with sexual content and
crazy antics.
You can create equally shocking content by uncovering little known facts and statistics, finding
amazing case studies that are hard to believe or even making boastful statements that make
people shake their head in disbelief.
2. Controversial
There nothing like a great controversy. Select an especially sensitive topic, pick an unpopular
side and argue for it.
Today I got caught in a heated online discussion about religion and the presidential campaign.
People flooded into the conversation.
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3. Especially controversial topics include breaking stereotypes, clashing of genders, religion,
politics etc.
When writing about controversial topics, ask your audience to share their opinions and thoughts
about what you’re written and watch the sparks fly.
3. Insanely Great
Creating insanely great content will go viral and is especially beneficial to businesses trying to
build an audience.
You’ll hear the founders of the top blogs in the business world say over and over again, their
secret to becoming popular is creating great content.
Usually great content provides an in depth education about a specific topic and includes
practical information, graphics, case studies, audio or video and thought provoking ideas.
3. Inspiring
Everyone loves an inspiring story. Inspiring stories stir people’s emotions and tug at their heart
strings.
It invokes deep feelings that compel people to want to share it with others. Inspiring content
could be rags to riches stories, comeback stories, or great achievement stories.
It could also include poems, sayings, quotes, graphics or videos that inspire. This type of
content has huge pass around value.
4. Weird or Strange
People love to pass around weird and strange content. Stuff that totally out of the ordinary.
I read a headline in my inbox the other day that read, “Champion Jiujitsu Expert Gets Beat Up
By Woman.” Okay, that’s weird (I opened the email).
Not long ago I wrote an article with the headline, “Ex-Corporate Exec. Flunks Marketing 101.”
That got a huge open rate and was passed around by a lot of people. It was weird.
5. Practical How To
People LOVE step-by-step, how-to information. They love to be taken by the hand and showed
exactly how to do something.
Step 1 -> Step 2 -> Step 3
I find myself writing a lot of practical how-to information because I usually write about what I’ve
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4. actually done.
Some of the most passed around content teaches people how to do specific things step by step.
6. Funny
Everyone loves a good laugh and if you can tell a story or two that will make your audience
laugh, your content will be passed around.
I like to tell embarrassing stories from my career and personal life. Self-deprecating humor is
some of the best humor.
7. Graphics
Right now, infographics are all the rage. Infographics tell stories graphically using quotes and
statistics. They are popular because people usually like to consume information through
pictures and graphics versus plain old text.
That’s what infographics do. They provide valuable information using graphics.
Although it takes some time to create a very useful infographic, it’s worth the time and effort.
You’ll get tons of shares and lots of backlinks with a great infographic.
8. Facts and Figures
Facts and figures prove your point. And the more interesting, shocking, surprising, and
compelling your facts and figures, the more popular your content will be.
We used to do a lot of surveys on another site I run and then we would turn those surveys into
press releases, which became the most shared and talked about press releases we ever did.
9. Thought Provoking
I enjoy reading blogs from people like Michael Hyatt and Seth Godin because they always have
ideas that are thought provoking.
When your content makes people stop and think, it’s going to be passed around to their friends.
In order for you to create that type of content, it requires you to step back and think about things
at a higher level.
10. Drama
Just a few weeks ago I saw a post on Facebook from someone who had passed on a blog post
from a company that was getting sued by a website that had actually ripped off their content.
The company had a blog and made all the documents public. Talk about drama.
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5. I also remember when a very well known leader in the internet marketing world, who jointly
owned a company with another high profile marketer, sued his partner because he was stealing
money from the company.
He made the court document downloadable on his website. Holy cow, it got the whole internet
marketing community talking. People love drama.
Conclusion
So that’s how you make your content go viral. Easier said than done, but when it happens, it’s
a beautiful thing.
Hope this helps.
P.S. Click here to check out all our interview reports with viral marketing gurus and experts.
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