How to Make Your Online Video Go Viral

Here's the Magic Formula to Get Your Push Embraced, and Avoid Being Stalled at the Gate

by Matt Cutler

Consuming internet video is a full-contact sport -- the initial viewing experience is just a gateway to the commenting, rating, sharing and even remixing or mashing up the original video content. And what brand doesn't want to tap into this new class of consumer behavior, making their ads "go viral" (cough) and picking up millions of "free" (cough, cough) impressions?

Starting off strong

And, increasingly, success is seeded in the campaign's earliest days. We've discovered viral video ad campaigns tend to hit the ground running -- they average 35% of their total viewership during their first week. This initial growth phase is likely to set the campaign's overall trajectory, so many brands now front-load their marketing and promotion efforts.

The campaigns profiled here then entered a two-week-transition phase, during which their viewership grew by 20% each week. Note that these growth rates are roughly the same between the embraced campaigns and the stalled campaigns, making the performance during launch all the more important.

Finally, after the growth and transition phases have passed, viral-video ad campaigns tend to settle in to a steady-state phase, growing at 10% or less per week thereafter. It's worth nothing that some campaigns, such as "Durex: Get It On," have a more linear view-growth trajectory, steadily gaining new views each week.

Here's how your video can hit the ground running

Seed smartly. Not all video-sharing sites are created equal in terms of the audiences they appeal to. So put it where you're most likely to find the right demographic. Is it young males you think will spread your video? Then try Break.com.

Think deep, not wide. Successful campaigns don't distribute their clips to 50 networks at once. Just because you upload it to a site doesn't mean everyone will see it; instead select 3 to 5, buy media to support it, reach out to targeted press and users and aim to climb that "most watched" list at a handful of sites.

Don't spell it all out. From a creative standpoint, you want to leave room for interpretation. Look at Microsoft's Jerry Seinfeld- and Bill Gates-starring "I'm a PC" campaign or Cadbury's "Gorilla" ad. Successful online videos keep people guessing -- "Is it real?" "Did that really happen?" That helps propagate the content.