I run an electronic dance music blog and we were the first website in the world to break the story on will.i.am stealing a song from trance music producers Arty and Mat Zo. In one day we saw 31,XXX visitors and the post went viral across social networks. The big news outlets were slow to react and quoted our #1 competitor in the space. It doesn't matter because we already won the battle.
I wrote a similar story about a girl who called out Torrey Smith (WR for the Baltimore Ravens) that got over 28,000 visitors from the DC / MD / VA area in one day that also went crazy viral until my webhost shut it down. If you want to go big, make sure you have the architecture in place. I use WPEngine.
What makes a viral story?
Viral stories contain conflict. It's best when your niche, market or readership is the side that's getting attacked, but not necessary.
As a blogger if you present a problem with facts that are infuriating and allow your readers to choose sides they will. If the problem is so irritating they'll comment and they'll share.
Conflict drives discussion that drives action.
It doesn't matter how big your readership is, if the story touches the right person... it can explode.
Creating a viral story...
You should be following every single mainstream outlet, influencer, blog or whatever else in your market. When conflict arises you want to be the first one to post.
For the will.i.am post we ran with this as a headline,
[h=1]"will.i.am Steals Mat Zo & Arty’s ‘Rebound’ Without Anjunabeats Approval (Developing Story)"[/h]
The first thing that happens is you recognize will.i.am and then you see that he stole. Most of my audience hates the "mainstream-ification" of EDM and will instantly read on. They see Mat Zo and Arty there and are like... "WTF HOW CAN WILL.I.AM steal from MAT ZO & ARTY?" further "NO NOT REBOUND THAT'S MY FAVORITE SONG" and neext Without Anjunabeats Approval "I KNEW ANJUNABEATS (ONE OF MY FAV LABELS) WOULDN'T SELL OUT!!!" and finally Developing Story "SHIT THIS NEWS IS BREAKING I NEED TO READ NOW"
So the headline is catchy... but that doesn't even matter as much as the image. Images are everything as facebook sharing 100000% relies on them.
I made a meme using an easy to identify photo of will.i.am that's funny and offensive.
Use relevant memes on your facebook pages. Trust me.
From there the story just exploded and everyone else copied. We did zero paid promotion and still got this kind of exposure.
Find a story, create conflict and let your readers choose a side. Boom
I wrote a similar story about a girl who called out Torrey Smith (WR for the Baltimore Ravens) that got over 28,000 visitors from the DC / MD / VA area in one day that also went crazy viral until my webhost shut it down. If you want to go big, make sure you have the architecture in place. I use WPEngine.
What makes a viral story?
Viral stories contain conflict. It's best when your niche, market or readership is the side that's getting attacked, but not necessary.
As a blogger if you present a problem with facts that are infuriating and allow your readers to choose sides they will. If the problem is so irritating they'll comment and they'll share.
Conflict drives discussion that drives action.
It doesn't matter how big your readership is, if the story touches the right person... it can explode.
Creating a viral story...
You should be following every single mainstream outlet, influencer, blog or whatever else in your market. When conflict arises you want to be the first one to post.
For the will.i.am post we ran with this as a headline,
[h=1]"will.i.am Steals Mat Zo & Arty’s ‘Rebound’ Without Anjunabeats Approval (Developing Story)"[/h]
The first thing that happens is you recognize will.i.am and then you see that he stole. Most of my audience hates the "mainstream-ification" of EDM and will instantly read on. They see Mat Zo and Arty there and are like... "WTF HOW CAN WILL.I.AM steal from MAT ZO & ARTY?" further "NO NOT REBOUND THAT'S MY FAVORITE SONG" and neext Without Anjunabeats Approval "I KNEW ANJUNABEATS (ONE OF MY FAV LABELS) WOULDN'T SELL OUT!!!" and finally Developing Story "SHIT THIS NEWS IS BREAKING I NEED TO READ NOW"
So the headline is catchy... but that doesn't even matter as much as the image. Images are everything as facebook sharing 100000% relies on them.
I made a meme using an easy to identify photo of will.i.am that's funny and offensive.
Use relevant memes on your facebook pages. Trust me.
From there the story just exploded and everyone else copied. We did zero paid promotion and still got this kind of exposure.
Find a story, create conflict and let your readers choose a side. Boom
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