A few weeks ago I was talking with Jeremy Scott from Viral Orchard (and ReelSEO) and he used the phrase "viral catnip" to describe some of the elements that seem to help online videos gain an audience. I couldn't get that phrase out of my head. Could it be that there's a science behind what appears to be random lightning strikes? Are there really common elements that could be specifically and strategically applied to a video to increase the popularity of the videos? I hadn't really thought about it from that aspect before.
Later that day I emailed Jeremy with a list of several elements I've observed from popular online videos to see if he thought they were "viral catnip" and he agreed with my list and added some more of his own. Our list (so far) of elements that viral videos seem to contain are:
- Cats, of course, and other animals too
- Beautiful people (especially women)
- Cute kids (especially babies)
- Celebrities
- Creative spin on popular music
- Crazy stunts
- Random acts in public
- Massive efforts (stop motion video, big art projects, flash mobs)
- Camera tricks (slow motion, time-lapse)
- Pop culture references (Star Wars, iPhone, Super Mario)
- Fail videos
- Shock or total surprises
I think it's worth noting that shooting a video with one or more of the elements above certainly doesn't guarantee success. In fact, don't go into any video project thinking it's going to go viral. You have no control over that. Seek to create a great video that's worthy of attention, communicates the things you want, and is interesting enough for someone to share and pass along to friends. If you do that you win. If it goes viral that's bonus.
How I'm Using This List
I'm personally using this list for brainstorming meetings when I'm working with clients to develop new video concepts. At the end of the day you want to earn attention with video that people want to watch. The twelve elements from the list above have, at the very least, very much proven themselves worthy of earning attention many times over and that's worth considering.
If you want to dig into this further, Jeremy wrote an ebook called The Social Video Blueprint: A Marketer's Guide To Social Video Success and it's available for a free download on ReelSEO.com.