In order to create something that is viral and not a regular advertisement I must first understand what a viral is.
I did a project in early 2010 that focused on producing a viral video, but it was much less an advertisement and more an infomercial or a piece of content designed to influence behaviour. For this I did some research in to what makes a virals and on the project I learnt a lot so I thought it would be useful to take another look at that blog with the hindsight I gained from what I had produced then, and also to refresh myself on the core concepts of viral media.
Old Research
I found some interesting sources in my research:
Wiktionary lists it as:Nounviral (plural virals)1. (marketing) A video, image or text spread by "word of mouth" on the internet or by e-mail for humorous, political or marketing purposes.There are different terms associated with viral, the most prominent being Viral Marketing. I will be producing a viral video, which may be a part of viral marketing but my main focus is on the video being Viral.Wikipedia has an article specifically on viral video:A viral video is a video that becomes popular through the process of Internet sharing, typically through internet media sharing websites. Viral videos often contain humorous content and include televised comedy sketches such as Saturday Night Live's Lazy Sunday and Dick in a Box; amateur video clips like Star Wars Kid, the Numa Numa videos, The Dancing Cadet, The Evolution of Dance, the "Benny Lava" video, Chocolate Rain on youtube; and web-only productions such as I Got a Crush... on Obama. Some "eyewitness" events have also been caught on video and have "gone viral," including the Battle at Kruger.Humor is sometimes considered to be a vital component and characteristic of a viral video. But humor is not, in fact, the defining characteristic; a viral video is any video that is passed electronically from person to person, regardless of its content.There is also an interesting analysis and tips for what makes a viral video by Dave Grishman on SlideShare:Tip#1. The KISS (Keep it simple stupid!) Rule. The main reason a video becomes viral is because it is quick and interesting to watch and can keep the ever shrinking attention spans of its viewers through humor. Many times, viral videos that have spread like wildfire are random and pointless, yet very memorable.Tip#2. Avoid overpromotion. Videos should be aimed at entertainment rather than direct advertisement. Trust in the fact that people will remember your name when they enjoy your video. Portions of the video could be itched into their mental lobes, which will increase the recall capacity of its viewers. Even if they do not mean to store this information, they will unintentionally, which is a reason this type of marketing is so effective.Tip#3. Make Video Accessible. Place your video where people can see it. YouTube and Facebook are not the only social networking sites out there. Look at places outside of the big name social networks. If the video is catchy, the more sites the video is on, the more clicks it should receive.
I also posted some thoughts on this research.
So what can I learn from all of this? Well, it seems as though Virals are forms of advertising as entertainment. It is much like the 'word of mouth' type of marketing but virals use technology such as the internet, email and instant messaging. A viral video is a video that makes the viewer want to show other people, and by the overwhelming number of examples this seems to be down to comedy, or impressive feats. The reason Virals are effective is that you don't have to worry about distribution, people do that for you. Also, because it is entertainment people will remember the entertaining video and along with that is the product or message it spawned from.I need to make my video entertaining in capacity, in a way that makes people share it. Show it to friends, family or co-workers. The easiest way I might do this is to identify my target audience, and by appealing specifically to that audience it could capture something that they enjoy, and so would automatically want to share with others in that target audience because it would have universal appeal. Target audiences however seem to be largely a myth, as people are so diverse aiming something at a group could really miss the mark without knowing what each person specifically wants. This is why humour is so successful in Viral Marketing, because comedy is universal. Sure, some people have different sense of humour but if its funny people will laugh.
Learning what makes viral content viral is an essential component to this project. The key components of viral advertising are the opposite of the shortcomings of traditional advertisement. It makes people engage with the content with a lowered guard, not prepared to resist a product that is being oversold to them. There were TV programs at the turn of the century dedicated to entertaining, funny and shocking (often banned) TV ads. This shows how 'exceptional', revered or special they were in the public eye. Now these can be shared all around the world without TV standards from Ofcom being applied.
The entertainment value which is key to a viral is a proposition not held by most traditional advertising. Even if the advertisement is imbued with a component of entertainment that doesn't make the video viral. it has to appeal in a certain way that makes people want to share it. That often means that the video has to be short. A video of a substantial length feels more like a commitment than a fling (to use a crude analogy). A shorter clip can be played without the user feeling like they are going to be sitting there for very long, increasingly important in an office environment as they should be working and not watching video.
Problems
My biggest concern about this project is that virals are so rare. Many are created, but only a small number rise to the status of being truly viral. Shared around the internet with millions of hits. Viral ad uptake can be as low as 15% (source: http://econsultancy.com/uk/blog/5620-millward-brown-only-15-of-ads-go-viral-online). I can design my content in a way that makes it desirable as a viral but that doesn't guarantee success. Rather than making it a series of features that I can tick off on a chart of 'what should be viral' I think it would be better to think of something that is engaging in it's own right and see how that can be applied to the viral model.