Social Marketing Revolution

Being able to produce a “viral sensation” on social media may seem like magic, but Twitter hopes to uncover the secret sauce behind the world’s more viral tweets. The question is, can you really boil down “going viral” to an algorithm?

Predicting virality, however, is not as easy as looking at how many retweets a tweet is getting and assuming it will “go viral”. Just think about Gangnam Style… who could have ever predicted how far and wide this infectious pop phenomenon would travel? And plenty of marketing firms have spent top dollar on YouTube videos with all the elements of “virality” – like cute cats, memes and hipster-cool spokespeople – only to have them flop.

Plus, there are different degrees of online virality. Some videos, photos and other content seem to bubble to the collective surface of the internet – again, think Gangnam. I bet even your grandma would recognize the tune. But other forms of virality exist, and might be even more important. What’s hot among my peers or colleagues would probably hold my attention longer than a generic trend, and I’d consider it more valuable to be able to tap into what’s “going viral” in my own network.

Via Brian Yanish - MarketingHits.com, The Newsroom 3.0, RadeBigMan, Angie Mc, Ivo Nový, John van den Brink