Bootstrapping Viral Content
and Accidental PR
Jonathan Vingiano
March 2, 2012
Bootstrapping Viral Content
A/S/L
- 25
- Male
-
New York CityUtah
OKFocus
- Product Design
- Software Design
- Graphic Design
An agency?
A development shop?
A design studio?
A strategy consultancy?
An excuse to make stuff with my friends?
2008/9
Opticks blog network
- + 2.5 million visits in 2011 (1.75m uniques)
- Kind of annoying to maintain
- Labor of love
- Provides us a safe place to fail
How to win at the internet as explained by Michael Jordan
What makes something go viral?
The most important thing: people want to share it.
Less about the content itself and more about the social engagement around the content.
7 Lines of Code
get '/' do
@mta_url = 'http://mta.info/status/serviceStatus.txt'
@doc = Nokogiri::XML(open(@mta_url))
@status = @doc.xpath('//status')[7]
@train_status = @status.to_s =~ /GOOD SERVICE/ ? 'nope' : 'yup'
erb :index
end
My "press release"
Making viral content worthwhile
ROI needs to (or should) be extremely high.
Content says something about you or your brand without overtly selling something. (Old Spice)
Alternatively, do the exact opposite. (Absolut)
Failing needs to be ok.
Transparency, honesty.
Do things, tell people.
by Carl Lange*
*a college student in Ireland
"Do things, tell people...These are the only things you need to do to be successful. You can get away with just doing one of the two, but that's rare, and usually someone else is doing the other part for you."
Comic Sans
Pixel Comic Sans
Low overhead
Timing the release
Growth
Jonah Peretti and the bored at work network
"A decentrailzed network that enables media to 'go viral' if ordinary people enjoy sharing it"
Bored at work
Make sharing easy
Make sharing part of the participation
The tools are there, for free
- Don't over think it.
- Major social networks give you the tools to push/publish your content.
- Utilize existing networks to broadcast your content.
- Think about the bored at work/school network.
- Have analytics for everything.
Stuff to think about
- Fail early and often.
- Implemetation should be easy-ish and cost effective.
- Be earnest.
- Try a bunch of approaches and focus on the best.
Not everything is viral, even if you want it to be. - Don't over commit to one approach. Be cool with throwing ideas away. Qutters win sometimes.
- Make sure the means of sharing your "thing" is baked into the "thing" itself.
In closing, a formula for digital stunts
Minimum amount of effort. (This makes failing ok.)
Critical of your own work.
(Don't be afraid to toss out ideas that aren't working.)
Maxium amount of cultural resonance.
Target the bored at work network.
Think like a venture capitalist would.
Decisions dictated by research, analytics. (+ instinct)
Many investments over a diverse portfolio.
One successful investment is all you need.
Thank you!
@jgv — j@okfoc.us
@okfocus — okfoc.usDo things, tell people. http://carl.flax.ie/dothingstellpeople.html