Emotional Marketing

Viral Emotional Marketing

  

   In a future post I'd love to look more closely at some of the factors that seem to dampen the viral effect.  From a client perspective, it is important for them to understand that there are no guarantees, and committing to viral content marketing means committing to trying multiple executions. 

https://buff.ly/2ZFCsEr 

Creativity is the ultimate currency of agencies; a talented agency must work under the assumption that there is an idea that will work for every client, whatever vertical they might be in.  That said, it is important also to manage expectations, and the more money the client has to play with, the better their chances of viral success. 

There are a tremendous number of influences that determine what makes something viral, and also a large number of factors that can lead to the failure of otherwise viral content. The type of lateral thinking required to create compelling viral content under these circumstances is not easy to find, and it is where agencies can really demonstrate their talents. When it ultimately comes down to it, there is no perfect way to gauge whether or not a particular piece of content will have a viral coefficient above 1. 

This type of content comes off as an ad, rather than an engaging story that provides a greater benefit to the reader and provokes that person to share. Emotions are a very powerful asset in content marketing. There is no perfect way to gauge whether or not a particular piece of content will have a viral coefficient above 1. The key is to identify the emotional motivating factors that must be activated in these audiences and then work backward toward your content. 

In an analysis conducted on The New York Times’ most emailed articles list, researchers found that people were much more likely to share content that evoked ‘high arousal’ emotions, regardless of whether they were positive (awe) or negative (anxiety or anger). In content marketing, the viral cycle time can be thought of as the amount of time it would take for a viewer who had a piece of content shared with them to view the content and then decide whether or not to share it themselves. 

The very first step to develop a viral marketing campaign is to find out who your targeted audience are and where your target audience lives online. In order to tap into the exponential growth of a viral marketing campaign, it’s crucial to first understand why people share things. Just like a biological virus, a viral marketing campaign spreads from one person to another, resulting in a large number of views, substantial number of social shares and remarkable brand awareness. 

The content created an emotional connection with people loyal to their breeds, which caught viewers’ attention and helped the campaign receive over 21,000 social shares; it was also featured on high-authority publications such as Mashable and Mental Floss. In order to trigger an emotional response, it needs to have a degree of shock, triggering either a strong positive or negative emotional valence, aligned to the context of your audience. 

In practice, though, not all emotions are as effective in driving sharing behavior as others." My experience says fun has always been the best emotion that drives more viral content than any other emotion. Audience comes first and foremost when you create content, and the emotions you want to evoke should be your next focus. While emotions generally play the largest role in determining the viral coefficient of a piece of content, there are other aspects that can contribute significantly to whether or not a that content is ultimately shared. 

Why not create your viral campaign on this social media network, then share it on other networks, such as Facebook or Twitter?" concluded Tayla Geena, a real-time marketing specialist. By increasing the exposure of your brand and delivering value to your audience, you have a stronger likelihood of getting the success you need in your viral marketing campaign. Academic research into this very subject matter has yielded hard evidence to prove that emotion is one of the key factors in creating a viral campaign. 

There’s another part that goes into the viral video marketing campaigns, of course, that goes beyond great, emotional ideas. For promoting the brand effectively, Dove had strong social media strategies, which even lead to celebrities and other brands becoming a member of the conversation and sharing the video with others. "almost any emotion, given that it is strong enough is possible as behaving as the primary driver of sharing.” Increasing ease and speed of sharing, making your content simple and fast to share is absolutely essential for helping to increase viral cycle time. 

According to Investopedia, "Viral marketing seeks to spread details about a product or service from person to person by word of mouth or sharing via the internet or email. In practice, though, not all emotions are as effective in driving sharing behavior as others. It’s not the case that if you want to create a viral marketing campaign you simply have to think about it, plan it, and then you have it. 

The fact is, very few people know what goes into making a viral marketing campaign successful until it starts to spread. A viral marketing campaign should be able to tap into the emotions of the users, especially positive ones like joy and awe. To begin, the first, most important, and most difficult step is to create a chunk of content that you think will likely have a viral coefficient greater than 1. 

Consider that one of the best ways to create an emotionally compelling piece of viral content that also works well with your brand is to tie your brand to a message for the public good. New research analyzed the roles arousal and dominance play in generating viral content and concluded that high levels of dominance – like feelings of inspiration and admiration – tended to encourage more social shares. 

Eliciting an emotional response is an essential element of all successful viral content marketing campaigns. Viral content typically evokes high-arousal emotions, such as joy or anger. According to a study conducted by the New York Times's Consumer Insight Group, people share things to "enrich the lives of others" and "define" themselves in whatever community they take part in. 

When people develop strong, deep feelings like surprise, anger, fear, disgust, sadness and joy around an experience or message, social sharing becomes impulsive. As I mentioned earlier, viral cycle time can be thought of as the period of time it takes for a viewer to share from the time, they view the content. Content should always begin with the audience in mind, and specifically with a core understanding of what motivates that audience and what emotional triggers are most likely to inspire them to share. 

Identify the key issues that interest your audience and create content that will elicit a strong emotional response. By understanding your audience and the emotional drivers that motivate them, it is possible to increase your odds of success substantially. In a future post I'd love to look more closely at some of the factors that appear to dampen the viral effect.  From a client perspective, it is important for them to understand that there are no guarantees, and committing to viral content marketing means committing to trying multiple executions. 

https://buff.ly/2ZFCsEr