Going Viral: The Power of Content and How to Calculate Your Virality Factor

What is virality?

A piece of content’s virality is determined by its potential to be quickly shared and spread across a large audience. In the marketing world, this is referred to as virality.” A common characteristic of viral material is its capacity to elicit powerful feelings or reactions, such as amusement, shock, or awe. Viral material can be disseminated via a variety of venues, including social networking sites, email, and word-of-mouth.

1. How is the virality factor calculated?

The virality factor of a piece of material is gauged by how quickly it spreads over social networks. It is calculated by dividing the quantity of content shared by the quantity of content viewed. The resultant figure represents the virality factor as a percentage. These methods should be followed to determine a piece of content’s virality factor:

•  Find the content piece

Choose the article you want to analyse. A blog article, a video, an infographic, or any other kind of information can be used for this.

• Determine the total number of views.

Find out how many times the content piece has been viewed overall. This can be discovered through tracking technologies, social media analytics, or website analytics.

• Determine the total number of shares.

Calculate the content piece’s overall number of shares. Social media analytics, email marketing analytics, or other tracking technologies can provide this information.

• Compute the virality factor.

To calculate the virality factor as a percentage, divide the total number of shares by the total number of views and multiply by 100.

The virality factor, for instance, for a video with 10,000 views and 1,000 shares would be:

(1,000 / 10,000) x 100 = 10%

This indicates that out of every 100 viewers, 10 shared the video with their followers.

2. What Characteristics Make a Content Piece Go Viral?

Although there is no recipe for virality, there are some characteristics that frequently appear in content that spreads quickly across social networks.

• Effective and emotional appeal

Strong emotional reactions, like wonder, amusement, or empathy, increase the likelihood that content will be shared and go viral. Individuals frequently spread information that is meaningful to them or that speaks to them personally. 

• Relevance

Current events or trends make marketing-related content more likely to be shared and go viral. People are more likely to share content with their followers when they believe it to be significant or timely. 

• Uniqueness

Unique or unexpected content has a higher chance of being shared and going viral. Content that sticks out from the crowd and that people believe will be interesting or entertaining is more likely to be shared. 

• Aesthetic Appeal

Visually appealing content is more likely to be shared and go viral, such as eye-catching photographs or films. Visually appealing material has a higher chance of attracting readers’ attention.

• Shareability

Easy-to-share content, like that with social networking buttons or links that are simple to copy, is more likely to be shared and go viral. People are more willing to share content with their followers when it is easy to do so.

Virality is a potent weapon that marketers may use to boost engagement and brand exposure. Brands may improve their chances of producing content that goes viral by producing material that connects with their audience and arouses strong emotions. Hence, creating content with a mindset of virality will ensure your brand reaches new audiences and appeals to people’s emotions.

It’s quite easy, but if you are having a hard time, email me at aditya@denary.agency