Forgetting Social Media Can Kill Your Business

Viral Content Doesn’t Grow On Trees
The Old Spice Man. Whatever it is the fox says. Gangnam style. The Dollar Shave Club video that made men everywhere ask themselves, “why are razor blades so expensive?” Viral content is effective because it’s funny, it stands out, it makes an emotional connection and most of all, it makes us want to share with other people. The secret to viral content is creating something people will nag their friends and family to watch or read (and they won’t take no for an answer).
 
So we’ve established that you want viral content. Great, so do we. So does everybody else who does any sort of marketing. Viral content is an extremely coveted digital asset. But it shouldn’t be used to measure the success or failure of your social media and content marketing efforts.
 
The fact is, without a pre-existing community, only the best 0.1% of content goes viral. If you write a blog post right now, chances are it would only have a 1 in 1000 shot of going viral. If you’re automatically expecting that you’ll spend a few hours on a post and it’ll somehow go viral, you’re setting yourself up for disappointment.
 
With viral content, you can’t be results oriented. What you can do is pay more attention to detail with your content and social strategies. Doing the little things that make your content more shareable might not send it viral, but an uptick in shares is certainly a step on the right direction. And a few months down the road as your community gathers and grows around your content, you’ve suddenly improved your overall digital strategy and increased your chances of creating something viral.
 
Plant A Seed And Help It Bloom
Think about your content as a seed and social media as the soil. When you start creating content and sharing it on social media, you are essentially planting a seed. Most seeds don’t bloom in an hour or even a week, and they don’t reach their fully blossomed state for much longer. Likewise, your content (as a whole) won’t begin to show the fruits of its loom for quite a while. The only certainty is that if you don’t water and care for your plant, it won’t grow. If you aren’t giving your content creation and social presence the attention and care they need to be effective, they won’t grow and mature they way you want them to. But if you trust that your hard work will pay off, you’ll eventually have a fully-grown content plant surrounded by rich social media soil!
Marketing Stats
Social networkers keep brand interactions positive:    
 
· For 20 top global brands surveyed, 55% of interactions on Twitter we positive in nature
· On Facebook, 49% of interactions were positive
· In July of 2013, US marketers’ concerns over negative brand posting ranked last
 
Click here to read the whole article.