Seven Tips to Writing a Blog Post That Goes Viral

Jasmine of ShoutMeLoud reports:

"A viral blog post is a post that’s shared by lots of people. With the explosion of social media, there is more and more potential for any type of content to go viral...To be viral, a blog post has to strike a chord that many people can resonate with...Trendy is also an important quality that most viral posts contain. Some of the most popular items online are about celebrities, athletes, politicians and other well[-]known people. Sometimes trends are about things or events rather than people...Is there a hidden secret to creating viral blog posts? Unfortunately, there is no one action you can take that will guarantee that your post goes viral. Yet if you follow certain rules, you can increase the chances...Remember that only a good blog post will usually go viral. So don’t expect that everything you write is going to be wildly popular. One of the tricks to creating viral content is to consistently post lots of quality posts. That increases your chances of having some of these posts go viral. Make sure you give a unique angle and [the] article never miss[es] out [on] the personal touch. Specially, when we read blogs, we expect to read something based on personal experience or personal opinion, [because] without this a [b]log post is just another article...The title of your blog post is extremely important, as this is what people will see first. It also has a lot to do with how the search engines index your post. Giving your post a catchy title greatly increases the chance of people sharing it...You have little chance of having a blog post go viral if it’s on a subject hardly anyone knows or cares about. It’s fine to blog about your favorite obscure hobby, but don’t expect this type of content to be widely shared. Keep up with the news, [read] Google Trends, [read] popular magazines and do research...to see what people are currently reading, watching and discussing. While it helps to pick a popular topic, if you want your blog post to go viral you must have an original take on it. Don’t just repeat something you found somewhere else. Perhaps you can post a controversial opinion, citing evidence against what some experts claim...Images and video can help to make a blog post more popular. You might make a short video where you give your thoughts on a topic. Rather than just trying to spread the video, however, you can embed it into a blog post and make some relevant comments as well. Photos are also good for attracting people’s attention and making it more likely that they will share your post...[Infographics] are another great way to create viral blog posts and we have already shared how to make an infographic go viral. Though, you need to work on unique idea[s] and create an infographic...While some blog posts may go viral without the creator making much of an effort, this is rare. The more you share your content, the more likely it is that it will spread. To do this, you must go out of your way to connect with people on social media and social bookmarking sites. If you have lots of followers on Twitter, lots of Facebook friends and connections on sites like Reddit, Facebook and StumbleUpon it’s easier to have your content go viral...If you want to get a feel for what goes viral, pay attention. Every single day there are new viral videos, photos and blog posts. Go to various sites and see which posts and other content rises to the top. You don’t want to copy someone else’s content, but you can get valuable guidelines...Some content goes viral because it shocks, offends or misleads people. If you get famous for spreading this kind of material, you will be notorious rather than famous. If you want to be well[-]known at any cost, you may be able to create some kind of controversy that gets widespread attention. However, if you’re trying to build good will or a positive reputation, you should be careful about what type of publicity you get...While it’s great to have the goal of writing viral blog posts, you should not expect everything you write to go viral. This only happens once in a while, and it’s impossible to predict exactly which posts will be the lucky ones. The best you can do is increase your chances by keeping the above tips in mind."