4 Lessons From a Viral Video
One of my videos is earning tens of thousands of views on Instagram. And counting. Soon, more than half my followers will have been gained between last Thursday and today, which is Monday.
Amidst the scramble to respond to comments and messages, I’ve pulled a few lessons from this experience that I’d like to share.
Lesson one: the only reason this viral video is meaningful at all is because I have a library of content to back it up. When people click on my profile, they immediately see that I’m consistently bringing value. I would not be earning followers if my page was a collection of bi-annual brunch photos. For years I wished a video of mine would catch a wave in the algorithm’s ocean. But I realize that I wouldn’t have wanted one to before now.
Lesson two: this is where social media gets really addicting. Like everyone else in this world, I’m trying to find the healthy balance between social media and real life. But now, whenever I open Instagram, I get the added rush of seeing 15 or 30 or 100 new followers. For all the creators and influencers I’ve thought bad of over the years for being chronically on your phone—I’m sorry. You’re dealing with a different beast that the rest of us.
Lesson three: run some ads. I’ve been consistently posting very similar content styles since March. Some of them performed and some of them didn’t. If a video got 2,000 views and earned me 20 followers, I was excited. On Wednesday, I put $50 behind a video about my producing guide targeted toward 25-35 year old males interested in videography. Now the organic content I’m posting, that’s eerily similar to the content I’ve been posting since March, is performing like crazy. My hypothesis is that because of my audience choice for the paid ad, Instagram finally discovered who the ideal audience was for my organic content.
Lesson four: punch the bag. I’m not freaking out about the influx of hungry followers. I’ve got enough backlogged content to feed them. I’m in “content shape—I feel confident in scripting, recording, editing, and posting a video in about 75 minutes. I’m not wasting (too much) time daydreaming about my new life. I’m in the pocket, posting content, keeping this train moving. The lesson is to keep punching the bag, because if you gavial before you’re ready, it’ll all be wasted.
If you’ve been reading my work since 2018, I appreciate you. There’s more on the way. If you’re new here, I appreciate you too. We’ve been doing this for years and we aren’t stopping soon. Let’s all level up together in 2024.
