How often have you heard the phrase, “Let’s make this influencer post go viral!”? If it’s too many to count, you’re not alone. Along with generating engagement and sales, it seems that influencer marketers all have one underlying goal: to make our influencer content go viral. While it’s nearly impossible to predict the success of influencer content, there are intentional approaches you can implement to set your influencer – and client – up for success in the ever-evolving digital landscape.
Creative Freedom: First and foremost, letting your influencer have the creative freedom to create content that is true to their voice and aligns with your client’s brand messaging and values will help the content come across as natural and not ad-like.
Quality results take time to build, which is valid for influencer marketing. It’s crucial to the success of your campaign to have conversations, brainstorm, and hold content development sessions to lay the foundation for a strong, trusting partnership. Of course, you must ensure your influencer hits key messaging and follows FTC guidelines. Still, the natural, authentic content you strive to achieve will be realized by leaning into the influencer’s creative expertise.
Create Impactful Content: When conceiving content, certain avenues should be explored to aid in a post’s virality. First, the content should have an emotional impact. Influencer content that evokes significant emotion is more likely to receive engagements, giving the post a greater chance to catch on in the always-changing algorithm.
Amp’s Southwest Airlines collaboration with influencer Isaiah Garza (3.2M YouTube followers) perfectly combines creative freedom and emotion. For this campaign, we partnered with Isaiah to take a child battling cancer to their dream destination. Isaiah took the reins creatively and implemented subtle brand messaging to create a widely shared video across social media, garnering 58.1M organic views on YouTube. We saw a high volume of comments, a testament to the emotional connection between the viewers and the campaign message, Go With Heart.
Second, content should be relatable and helpful to have a greater chance of resonating with a broader audience. People use social media to connect with others, share ideas, and gain new perspectives on many topics. An influencer post from Christy Cooks (372K Instagram followers) sharing an insightful spin on how to make Maruchan’s notable Instant Lunch is an excellent example of this. By sharing a fun, easy way to elevate this well-known lunch option, she garnered 1.4M organic views on Instagram, reaching more than three times her follower base.
Be Relevant: Another approach to consider in helping content go viral is tapping into current trends, whether trending audio or capitalizing on trending content styles.
For our Denizen by Levi’s influencer campaign, we partnered with Steffy, who had 412K Instagram followers at the time of posting, to create content featuring a select style of jeans. Steffy’s Instagram Reel was seasonally relevant, featuring trending Halloween audio and fun, snippy transitions, which led the post to garner 1.2M organic views (three times her follower base).
Liam Reid (24K Facebook followers), an outdoor enthusiast, is another Amp influencer partner who tapped into the popular Day in the Life trend, sharing a video about how he spends his day living on his boat while subtly promoting Lippert’s Taylor Made boat fenders and CURT truck hitch. Liam captivated his audience by showcasing his summer morning and afternoon routine. Due to the unique nature of the content, as well as hopping on this relevant trend, this Facebook Reel garnered 1.2M organic views (five times his Facebook following).
Timing and Real-Time Engagement: The last approach, and possibly the most difficult nut to crack, is to lean on the influencer’s expertise and insights into the logistical side of sharing content. By working with the influencer to post when they see the highest engagement, ensuring they interact with comments on their post in real-time, and utilizing relevant hashtags and keywords, your influencer post will have a greater chance of going viral.
A recent influencer post for our client, The Moorings, is a perfect example of combining impactful content and tapping into trends, timeliness, and real-time engagement. Our influencer partner, The Globe Wanderers (276K Instagram followers), created an Instagram Reel, tapping into the “IDK who needs to hear this…” trend, telling their audience that this was their sign to book a trip on a yacht charter with nine other friends and island hop the British Virgin Islands for only $2,500 a person. The post, which garnered 21.5M organic views (almost eight times their following), was short, direct, and featured audio that evoked that sunny vacation feeling. Also, this post was shared in January, when many people were seeking warmer climates and planning summer vacations.
The Globe Wanderers received a significant amount of comments on their post. To keep the post’s momentum going, they replied to just about every comment, answering questions and generating excitement among their audience.
Although there is no guaranteed way to make influencer content go viral, keeping these approaches in mind while planning can increase the likelihood of a successful post. True collaboration with your influencer partners will help to unlock their full potential.
