Social Media: Viral Videos

I feel like there are two different types of viral videos: those that are created and those that just happen. The thing with trying to create a viral video is that it’s impossible. All you can do is set yourself up in the best way possible and hope that you can catch the wave. The videos that tend to catch focus on real life, emotion and creativity. A company that wants to create a promotional video to go viral has to rely mostly on humor and creativity, unless they use the real experiences of others to apply concepts to their businesses.

Red Bull is the company that has stood out to me the most recently. It is obvious that they have a huge viral video campaign going on right now. Not many companies have the budget that Red Bull has. But despite the budget, Red Bull has done some amazing things.

They have one of the best helicopter pilots out there, and a helicopter that can do flips and barrel rolls.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2qvZH79gwA

They have their own stunt plane.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4aVggpwrbc

My favorite is their recent snowboard movie that recently came out called "The Art of Flight."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4CUNVYxxZM

If Red Bull keeps coming up with videos like this and sponsoring the people that they do, they will have cemented themselves as the drink for extreme people.

In an article I read, trying to create new viral video is like "dropping a grain of sand on the beach." There is so much video content existing online that it makes getting discovered difficult. The author gives some advice. She says that people need to feel a sense of discovery when they come across a video so that it is something they want to share with friends. According to her the main things to focus on are having great content, building a fan base and search engine optimization. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123481783053894227.html

I was also a big fan of this one. http://www.reelseo.com/viral-video-lessons-2010/

Everyone enjoys watching a creative video, but it's the ones that depict real life and real emotions that tend to get the most views. There have been multiple nights where my roommates and I will sit and home watching YouTube videos and be completely entertained. Viral videos are my favorite form of social media. They inspire people to be more creative. They are going to define this generation.

Social Media: Location Based Programs

This is why I love Social Media class. I had no idea about Foursquare or how to utilize other location based systems. The only one that I knew about was Facebook Places. I researched an article that gives a short breakdown of five of the top location based programs. They are Foursquare (and from what I hear it’s the best), Facebook Places (fun to check in and let the world know where you are), Groupon (which allows you to see business that are close and what deals they are offering), Blippy and Loopst (I still need to find out a little more about the last two). http://www.studio1c.com/seo-and-internet-marketing/419-top-5-location-based-social-media-sites.html

The article at http://socialmediatoday.com/trevorjonas/287597/3-tangible-ways-utilize-foursquare-event-marketing, that gives great advise on how to incorporate Foursquare in to event marketing strategies. Foursquare is something that I am definitely going to have to play around with. As someone that will probably be working in some way with social media for the rest of my life, I feel like I am slightly behind the curve.

I work for a company called CityGro and I’m trying to create a social media plan where I can incorporate all of these new things in to our website. Foursquare might be beneficial as far as utilizing the “check in” tool to allow people to show when and where they use a specific deal. If anyone has any ideas on how I can make that work, let me know.