Earlier this week, members of the Blogzine Academy gathered online for the fourth edition of the Digital Bootcamp; on the topic of “How to Create Viral Video Content. Here are the key takeaways.

Viral content and trending content most of the time go hand in hand. Social media trends refer to various trends based on content-sharing and interactions between users that appear on social media platforms. It’s important to identify social media trends for business intelligence purposes, marketing, competitive advantages, and many other business goals. The more something is trending, the higher the chance it goes viral. But also something can go viral first and become the new trend. 

How to identify trends? 

As you are doing your weekly research for content to make there are many ways to identify trends. You can start off by using Google Trends to see what people are looking for online. You can use that information to see if some of those keywords or topics are also trending hashtags on Instagram or TikTok. 

Make a point of visiting TikTok’s Creative Center or scroll through the Instagram Explore page to get an idea of trending songs, hashtags, and videos. From a corporate standpoint, this may seem like superficial research, but being able to speak the language of users online makes all the difference when it comes to connecting with consumers.

If you have a lot of time you can scroll down the apps yourself and pinpoint videos or songs you frequently hear or see passing by. Look for songs that are popular and have more than a couple of thousand users using them. Or watch the music charts for upcoming album and song releases to be the first one to use a song (and start the trend). 

Later.com has a webpage where it posts a weekly update on the hottest TikTok trends. Which makes it easy for you to see what is trending and to start recreating videos yourself. 

Target group focussed content

If you want content that resonates with your target audience, you must first research who that is. As a business, you need to know where your target audience is active and what kind of content they like or just don’t like. 

Certain factors such as demographic characteristics, can affect the type of content that will be successful. To that end, make sure you create content for each different target audience so that each one will feel addressed at some point. 

Viral content is sometimes accidental; a fun or hot topic that immediately touches or pleases your target audience. But sometimes it can also be the result of a well-thought-out video marketing campaign. Because you did your research and now know your target group through and through, it can be expected to be well received. Using the storytelling canvas to come up with a creative video storyline is a great way to make sure you thought about the right elements for your video. In this e-book you can find out more about how to use the storytelling canvas and how to use storytelling for your business. 

The Digital Bootcamp is part of our program at Blogzine Academy. Twice a year we host a digital training for our members to put their skills to the test during two nights of intensive group and individual challenges. If you want to join our day two of the digital bootcamp edition 4, you still can. You can also become a Blogzine Academy member and enjoy the bootcamp for free, as well as get personal coaching and help to make your business successful.