How To Make a Tweet Go Viral:
12 Strategies
What is one strategy for making a tweet go viral?
To help you go viral on Twitter, we asked content creators and marketing experts this question for their best insights. From using trending hashtags to posting during high activity hours, there are several strategies that may improve your chances of spreading viral content on Twitter.
How To Make a Tweet Go Viral: 12 Strategies
One very important strategy for making a tweet go viral is to make sure to implement trending hashtags in your tweet! If you have a new account and you do not have many followers, or haven’t been getting too many interactions and responses recently, then using trending hashtags can be a very good idea to make your tweet go viral. You can use hashtags according to your targeted area. For example, if you want your tweet to go viral in the USA or UK, then you can choose trending hashtags for that region. Also, make sure that the hashtags also relate to the content you’re tweeting about.
When looking for a tweet to go viral, it’s helpful to follow and engage relevant users – people that are likely to find great relevance in the content of your tweet. Following users and starting engaged discussions on Twitter can earn you a more solid following, and can get the right eyes on your page. Even if they don’t end up following back, it’s like many of the users you follow will take a look at your page, and if you’ve offered a tweet with real value, humor, or intrigue, you’ve got the potential to start gaining retweets.
If you want your tweet to go viral, improve an original tweet that engaged Twitter. Here’s how: Go to Your Twitter profile. Click More and then Analytics. You will see your Twitter metrics such as your best tweets in the last five days and in the last month. If you find your tweet engaged Twitter, improve it by adding an emotional message.
In order for a tweet to go viral, your social media teams need to be making high-quality content, adding elements of humor, and staying on-trend. A company should be tweeting at least 2-3x a day and being on-trend in order to be noticed by consumers and the public. Humor keeps people engaged and being on-trend keeps you timely.
More and more people on social media learn new things from the platforms they browse after it’s been shared to them. Therefore, a good way to fish for a viral tweet is to provide a link to a resource, perhaps even one that you or someone in your circle or company wrote. The more novel and interesting the information, the better. Also, be sure to write engaging headlines that are specific in what the reader will get out of the article.
If you want to increase your chances of having a tweet go viral, try simply asking for retweets. Not only should you be asking for retweets, but you should be using words like please, help, check out, etc. These words tend to help increase the likelihood of a tweet being retweeted and going viral.
There’s one more great reason to create a positive presence on social media – you’ll increase your chances of going viral. Studies show that the information that faded the quickest on Twitter related to negative feelings and actions. At the same time, words that signify positive emotions, lifestyle, and leisure stick around much longer. Look at the general tone of the language shared on Twitter, then craft your tweets to align with it and reflect your own personal style. Though positive tweets tend to stick around longer, people often associate negative language with higher intelligence. A negative message may still go viral, but it’s likely to see a quick rise and fall rather than the sustained popularity a positive tweet offers.
Everyone loves a freebie, and running a giveaway contest on Twitter can easily explode your reach to thousands of new users if you do it right. If you want your tweet to go viral, you need to incentivize people to retweet it, so you simply ask people to retweet it to be entered in a free contest to win your giveaway. Instead of picking a winner at random, you could tell people that the person who racks up the most retweets of your post wins. Make the most out of your giveaway by sending reminder tweets about your giveaway every other day until your contest is over.
Think like CNN and craft tweets that could double as catchy news headlines. Researchers found that tweets with a headline style were retweeted more often than others, upping your chances to go viral. News headlines usually have a killer hook that draws people in with an actionable piece of advice, present-tense verbs, and uses powerful imagery to build a story in very few words.
Twitter series are a great way to engage with your followers, have the space (and characters) to tell a story and attract consumers. Storytelling is extremely effective when it comes to social media. If your story is compelling, influential or adds value, it will be sure to get a lot of traction, favorites, and retweets. Don’t forget to number your Twitter series in order to keep your followers aware of the sequence.
One strategy for making a tweet go viral is to avoid trying to make it go viral. A lot of campaigns seek to create a viral tweet by focusing on the wrong things—like “OMG, can you believe this?” tweets that are so over-the-top that they seem unreal. Instead of trying to be outrageous, try to be human. Write like you talk, and don’t be afraid to let your own voice and personality come through. And if your post IS over-the-top and you really do want it to go viral? Just don’t do any editing. One of the things people love most about social media is the immediacy—just bring your phone out and film!
Viral tweets are usually about something real, something honest and raw, something that comes from a place of authenticity. People love seeing themselves in viral posts; they love feeling represented by what’s on their screen. So the best way to create a post with strong odds of going viral is by being honest and letting your audience know that you see them too!
Twitter posts have the shortest lifespan of all social media outlets, lasting just under 20 minutes. Due to the fast-paced nature of this platform, timing is everything. Use an online Twitter analysis platform such as ManageFlitter or Circleboom to gather information on your Twitter followers and learn when they are most active. Schedule your tweets accordingly and save them in your drafts until you reach high activity hours. Or queue them to automatically post at a specified time via another platform, such as TweetDeck. Your tweets are not guaranteed to go viral if you post during popular times, but they are more likely to be seen by your followers, increasing exposure.
Ready To Make a Tweet Go Viral?
You’ve heard what the experts had to say, now it’s your turn.
Now that you know how to make a tweet go viral, which tip are you going to try first? Let me know in the comments below.
