You Don't Want a Viral Campaign. You Want a Safe Campaign With Viral Results.

“We need this one to go viral.”

Okay.

Love the ambition.

What are we thinking?

“Something funny.”

Great.

“Just not too funny.”

Right.

“Something surprising.”

Excellent.

“But nothing that could confuse anyone.”

Sure.

“Something people will share.”

Perfect.

“But obviously it needs to communicate all five product benefits.”

Naturally.

“And feel really authentic.”

Love that.

“We’ve written the creator a script.”

Of course you have.

Anything else?

“Logo in the first three seconds.”

Yep.

“And throughout.”

Beautiful.

“Legal has also made a few changes.”

How many?

“Not many.”

How many?

“Seventeen.”

Right.

And we want this to go viral?

“Exactly.”

Cool.

I think I understand the brief.

You don’t want a viral campaign.

You want a safe campaign with viral results.

Slightly different product.

Everyone Wants Viral Until Viral Walks Into the Meeting

Brands love the idea of virality.

Millions of views.

Comments flying.

Group chats humming.

People tagging their mates.

Earned media.

Organic reach.

The CEO discovering TikTok for the first time and forwarding the post to the entire company with:

“Great work team!”

Lovely.

What brands are sometimes less enthusiastic about are the things that make people share things in the first place.

Humour.

Surprise.

Emotion.

Personality.

Novelty.

Opinion.

Absurdity.

Timing.

Risk.

Something you haven’t seen before.

Something that doesn’t feel like an ad.

Something that might make one person say:

“What the fuck?”

That’s where everyone starts getting nervous.

Because viral is exciting as an outcome.

It can be deeply uncomfortable as an input.

Can We Make It Viral, But More On Brand?

Of course.

Let’s take the idea people might actually share and improve it.

First, we’ll make the joke less weird.

Then we’ll bring the product benefit forward.

Add the campaign line.

Put the logo in earlier.

Make the creator say the brand name.

Actually, twice.

Can we make the talent feel a little more aspirational?

Legal would like a disclaimer.

The Head of Brand doesn’t understand the reference.

The GM thinks the opening is confusing.

The CEO’s daughter says she wouldn’t share it.

She is 31 and works in commercial property.

Useful.

One more round.

Perfect.

We have now successfully removed everything that made the idea interesting.

Media team, over to you.

Virality Is a Behaviour

This is the bit that gets lost.

Going viral isn’t a media format.

It isn’t an objective you select in Ads Manager.

It isn’t something your agency can guarantee by putting VIRAL CONTENT on Slide 36.

It happens when lots of human beings independently decide something deserves more attention.

They watch.

Then keep watching.

Then send it.

Then someone else sends it.

Then people comment.

Remix.

React.

Talk about it.

Maybe the platform notices all this behaviour and distributes it further.

The audience is doing part of the distribution for you.

Which means the question shouldn’t be:

“How do we make this go viral?”

It should probably be:

“Why the fuck would anyone share this?”

Much less exciting question.

Much more useful.

Nobody Shares Your Objectives

Your campaign has objectives.

Your audience does not care.

You need awareness.

They don’t care.

You need consideration.

They don’t care.

You need to communicate the new formulation.

Still nothing.

You need to land three RTBs, a promotional mechanic and your new positioning.

Best of luck.

Your audience is sitting on the toilet.

They will share your content if sharing it does something for them.

It makes them funny.

Makes them useful.

Makes them look smart.

Says something they wanted to say.

Makes their friend laugh.

Makes someone feel seen.

Starts a conversation.

Or is simply so fucking weird they need another human to witness it.

“Look at this.”

Those three words are basically the engine of the internet.

Your campaign needs to earn them.

“But We Don’t Want to Be Controversial”

Fine.

You don’t need to be.

This is where conversations about brave creative sometimes become stupid.

Interesting does not mean offensive.

Bold does not mean reckless.

Shareable does not mean your Community Manager spends the next 72 hours hiding in a bathroom.

You don’t need to insult anyone.

You don’t need to start a culture war.

You don’t need your CEO issuing an apology filmed against a suspiciously empty bookshelf.

There are a million ways to be interesting.

Funny.

Useful.

Beautiful.

Unexpected.

Emotionally honest.

Ridiculous.

Specific.

Generous.

Culturally sharp.

The problem is when brands remove all of those things because every distinctive choice introduces some possibility that somebody somewhere might not like it.

Now we’re back to:

Fine.

Professional.

Polished.

Safe.

Completely fucking invisible.

Authenticity Has Entered the Chat

Then there’s creators.

“We want it to feel really authentic.”

Great.

We’ve found a creator whose audience loves them.

They know exactly how they speak.

They know their community.

They understand the platform.

They know what gets watched and what gets annihilated.

So naturally, we send them this:

“Hey guys! I’m SO excited to partner with [BRAND] to tell you about their incredible new [PRODUCT], featuring [BENEFIT ONE], [BENEFIT TWO] and [BENEFIT THREE]!”

Beautiful.

Sounds exactly like them.

The creator makes some changes.

Brand changes them back.

Creator says the product name differently.

Changed.

Creator removes a claim that feels unnatural.

Put it back.

Creator wants to open with the joke.

We need the product earlier.

Then, after successfully removing their voice:

“Can we make it feel more authentic?”

Sure.

Maybe add a handheld camera.

You Cannot Brief Culture Into Submission

This is what makes social uncomfortable for traditional marketing structures.

You don’t control everything.

The audience gets a vote.

Creators get a vote.

Culture gets a vote.

Timing matters.

Context matters.

The comments matter.

And sometimes the thing that works wasn’t the thing anyone predicted.

That’s precisely why social data is so useful.

Make things.

See what holds attention.

See which hooks work.

See which creators people watch.

See what gets shared.

Learn.

Make again.

Over time, you can become more intelligent about the risks you take.

But that’s different from eliminating risk entirely.

If your requirement is:

“We need proof this exact thing will go viral before we approve it.”

Congratulations.

You have invented time travel.

Please stop working in marketing immediately and contact a physicist.

The Algorithm Isn’t Your Biggest Problem

Brands love blaming the algorithm.

“The algorithm didn't pick it up.”

Maybe.

Algorithms are mysterious little bastards.

Distribution changes.

Platforms change.

Timing matters.

Paid support matters.

Luck absolutely matters.

But occasionally there is another explanation.

Nobody particularly liked it.

Painful.

But useful.

The opening didn't hold them.

The joke wasn't funny.

The creator-brand fit was weird.

The idea felt like an ad.

Nobody felt compelled to share it.

This is actually good information.

Because now we can make the next thing better.

Unless, of course, we decide the real problem was insufficient media spend and put $50,000 behind it.

Then we can learn absolutely nothing.

At scale.

Viral Is Not a Strategy

Worth saying.

Chasing virality for its own sake can produce enormous numbers and absolutely fuck-all business value.

A video of your CEO being chased through the office by an emu might get 14 million views.

Congratulations.

Do you sell emus?

Did anybody remember the brand?

Did it change anything?

Did the attention connect to the business in some useful way?

Viral does not automatically mean effective.

Just as effective does not automatically mean viral.

The goal isn't to make every post explode.

The goal is to understand what makes people voluntarily give your brand attention and build more of those ingredients into the work.

Sometimes that produces 50,000 highly useful views.

Sometimes five million.

Sometimes something absolutely flies and everyone pretends they knew it would.

Marketing is fun.

Stop Asking for the Outcome While Rejecting the Inputs

This is the real problem.

“We need innovation.”

Has anyone done it before?

“We need younger audiences.”

Has anyone asked the young people who work here?

No.

They’re junior.

“We need authentic creators.”

Great.

Here’s the script they must read exactly.

“We need viral.”

Excellent.

Can we be funny?

Not too funny.

Surprising?

Not confusing.

Emotional?

Not sad.

Provocative?

Absolutely not.

Weird?

Not on brand.

Opinionated?

Could alienate someone.

Unexpected?

Management might not understand it.

Right.

So what exactly are people sharing?

The product benefit?

The logo?

The legal disclaimer?

Maybe the CTA really pops.

The Safest Campaign Can Still Fail

This is the strange calculation companies make.

Bold idea = risky.

Safe idea = safe.

But safe creative has risks too.

Nobody watches.

Nobody remembers.

Nobody shares.

Nobody talks about it.

You spend your entire media budget repeatedly putting something forgettable in front of people.

Nobody complains.

The campaign ends.

The dashboard has some green arrows.

Everyone moves on.

It feels safe because the failure is quiet.

There’s no angry email.

No uncomfortable management meeting.

No comment from somebody called @BigDawg1997.

Just indifference.

And indifference rarely gets escalated to the CEO.

Make Something Worth Sharing First

So no, we can’t promise your campaign will go viral.

Nobody sensible can.

There are too many variables.

Culture is unpredictable.

Platforms are unpredictable.

Humans are spectacularly unpredictable.

But we can give the work a chance.

Start with the audience.

Use what you’ve learned from the content they actually watch.

Bring creators in before the idea is finished.

Give them room to be themselves.

Make the opening worth watching.

Have a point of view.

Make decisions.

Protect the strange little bits that make the idea distinctive.

Then use media intelligently to amplify it.

And when somebody in the approval meeting says:

“I love it. I’m just worried some people might not…”

Pay attention.

Maybe they’ve spotted a genuine problem.

Or maybe you’ve finally made something with enough personality for another human being to have an opinion about it.

Because if the brief is:

“Make something everyone is comfortable with that millions of people voluntarily share.”

We can save everyone a meeting.

That isn't a creative brief.

It's a fucking contradiction.