How to Make a Viral Video: Must-Have Criteria and Crucial Do’s & Don’ts

Go behind the scenes with the viral video gurus at Grasshopper to discover exactly what it takes to make your own leap to YouTube stardom.

Going viral: It’s the white whale of video marketing. Though many have gone in search for the secrets to viral success, few have come close to cracking the code. Even those who accomplish the elusive feat once often have trouble replicating it.
One notable exception — Grasshopper. The virtual phone system provider for entrepreneurs and small business owners has produced multiple viral videos with 1 million+ views, and is a great example of a company successfully applying method to the viral madness.
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Watch three of their videos — including “Sh*t Entrepreneurs Say,” voted “Best Viral Video of the Year” by OpenView readers — in the gallery above.
OpenView asked the creative minds behind this year’s B2B Oscar-winning “Sh*t Entrepreneurs Say” to shed light on how to make a viral video by giving us a sneak peek inside their creative process. Grasshopper Content Marketing Specialist Emma Siemasko responded with insights and tips B2B marketers can use to develop their own winning recipes for viral success.

OpenView: What are the key components of a viral video? Or, to put it another way, what gives a video good viral potential?

Emma Siemasko: Videos have good viral potential if they are fun and culturally relevant. Stiff videos rarely go viral. It’s the playful videos that see traffic and shares, even if they’re a “how-to” or “explainer” video.
All three videos in the OpenView Labs contest capitalized on current pop culture trends. “Sh*t Entrepreneurs Say” was a parody of the “Sh*t Girls Say Video,” and HubSpot worked with the infamous “Gangnam Style.” Instructure went with the “Harlem Shake.” All of them were funny. I smiled when I watched them – they all induced an emotional response which is key to viral success. 

OV: How closely should a viral video reflect the company culture?

ES: Business-produced videos almost always reflect the company culture, whether they mean to or not. If a company is super traditional, they’re going to create a safe video. To be honest, I think videos that go viral tend to take some risks. Grasshopper’s made fun of tech entrepreneurs, even though we love and respect them. The best videos are a little boundary pushing. If the company culture encourages that spirit, it will translate over to the videos.
Even so, if your company and clients aren’t particularly wild and crazy, then you should create a video that fits your culture. If it’s a really well-done explainer video, it can still go viral, even if it’s not particularly funny and boundary-pushing. “The Official Ultra-Ever Dry Product Video” comes to mind. The video just shows what the product does, but it’s an awesome product, and it’s seen more than 4.9 million views!

OV: What are some ways companies can reflect their culture in viral videos?

ES: Companies should take a step back and consider what their values are when they are creating a video. “Entrepreneurially Generous” is one of our brand promises, and I think it’s reflected in our video. We’re the sort of company that sent out chocolate-covered grasshoppers when we adopted our new company name, and we created a spoof called “The New Dork-Entrepreneur State of Mind”, highlighting  and poking fun at startup culture.

OV: How DIY should you get with your videos? What should you outsource and what should you keep in-house?

ES: Well, it depends on the size of your company and the resources you have. If you have people in-house with the know-how and the time to create a video, it’s a great project that can bring in awesome rewards. If creating a video means sucking up all of your marketing team’s time for two weeks, it’s probably not the best idea.
If you want a video to be successful, to go viral, then you’ve got to develop the idea and the script in-house. You can’t outsource company culture or company spirit. You can’t outsource the world’s coolest video idea.
That said, marketing video companies exist for a reason, and can help you turn an idea into reality, complete with state-of-the-art cameras and cool cinematography.

OV: What are some key do’s and don’ts for making a viral video?

ES: Here are a few that come to mind:

• DO be generous and open. Ask around the office and among friends about what people think of your video ideas.
• DO think of what’s popular and what’s going on in current events. TV Shows like Saturday Night Live and The Daily Show and newspapers like The Onion are so successful because they harp on what’s happening.
• DO be yourself. Create a video that feels genuinely like you and your company.
• DON’T be boring and generic. It’s easy to say, and harder to do, but if you create a video with one person rattling off “Ten Marketing Tips,” people won’t be interested. Be willing to take risks — it will pay off.

OV: Can you walk through the basic steps Grasshopper took in creating “Sh*t Entrepreneurs Say”?

ES: Siamak Taghaddos, our CEO, spearheaded this project. He thought of the viral video after some of the other Sh*t videos came out, and emailed Allen Branch at LessFilms with a bullet list of cliches and phrases that entrepreneurs say. Allen is also a startup guy, so he worked on the phrases, but did so quickly to make sure the video came out before the fad died out.
Siamak told me that he liked the Sh*t videos because they speak to highly targeted groups and could easily spread throughout those groups. As you’ll recall, everyone was searching for the “Sh*t (fill in the blank) Say” video that best represented their own cohort.
Siamak also noted that it’s important to understand the timing when it comes to fad videos — he thought about doing a Harlem shake video, but realized our version would come out too late to remain relevant, especially since the Harlem fad didn’t speak to as targeted a group as “Sh*t Entrepreneurs Say”.

You’ve heard from Emma, now we want to hear from you. What do you think are the most critical elements for making a viral video?