Creating viral content is a marketer’s dream come true. If you’re unfamiliar with what it means to “go viral,” it basically refers to the widespread popularity of a piece of content, extreme popularity that is generated within a short period of time. Usually, it’s a result of a high quality piece of content being shared from one person to another in a rapid fashion via numerous social media outlets, hence yielding a great amount of views and shares.

When a piece of content goes viral, it basically draws a tremendous amount of attention to your brand, thereby providing exposure to an audience that you may never have believed you could have reached before.

Often, there is more to getting a video to go viral than meets the eye, but many people want to do everything they can to create a viral video production. The following are five tips that will help you create a viral video production.

1. Create good, relevant video content

One of the biggest mistakes that you can make is to focus too much on creating video content that goes viral. Some companies will pay attention to the viral videos of the day and try to replicate them – even if they aren’t relevant to their brand. The key ingredient to creating video content that goes viral is quality.

If your video is of high quality, then you will have a better chance of attracting (and keeping!) attention. So what makes a high-quality video? Production value and content.

Production value

While you will see a video shot on a phone go viral once in awhile, it’s typically not branded content. Instead it’s something a consumer shot that becomes newsworthy.

Unless you’re making a parody of a well known video, it’s better to concentrate on creating something that’s aesthetically pleasing. This means using a video production company to help plan out your video, light it, shoot it in a professional manner and edit it together in a well-paced and impactful way.

Content

Your video should tell a story or convey a message that is of value to viewers, whether educational or emotional. Stories help to engage the viewers and they are much more likely to share it with friends and family members on their personal social media pages if the video is upbeat. The content should be relevant to your brand and brand followers.

2. Build an engaged audience base

No video content is going to just go viral right out of the gate – not without an audience that is already engaged with your brand. Posting a video on your website that nobody watches because you don’t already have an audience, means that it will be difficult for it to go viral.

You need to consistently work on building an audience that watches your videos whenever you post them. This means engaging with customers on social media by regularly posting not just video content, but written content as well – and encouraging comments.

Even just posting questions on Twitter once in awhile is a good way to keep your audience engaged – and commenting or sharing the posts of followers is a good way to build a relationship with them. By doing this, you’ll gradually grow your audience all while keeping them engaged with your brand.

When you do release a piece of video content, they’ll be more likely to comment on it or share it, thereby giving it a kick start that it needs to go viral.

3. Create video content that is up-to-date

By up-to-date we mean current. Videos that are relevant to what’s going on in the news or in pop culture today is more likely to go viral. For example, maybe you’re thinking about trying to create a viral video production that parodies the American election process.

Using Nixon or Reagan as the parody’s target isn’t going to be nearly as effective as using Trump, because Trump is much more relevant today. The same goes for popular culture. A video that is a riff on Game of Thrones is more likely to go viral than a video that pokes fun at Cheers.

4. Keep your videos short and sweet

When’s the last time you saw a 30-minute video go viral? Probably never, and if you did, you probably didn’t watch it. Most consumers don’t have the attention span or the time to sit through a video that’s more than a few minutes long.

Many consumers watch videos from their phones or during short breaks at work. They can’t watch something that’s long, which means they are less likely to share it with others. Most viral video productions tend to be on the shorter side.

Anything from twenty seconds to two or three minutes. A hilarious 30-second video is going to get much more traction than a somber 20-minute video – it’s why social channels such as Vine and Snapchat have grown so quickly in popularity.

5. Use humor or emotion

The most-shared types of video content are ones that use humor or evoke emotion, as well as those that are educational in a very simple way. Focus on content that allows a person to easily take in the message and enjoy the experience of doing so.

These days most people are watching content on multiple mobile devices (phones and tablets), sorting through social media feeds and browsing content at their whim. In most cases you’ll only have a few seconds to capture their attention, and a quick shot at giving them something they’d want to show someone else they know.

In most cases this is content that is funny, moves at a quick pace, tugs at the heartstrings, or reveals a new piece of important or unique information. These tips can help you create a viral video production.

Just keep in mind that making a video go viral at times a stroke of good fortune, and at other times a deeply strategic and planned coordination of production and publishing. If you’re not submitting your content to blogs or other publishers, and you’re not promoting or building your social media pages, you can only set your content up in the best position possible to go viral and hope for the best.

A video production company can ensure that your video meets professional quality standards, while a company with video marketing experience can help boost your chances of creating a viral video production even more.