There are websites today whose only reason for being is to create viral content on the web.
The headlines are unmistakable click bait, such as the title of this blog post.
What happens next is you click on the link. Job done. Upworthy is particularly adept at this manoeuvre.
In news terms, the best click bait is a good news story. Nothing on our website creates more traffic than the story everyone wants to read. Have a look at 2014's 25 most-read online stories for some great examples.
Then, there was the woman whose disappoinment over missing her ferry was caught on video and shared around the world, including this blog.
And she was great for business. Without revealing too many trade secrets, I can tell you that my blog with her video attached received 20 times the pageview of my typical posting.
The blog post was shared on Facebook more than 1,600 times.
Click bait indeed.
It's hard to tell how many people have actually viewed the video at this point, but it's certainly in the millions, which has been the unofficial standard of "going viral," but many now easily surpass five million or even 20 million views.
Many videos, like this one, go viral accidentally. Others have effort behind them as a means to promote music or movies. On the dark side, sometimes it's instances of bullying that push a video into viral territory.
The Internet, social media — especially YouTube — and email are all used to deliver the viral material.
One of the first was this gem, circa 2000:
We've moved on to "epic fails" and more dogs and cats than we can count.
Personally, my high-water mark for a viral video was a slideshow of a backsplash I installed in my Nanaimo kitchen.
More than 4,400 views!
