Planning to Go Viral

 Can you actually plan to have a post or website go viral?

I try to post at least once a week to each of my seven current blogs. It takes a good chunk of time and usually happens between other tasks. On this weekend blog, I try for a Friday, Saturday, and Sunday post most weeks with the occasional midweek post for topical events on Earth (holidays and such) or in the heavens (Full Moons, comets, etc.).

Many bloggers write as a job or at least do it to make some income, so getting more traffic to your blog posts and catching the attention of more readers is important. I certainly like having more people read my writing, but I have never made money at it and don't imagine I ever will, but I still look at blog "marketing" articles.

I'm very skeptical of titles like "How To Promote Your Blog And Make It Viral." If anyone knew how to make a blog post or video go viral, then all posts would go viral and there would be no viral left. So, do I just write and let Google do the rest?

There have been more than a million visitors to some of my blogs, and that seems pretty good to me. But I looked at that post, which lists strategies, and it is quick to say that "going viral" is not necessarily an "accountable strategic outcome," but I thought I might get a few tips. Some suggestions are things I actually do, even though I don't have a real marketing strategy for my personal writing, the way I would create one for a client.

Let's look at a few:

Send your content by email.  Most blog platforms, like WordPress, allow readers to subscribe and receive an email when a new post is available.

Share content via social media. Again, it is fairly simple to set up your blog to automatically send a post to X, LinkedIn, Facebook, Tumblr, and other social sites. I use that option. It's easy. Perhaps, too easy. These automated widgets often just grab a post title or as much of the first line that fits into the character or word count limit. Customized posts are always better. If someone follows you on several networks, it's not good for them to see the name information repeated.

Mention an influencer. Hmmm. Name dropping and guest blogger posts? Not my thing.

Submit posts to a content community. A kind of repost and cross-post strategy. I have experimented with reposting in other networks like Medium, Reddit and Substack, which opens up other audiences. I also occasionally cross-post on another one of my own blogs.

You certainly should make it easy to share your content. The one-click buttons on this post allow readers to share your content in their own networks. They may not have a big network of followers (though they might have more than you!), but their word-of-mouth endorsement probably carries more trust than your own social media link.

If you were a client, I would advise you about using paid ads and remarketing, but for personal content, I don't see the point. However, I would strongly advise following one of the tips: focus on places that get the best response. That requires some work using analytics, monitoring the keywords people use to find your content, and tracking the source of your traffic. Links on my Facebook page send more people to this blog than other networks.

But, the real final tip is my own: write good posts about topics people are interested in. Easier said than done. Good writing is always tough, but figuring out what people are interested in reading is harder.