Have you discovered the five characteristics of a 10W+ viral article?

A 10W+ viral article can be produced accidentally or through a standardized model.

The so-called inadvertent means that the specific method has not been mastered, and the emergence of explosive articles is a probabilistic event. The so-called standardized model means that by mastering specific methods, one can produce popular articles at a high frequency and in a replicable manner.

• What kind of content will cause the public to forward it?
• What are the dissemination patterns of those popular articles?

I observed and analyzed a large number of top-tier accounts and popular content that became popular on the Internet, and found some answers.

1. Awakening Psychology

Friends who have read "Contagious" know that the author mentioned a communication phenomenon called "awakening."

So-called awakening means changing a person's "physiological state" or "psychological state" in some way. If the content you provide fails to achieve this effect, it is boring content. In other words, boring content is difficult to stimulate users to share.

1) Physiological arousal

For example, you are in the audience watching a show. The host suddenly invites you to the stage to cooperate with a performance. At this time, your heartbeat may accelerate and your palms may sweat. This phenomenon is physiological arousal.

2) Psychological awakening

For example, you are watching a video. In the video, a young man refused to give up his seat to an elderly person and even beat him. This video makes you feel angry, and this phenomenon is psychological arousal.

The so-called awakening is to transfer the user from one state to another, including "physical changes" and "emotional changes".

It should be emphasized here that when physical changes occur, emotional changes may also occur at the same time, but they are not perceived at the first time.

From this point of view, we believe that content that can awaken users is good content. Think about it carefully, does your popular article have this characteristic?

Arousal is a process. When a person's emotions are aroused, there are two arousal results: "high arousal" or "low arousal".

1) High arousal

For example, a 19-year-old girl attempted suicide by jumping off a building, but the crowd watching nearby shouted at her to jump quickly. We feel very angry when we see this kind of vile phenomenon of onlookers.

2) Low wake-up

For example, you finally get to eat the internet-famous delicacy you’ve been waiting for and feel very satisfied.

The so-called high and low refer to different degrees of awakening, so the user's willingness to share is also different.

So the question is, what content and what emotions will awaken users?

Two ways to stimulate emotions

When classifying emotions, they are mainly divided into two types of emotional fluctuations: "positive emotions" and "negative emotions".

1) Positive emotions

For example, when we see content that "China has become very powerful", we will feel very proud in our hearts.

2) Negative emotions

For example, if we see that “an actor we like got into a car accident,” we will be very worried about him.

Visual Journal once published an article that caused a sensation on the Internet, "Thank You for Loving Me", which presented 18 stories between people, people and animals, and animals and animals with text + gif images/static images. These stories made people feel very moved and were full of positive emotions.

In "Contagious", the author provided a picture.

• Positive emotions such as awe, amusement, and excitement are all high arousal states. Negative emotions such as anger and worry are high arousal states.
• Positive emotions such as contentment are low-arousal states. Negative emotions such as sadness are low arousal states.

Based on my experience and observation, this diagram is applicable in most cases.

For example, for the account of Little Princess, most of the articles with high forwarding volume are about "account blocking" and "increasing followers".

For example, which public account has been blocked again? Why was it blocked? Which account has gained followers again? As long as keywords such as "account ban" and "increase followers" appear in the title, the opening rate and forwarding rate will be higher than other articles.

Something worrying like an account being blocked is a high-arousal negative emotion; something exciting like increasing followers is a high-arousal positive emotion.

The reason I say most is because there are of course cases where it does not apply. For example, when a person who has made outstanding contributions to society dies, this very sad thing (low arousal negative emotion) will still be widely spread.

Awesome content also stimulates opening

"Going Viral" mentioned that the forwarding rate of awe-inspiring articles is 30% higher than that of ordinary articles (articles without awe).

Content with a high forwarding rate may not necessarily make people feel awe, but content that makes people feel awe will have a significantly higher conversion rate than other content.

We often have this feeling. When we appreciate "great knowledge", "magnificent scenery", "solemn splendor" and "majestic power", we will feel a sense of awe.

• Great knowledge makes us feel small;
• The charming scenery makes us feel the magic of nature;
• The solemnity of the occasion makes us respectfully respectful;
• The mighty power makes us fearful and timid...

When one of these elements is present in content, it is forwarded more often than other types of content.

In 2017, the Planetary Institute published an article titled "What Will You See When You Climb Mount Everest?" ", it shows people the majesty and danger of "from the foot of Mount Everest to the top of Mount Everest" and "from the top of Mount Everest to Beijing, 40 meters above sea level" from a God's perspective of climbing Mount Everest.

At that time, many accounts reposted this article and all received over 100,000 views. I think this article can be regarded as a classic in new media communication.

The person who wrote this article is very talented, because this article has four elements at the same time: "smallness", "magic", "solemnity and respect", and "fear". There is a reason why it became popular.

Awe can make people feel "surprised", "unexpected" or "fearful", and actually includes two emotional systems: respect and fear.

When something inspires respect or awe in people, it successfully impresses users and promotes sharing.

2. Provide Value

Chicken soup has spiritual value.

Good inspirational articles can give readers a sense of spiritual satisfaction, such as "vanity", "social currency", "motivation" and so on.

For example, emotional chicken soup.

"It is really important to be with outstanding people", "A woman who is too soft-hearted will not have a good life", "A man's character determines the outcome of his marriage."

This kind of chicken soup does not have a definite answer, but it contains profound ideas and truths. It can give users certain inspiration on the ideological level. The greater the inspiration, the greater the benefit to users, and this kind of chicken soup is likely to become a hit article.

For example, this paragraph: We must believe that the second half of our life will not always be difficult. But you have to first learn to live a good life, learn to face things calmly, and learn to love yourself well.

For many people, they feel that the value gained at the spiritual level is far higher than other types of value, and it is an indispensable part of life.

Dry goods have material value.

High-quality articles can give people "vested interests". They are "objectively existing" things with "practical value" that people can "own" after reading them.

Be careful, this type of people may hate providing spiritual values ​​because they think spiritual values ​​are too illusory and reading chicken soup is a waste of time.

"Guide to promoting cosmetics" is a typical material value. It can provide "practical" content to everyone, so that people can know which cosmetics are good, which cosmetics are cost-effective, and which cosmetics are suitable for them after reading it.

"Career strategies" are also typical material values. This type of content is hard currency, and once mastered, it can effectively improve your survival skills in the workplace.

Contents like "academics", "strategies", "food", and "health" all have practical value. Academics are about popularizing science; strategies can improve the quality of life; food can satisfy daily needs...

To make an article into high-quality content, it is either necessary to provide pure spiritual value, or pure material value, or to add some dry goods to the chicken soup, or some chicken soup to the dry goods.

3. Save user time

1. Guides can not only provide material value, but also help users save time

For example, the cooking guide provided by Rishiji, "When you are sad, this sad jelly understands you best~" allows everyone to learn cooking skills through videos.

Users can master the recipe of a dish permanently in just a few minutes, so they naturally have reason to pay attention. If you can add a little bit of unknown secrets into this process, there is a chance of it happening.

Similar characteristics are not only reflected in WeChat hot articles, but also appear on other platforms. For example, travel guides help users save time.

Mafengwo is a travel guide website with high traffic in China. Its core product “Travel Notes” has a very good design experience. It is recommended that users who publish travel notes clearly write down: departure time, number of travel days, people involved, average cost per person, and how much money was spent on each stage.

This will make it easier for other users to refer to and learn how to make their own budget. For other users, reading guides is a very rigid requirement. In order to optimize this point, Mafengwo has launched multiple versions and is constantly updating and optimizing them.

1. Exclusive hot spots are a way to help users save time

Hot topics usually contain a lot of explosive content, which is usually exclusive. For example, "live video", "chat records", "voice records" and so on of some hot events.

The faster you follow and publish, it means you have first-hand news sources, and users must get a lot of exclusive information from you.

1. Help users filter information

Many people hope to spend the least amount of time to get the best and most content, and news intelligence is to filter out complex information.

For example, "Feng Webmaster's Home" pushes domestic and international hot news every day, allowing users to see many social news events in the shortest time.

4. Killing users’ time

I found that content and products that can kill time are more likely to be liked by users. Tik Tok videos are a typical example.

The reason why short videos can instantly attract a large number of users is mainly because the viewing cost is low, they can be watched with just a swipe, and they can also kill boring time.

1. Interesting content of short videos

For example, @天天逗事 posted "Brick movers all drive BMWs, what about you?" ”, this is a short video with purely entertaining attributes, which can make people laugh after watching it.

For example, the film directed by Papi Jiang, "Parents have grown up, become more independent, and become more and more disobedient!" 》This video can help people kill time. Papi Jiang talked about the case of helping her parents enroll in a senior citizen school, which resonated with the feeling that we were forced to attend classes when we were children.

1. Interesting content in comic format

For example, the popular "Little Monk Yichan" published "Happiness Is Where You Are", which expresses stories, opinions, etc. around life in the form of comics.

Interesting content in comic form can easily kill people’s time, and people read comics just to relax.

These entertainment videos/comics are divided into three categories:

1. Jokes (story-telling jokes, daily life between boyfriends and girlfriends)
2. Phenomenon (generally very funny, legs go weak on a glass bridge several hundred meters high)
3. Brain hole (refreshing people's imagination, a bunch of balloons take the puppy to fly into the sky)

Summarize

There are five main characteristics of popular high-quality content: awakening psychological emotions, providing spiritual value, providing material value, saving user time, and killing user time.

If your content meets the above points, it will be relatively easier to become popular.

Author: Operation Publicity Xiao Leilei

Official account: Operations Publicity Xiao Leilei