5 Takeaways from Studying Articles that Went Viral on Popular Blogs

Last year, Twitter announced that they were going to shut down the API that allowed users to display Twitter share counts on their website. Before that happened, I decided to scrape social share counts from some of the most well known blogs that used content marketing to successfully grow their businesses.

I then sorted the data and took a close look at some of the articles that went viral on these blogs. Some blogs have articles that got shared over 10,000 times.

In this article, I take a closer look at some of the most shared articles on these blogs and what we can learn from their success.

1. Many popular blogs still underestimate the importance of visual content

Most people know that adding visuals to your content can help increase social sharing, especially with the growing popularity of visual social media channels like Pinterest and Instagram. An article by Buffer indicates that content with images get 150% more re-tweets and receive 94% more views on average.

Many recipe and craft bloggers would say that visuals are required for success in these niches. However, bloggers in other non-visual niches don’t invest in visual content as much. Many people think that sites like Pinterest only work for things like recipes, clothes and crafts.

But Pinterest has amassed an enormous following and has even succeeded in growing its male user base. Creating visual content requires resources and can add complexity to the content creation process. But is it worth it for non-visual niches like business and marketing blogs?

Let’s look at a few examples…

– Content Marketing Institute has become a popular blog to keep up with the latest in content marketing. They’ve talked about the positive effect that visuals have on content, but at this time, they don’t use visuals on all of their blog posts.

In fact, they don’t even link to their Pinterest account on the social media sidebar on their site. Nor do they have a Pinterest share button on their articles.

The most shared blog post on their site, entitled 21 Types of Content We Crave, has over 40,000 social shares, most of them from Pinterest. This article got shared 4x more than even the second most popular article. The article was written by a guest author in 2012 who included a simple infographic in the post.

– Boost Blog Traffic is a thought leader in the blogging niche. They post an article once a week about how to become a more successful blogger. Boost Blog Traffic does include a stock image at the top of every post, but doesn’t usually use visual headers or infographics. And like many other blogs in the blogging niche, Pinterest is not a focus.

However, the most shared article on their blog has over 17,000 shares and 12,000 of those shares are from Pinterest:

317 Power Words that Will Instantly Make You a Better Writer

– Kissmetrics is an analytics SAAS company that has done well with their content marketing and has invested in infographic creation.

The most shared post on their blog a very short article with an infographic that explains how color choices affect people’s perceptions of your brand and website. This article has over 45,000 Pinterest shares:

The Art of Color Coordination

Visual content does take more time and resources to create. But if you want your content to go viral, then you might want to consider investing in visuals.

2. Broadly targeted articles can get shared a lot

One common piece of advice for blogging and content marketing is to target a specific niche with your content. Targeted content can help you attract the right prospects to your website who may eventually convert into sales.

However, a more broadly targeted article can potentially reach many more people and be great for branding.

Buffer is well known for their content marketing and a lot of their content is about social media marketing, since the tool they are selling is a social media management tool. However, some of the most shared articles on their blog come from more broadly targeted ideas.

The table below shows 5 of their most popular posts and the total social shares from Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Google Plus.

The first article is about music and received over 67,000 total social shares to date. The second article on the table is about Facebook and the psychology of colors in marketing. While the topic is related to marketing, it is also interesting enough that non-marketers might find it interesting and share it.

Writing broadly targeted content with viral potential or tying your content into other popular topics might be worth considering if you want to increase the reach of your content marketing.

3. Don’t underestimate the popularity of list posts

Most content marketing blogs are stressing the importance of focusing on quality when creating content. As a result, a lot of blogs are moving away from creating list posts.

List posts are easy to create and many people often view list posts as less authoritative than case studies or data driven content. However, many readers find a well written list post to be valuable and list posts can still accumulate plenty of social media shares.

Post Planner is a Facebook marketing tool and they have done well with their content marketing. Several of their most shared posts follow the list post format. The table below shows the most popular post from their blog and the number of total social shares received.

A lot of content marketers don’t view list posts as the most authoritative type of content, but they are still popular and should be considered for inclusion in your content mix.

4. LinkedIn is sometimes overlooked as a content promotion channel

LinkedIn is typically thought of as a place for networking with other business professionals, but a lot of people do share content on LinkedIn as well. However, many blogs still don’t include a LinkedIn share button on their articles.

Hubspot is one blog that does include a LinkedIn share button and its most shared posts show the importance of LinkedIn. As you can see, LinkedIn makes up approximately 25% of the social shares in the top 5 posts.

So why doesn’t everyone include LinkedIn sharing buttons on the blog articles?

Some people have done A/B testing and found that reducing the number of social sharing buttons increases social sharing. For example, Neil Patel mentioned that when increased social sharing buttons from 3 to 5, social sharing declined by 29%.

As a result of studies like these, some blogs have decided to only include Facebook and Twitter sharing buttons. But it’s important to note that Neil’s blog received most social shares from Twitter and Facebook, so in his case it made sense to omit other social sharing buttons.

So should LinkedIn be a part of your content marketing strategy? The answer is that you need to test it for your own blog because people do share content on LinkedIn.

5. Expert roundups can be effective

Expert roundups are articles that include insights and quotes from multiple influencers. One of the reasons that they work well is that sometimes the influencers will share the blog post with their audience on social media.

A lot of marketers don’t use expert roundups. A few reasons are:

– It involves a lot of work because you have to reach out to and co-ordinate with other influencers.

– Some people might be afraid of bugging other busy influencers.

– Many online marketers view expert roundups negatively. While expert roundups can be effective, there are also a lot of really bad roundups out there created by new bloggers who haven’t put much thought into asking meaningful questions or weren’t promoted effectively. (And yes, you should still put the work into promoting an expert roundup even if other influences are sharing it for you.)

Social Media Examiner is one of the largest and most successful blogs about social media and they regularly get thousands of social shares on each blog post they publish. They already have a really large built in audience but still use expert roundups to expand their reach even further.

The table below shows the most shared blog posts on Social Media Examiner and the total social share counts from Twitter, Facebook, Google Plus, LinkedIn and Pinterest. Three of the top 5 posts are expert roundups with over 10,000 total social shares.

So while expert roundups do require a good bit of work to organize, they can still be effective and should be consider for inclusion in your content mix.

To Sum It Up

Taking the time to study other successful businesses is a good place to start looking for ideas to improve your own results. Here are the key lessons from this study:

1. Visuals can increase reach significantly and potential allow content to go viral on social media. Pinterest has grown large enough that you should consider it as a social media marketing channel, even if you aren’t in niches like food, clothes or women’s interests.

2. Consider writing some broadly targeted articles if you want to grow your brand recognition or expand your reach, especially if you can think of a topic that has the potential to get shared a lot. While such articles might not convert visitors into customers as well as niche targeted articles, they could still provide a better ROI if they go viral and reach enough people.

3. Although list posts aren’t seen as the most authoritative type of content, they still get shared a lot and drive traffic. Consider incorporating list posts into your content mix.

4. Consider LinkedIn as a possible marketing channel. Some people view LinkedIn as only a place to network with others, but people also do share content on LinkedIn.

5. Expert roundups can work really well when it comes to increasing your presence through social media. While they do involve more work, even an established blog like Social Media Examiner uses them to increase the social reach of their content.

So what do you think? Are you implementing the above tactics in your content marketing?