If you have ever created a piece of content that enjoyed many times more hits than the rest of your output, you may have noticed something: after the initial popularity spike, it takes about three to five days for the hubbub to die down.
If this chimes with your experience, then you may want to read this post by Medium, which explores the issue further. According to the post, vitality lasts four days, and the post has plenty of graphs to back up what the site has witnessed with its own content.
Medium’s Mike Sall picks up the point:
The high-traffic stories are propelled beyond an author’s personal network. This often involves significant sharing on Medium, Facebook, and Twitter, popularity on forums like Reddit, and good old-fashioned word-of-mouth via email and chat. But none of this is instant. It takes about a day, and these stories end up peaking the day after they are first published.
But by high-traffic stories, Sall isn’t referring to virality. As he says, viral stories are different still:
The viral stories go even farther… They get picked up by other publications, lead to new communities, and generally take on a life of their own (in the case of Dinovember, a book of its own). And while they still see initial spikes like any other story, all of this takes a few days — roughly, 4 days.
So if you are surprised by the unexpected popularity of a post you have created, don’t be surprised if your audience numbers dip back to normal again within a working week.
Of course, no one can guarantee that your content will go viral, but here are some tips to help your chances:
Consider your format carefully
Whether you are writing an A-Z, creating an infographic or filming a head-to-head debate, consider the best way of presenting your content. Reams of prose aren’t to everyone’s taste, and may not be particularly readable on some types of smartphone.
Create share-worthy content
This means investing time in what you create, and in some cases hiring the right content creator to help you. The aim is to create content that is original, thought-provoking and valuable to your readership. Or to create a gallery of cats.
Share in as many places as you can
The obvious places for sharing content include Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. But you can do better than that. Forums and message boards offer a great platform for sharing content, and will most likely offer you a platform for a community interest, such as a forum on fly fishing.
Don’t forget the social buttons
Those buttons on blogs and web pages are there for a reason. Make them visible so that viewers can easily click on them and share to the likes of Reddit, Twitter, Facebook and Google+.
Good luck!
