If you’re one of the thousands of webs-savvy business owners executing a marketing campaign online, you’ve probably set up a business blog to support your website.  A business blog that is an extension of your corporation or company gives visitors an ‘insider’s’ perspective on the latest news, events and company culture.  It’s your chance to share what your company is about in a casual way; however, your business blog can also be used as a powerful marketing tool when you update it with viral content.

What is Viral Content?

Viral content is any type of online media – articles, videos, podcasts – that attracts a large audience in a very short period of time because it is a hot topic at the time, especially creative and/or provides something valuable to the reader that can’t be found anywhere else (easily) on the web.

Many ad agencies and PR firms execute viral campaigns to generate a lot of traffic to a website or product page, and anything especially creative or unique is often bookmarked, shared and promoted between readers.   Viral content is designed to share a certain message as fast as possible; the chances of reaching ‘critical mass’ with your particular piece largely depends on the type of content you promote, the topic, and how well your piece is optimized for the search engines.

Viral Content and Your Business Blog

If you are running a website with a blog designed with Wordpress or Google Blogger, your chances of getting indexed on the search engines quickly are typically higher than if you were using other platforms.  When you’re focused on creating viral content, make sure you are using templates and designs that enable Web 2.0 social bookmarking features such as ‘Add to Twitter’ and other ‘Share’ functions.  This gives every reader a chance to share the information much more easily, and increases the chances that your content will actually be turned into a viral piece.

Creating Viral Content for Business Blogs

Since the business blog may be used as a news outlet, you’ll need to rewrite company press releases, keep up wit the latest industry news, and provide new insights and comments from different departments. 

One of the best way to present this information on your blog is to write a solid headline.  Headlines are critical for attracting the reader’s attention, so you need to develop compelling headlines regardless of the topic you are writing about.  The ‘most clickable’ headlines are those that promise a specific result; for example, 9 SEO Tips from our Marketing Specialist, or 7 Effective Ways to Generate Sales from Your PPC Campaign tell the reader exactly what they can expect from reading the article. 

Be as specific as possible, and focus on writing, long, descriptive lists about your topic.  Bullet points, numbered lists and well-organized sections are the best ways to keep readers interested; most of your online audience will enjoy a quick ‘rundown’ of essentials for any ‘how-to’ topic you might want to share.

Other essentials for viral content:

• Choose buzz-worthy topics and use keywords throughout your article
• Include links to your company’s projects or other parts of your website
• Promote your own links on Twitter
• Review keyword data that is currently driving traffic to your site to find out what people in your industry are searching for
• Provide value for the reader: focus on the  ‘takeaways’