Viral Stacking To Get 35M Views in 10 Seconds

Viral Stacking To Get 35M Views in 10 Seconds

@sproutworld official is an E-commerce brand that solely sells its items on Amazon. The traffic from TikTok is used to fuel purchases from their store, but also increase their ranking on Amazon so that amazon’s own product recommendation/ search algorithm pushes their items to even more people, a genius way to use organic TikTok traffic to kick off an almost automatic marketing strategy. Their highest-performing video reached 35M people, but first, let’s address some changes happening with The TikTok Lab, now known as The Short-Form Lab.

I have changed the name to “The Short Form Lab” because future letters will dig deep into how virality works on other platforms providing you with cross-platform short-form fluency. I want you to walk away from this newsletter knowing how to make viral short videos on any platform, not just TikTok.

Another change my emails will now be sent Bi-weekly instead of weekly. Many of you have inquired about my consulting and short-form video creation services so sending weekly letters is no longer sustainable with my present workload.

All right, that's it for the updates. Thanks for being here, now let’s understand this brand’s viral video!

Video Stats (video here):

4.3M likes, 35M Views, 12.5K comments, 98.5K shares 287.1K saves 10 seconds long

Standout Video elements that made each video viral:

Video 1:

• 2 frames in 1 second

• Trending Audio

• Text on screen that is TikTok Native “POV:”, and the text communicates an odd idea of planting a pencil

• Showing the process of planting a pencil in a fast and simple way

• Not showing the end (the plant grown from the pencil)

• Shareable content, that targets a passionate group of people “Environmentalists”. to whom the sharer can provide value/ increase status by sharing.

Digging Deeper On What Made The Video POP!:

The opening frame of the video includes text that says “POV: It’s finally time to plant your pencil”, this text communicates an abnormal idea that captures the attention of the viewer and stops their scroll. Another thing this particular sentence does well is that it starts a story and gives the viewer an outcome to anticipate at the end of the video (The pencil growing into a plant), although the plant turning into a pencil is a frame that never happens, instead the video ends with the pencil in the pot and text on the screen that says “Waiting for it to sprout”. This means that many viewers most likely watched the video all the way until the end and didn’t even realize the video had ended which held on to their attention until the video replayed, creating a video loop and a high retention rate. We should also note that almost anyone would be interested in seeing a pencil turn into a plant, so the audience for this video was huge aswell, the watch time retention was most likely phenomenal for anyone who came across the video so TikTok spread it to everyone like wildfire!

We should also note that the product itself is a “Viral Product” and this brought in a large portion of its views. If it was a normal eco-friendly wooden pencil that didn’t turn into a sunflower, or provide an experience, the video would need some other elements to draw people in, but the concept of this pencil is polarizing and provides a unique experience not showcased often.

Lastly, this video allows the viewer a to share a video that provides a positive emotion ( or “Emotional Affiliation Alturisim”) and incorporates a possible passionate interest of the viewer, “Environmentalism”. People who care about the environment usually hold this as a really strong value and surround themselves with others who think similarly. Therefore being able to share this interesting product with those around them allows for an experience of connection between them and their friends, but an increase of status for passing on the positive emotion that they felt while watching the video to be passed to their friends. I learned about the concept of “Emotional Affiliation Altruism” from this study but I adapted the idea to this video. In the study they asked people why they share online ads, here are some of the reasons that were listed “I would share this ad in order to share the positive emotions I experienced while viewing the ad,” “I would share this ad to talk about a common interest I have with my friends,” “I would share this ad to recommend the brand,” “I want to be the first to tell my friends about this ad.” It’s a great study I recommend reading it and aiming your videos to incorporate one of these reasons for people to share your content!

Overall:

There are many reasons why people share online content, but make sure to focus on at least one shareability factor being highly present in your video as Sprout did, be clear, to the point, simple, and fast in your video delivery, and don’t be afraid to leave some things to the imagination, cut your story off before the viewer gets what they want and try to get that loop in!

Thank you for reading, happy to be back :)!

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