Melanie
The Monday Morning Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Esther of IPA Group, bringing premier online promotion to your business.
Esther
And Melanie of STOMP Social Media Training, who empowers business owners to manage social media and marketing for themselves. And welcome back to another episode of the Monday Morning Marketing Podcast. Today, we're joined by Anna Skip with, founder of HelloSocial.Media, and we're talking about going viral. Now, that's no mean feat. I mean, hands up, who has wanted to go viral or who's been asked by clients to go viral? Yeah. The hands are up. The hands are up. Admit it. Admit it. So Anna, explain to us how you went viral.
Anna
So back in 2019, I took a photo of some of my friends dogs at our local polling station for the general election. And that was because I run a local Instagram account for our local community. And so it was natural to have a picture of our dogs at polling stations. It had become a bit of a tradition UK-wide. And while I was doing it, someone behind me snapped the pictures. Sorry, snapped dogs, and it appeared it was someone actually from Getty. It was out in public, so that's fine. And it got into the press. That got me thinking, actually, maybe this could go beyond just our little local Instagram account. So in 2021, I got myself a bit more organized. Same scene, same polling station, a lot of the same dogs. And I made sure I was a bit more organized, put it straight on Twitter with the #DogsAtPollingStations. I ran home from the polling station and And by the time I got home, which was five minutes, it had got an awful lot likes and impressions had got to, I don't know, a thousand or something, and I was a bit taken back. I decided I was going to reply to all the comments and really practice what I preach about engagement and engaging with people who take the time to make a comment.
Then a couple of journalists got in touch. It was picked up by the press and it ended up on TV. All very exciting. So that was great. I did it again, I think it was '22 for the local elections, then earlier this year for the local elections, and then again for the general election on the fourth of July. And this time I was even more organized. I wasn't expecting it to go viral because I thought, well, it's a very similar scene. Everyone's seen that before. They'll want to move on to something new. But I tagged a few journalists, well, not really journalists, but at BBC News and so on. And again, it got picked up and I ended up talking to a BBC journalist who wrote a piece about it, and it ended up on ITV London as well. So I never expected I did of those photos on either year to go viral, but I did do those little things to help it along. But each time or both times, it was an absolute surprise. It's always a surprise. That is part of the challenge of what you do next because it's not in your routine.
Melanie
You've managed to find the nice balance of relevance, weight, and timeliness. It was a methodology that you saw work quite accidentally the first time, and you recognized it, and you set it up in motion for events coming up afterwards. How hard or how easy do you think that would be to replicate for other instances? Because we've got a very large range of businesses who are listening to us today. How would they recognize what works? If they don't recognize it, can they create it?
Anna
Yeah, so that is a really interesting question because for me, it's only happened in this one situation. I think things that have helped is certainly it was very timely. It was a big news day. It was highly relevant to the day. It was certainly the first time in 2021, people were commenting that it was a very beautiful picture, which I have to say is largely down to luck. I think a good image, along with the timeliness, is really important. I think careful tagging helps. I was a little bit resistant to tag because a couple of elections ago, I tagged my local MP, and then it went viral, and I was very conscious that she got a lot of... She got every comment coming through on her busy day as well. But this time, the BBC journalist who interviewed me started off by saying, Thank you for tagging us because we are on the look out for stories today. On election day, they're not allowed to talk about what's actually happening in the election in terms of what the outcome might be. So they are looking for a lot of space to fill. So that's why she was pleased.
So I think careful tagging to highly relevant people helps as well. But then also, if it does start to build, then what I was doing was replying to each comment in a nice friendly way. That will only help the algorithm. I did do it because I genuinely wanted to and I was getting nice comments, so it's nice to start that conversation. It It was both times, it's been a truly happy experience, and I felt like it's been a really happy part of social media. But that aside, actually responding in engaging is going to help it get put out to even more and more people. So I think people can do that and try and build that momentum as well.
Esther
Because it's interesting, you were saying there that you replied positively to every message, but was every message to you a positive one? Were they all super nice? Because elections and polling are polarizing, to say the least in any country. And even though you've got the cute dogs and we all know social media is all about dogs and cats. But how do you reply-.
Anna
That will be next.
Esther
Maybe. Cats at polling station. I did see a chicken at a polling station as well. Just randomly. Anyway, how do you reply positively to the negative comment?
Anna
This is one of my favorite aspects of what happened. I did have a few negative comments, and they were centered mostly around dog safety. I had a few people saying, really... Can I go back to what I was saying before about how to go viral?
Esther
Yeah, of course.
Anna
One thing about this, most dogs at polling station photos are of one or maybe two dogs. Naturally enough, people take their own picture of their own dog, and this one was a group. I think the other thing is to see if you can find a slightly different angle to what other people are doing in whatever your industry, whatever the day is about. The fact it was a group of dogs, I had a few people commenting Well, two things, really. One was people are being irresponsible, leaving their dogs outside the polling station. With that, I went back to them. There is a problem with dog theft. We all know that. Actually, back in '21, around where I live, it was probably bigger than it is now. I went back I explained, look, all the owners actually were there. They're just out of shot. Those dogs weren't abandoned at the front of the polling station, and I was there taking the photograph as well.
Esther
Yeah.
Anna
So the nice thing was, I probably half those... There weren't many, maybe 10 out of a few hundred comments. But the nice thing was probably half those people came back and commented again and said, oh, thank you so much for explaining.
Esther
So that helped the boosting of the post and the reach because there was more-.
Anna
Yeah, it did. Yeah, absolutely. The other comment I got, I think once actually in '21 was, Isn't it stressful for the dogs to all be together? There I could go back and honestly say, actually, those dogs all know each other. Also, the whole thing took about four minutes. Again, I got people coming back and saying, Thank you for explaining. Yes, that's good for the algorithm. It's good engagement. I wanted to balance. I didn't want to ignore the negatives because that would come across as maybe only wanting to talk to the positive people and ignoring the negative comments. But we can get philosophical about this, but it showed me actually we all need to just talk to each other a bit more and explain our points of view. Because I explained reasonably what the situation was, people were like, Oh, okay, I get it. Great. Thanks for letting me know.
Melanie
Okay.
Anna
So another good side of social media.
Melanie
Now we've understood how you've managed to go viral and you've explained how you managed to manipulate the algorithm in your favour and in their favour as well. Interestingly enough, that hashtag that you mentioned is also a name of a handle online as well. Somebody's obviously found it very relevant and has created a handle on X for it as well. To the listeners, which is pretty global, how would you recommend people make an advantage out of doing this? They've actually been very successful? Can they monetize it? Can they build recognition or authority? How do you make the most out of this opportunity?
Anna
On the day itself, you need to decide Whether you want to make... On the day itself, in terms of people using your photo, do you want to sell it and make money, or do you want them simply to put in your handle to credit you for the photo. I never even considered making money from it. Partly, I'm not a photographer. It's not my business. Social media training is my business. But also I felt it was very much a community thing. Originally, I'd done it for my local community for that Instagram account. Also, probably about 10 of my friends were involved and their dogs. So I wanted to keep it just as a nice thing that's happened that we can all look back on and little 15 minutes of pain thing. So I made that decision. But what is really important is that people do credit you because if you are suddenly on the BBC or anywhere, even on someone else's account, it's very, very important that that is seen as your asset. I mean, it is your asset. So that's one thing, the credit, because that's good for your visibility and it's copyright law anyway.
I don't know the ins and outs of copyright law, but it's very, very important. Actually also really important to follow it up if it's not done, even by the really big guys. Don't be daunted by that because you're not actually dealing with the big BBC, you're dealing with a staff member of the BBC, if they don't credit you. I should hasten to add the BBC did. Just using that as an example. But there were, and I'm not going to name names, but there were in 2021, there were a couple of publications and one business that used the photo and didn't credit properly, which was quite a surprise to me, and I did go back.
Melanie
Can you do anything about it if they do that?
Anna
Well, so I went back to them and asked them to credit me properly.
Melanie
How did you hear of it? Because if you weren't tagged, how did you hear of it?
Anna
I had lots of my friends were eyes and ears all over the internet because I didn't ask them to, but they were all very excited about it. I came across it with the hashtag as well.
Melanie
Of course.
Anna
By using the hashtag, I could come across it. Who knows? There may be ones that I missed, but credit I think that's really important. That's on the day. Beyond that, and what I didn't really do in 2021, although I told myself I should, I didn't contact anyone about maybe doing a bit of a story about it. Why didn't I do that? I think it was a bit of lack of confidence and Back then, I saw it was very much, well, two days later, it's old news. This time, I've thought of themes that can come out of it that actually are more, what's the word green?
Esther
Evergreen.
Anna
Evergreen. Thank you. Exactly. Things we can all talk about. You can write a blog about it, you can maybe be invited onto a podcast. Talk about it. So thank you very much. What I haven't done this time, that maybe I should have done, I could maybe talk to local press because it is a local story, and I'd like to keep it as a local story as well. It really depends what the subject matter is and what the story around it is as well. And whether you can leverage that to maybe tell a bit more about your own story.
Melanie
It's fairly easy to repurpose in that respect then. It sounds like you're talking about it, you're going on podcasts, you're going on possibly on radio, maybe on the local news, in the local paper. It is something that you can cluster your marketing with. Let's say somebody says, I really want this. We'll credit you. Can you also ask for money for that image?
Anna
I could ask for money for it. Whether anyone would pay or not, I don't know. I haven't gone down that route. But certainly, if you're your own boss making your own decisions, then I don't see why you couldn't ask for money. But if you did that, I would suggest having some idea of what a reasonable price tag would be. But again, I haven't gone down that route, so I wouldn't know whether, if I did, whether I should be asking for 50 quid or 500 or more. Who knows?
Esther
I mean, the dogs need fed, so I mean, I would base it on that amount. Now, you said at the start, so from 2019, you had nothing in place for what would happen if it did go viral, and then come 2021, then you had more measures. And you mentioned about tagging people and things, but what other things can people have ready if you get contacted by the press or the newspaper or What should we have to hand as business owners when people ask us for more information?
Anna
That's a very good question, and it's actually stuff we should have anyway. So things like making sure your profile, certainly, if the photo or the video is on X or Instagram, those profiles need to be absolutely up to date. And you should be doing that anyway. So this is just a good reminder. Also good to have just a very short 50-word bio ready. Good to have a headshot ready. Again, these are things that ideally you would have anyway. So this time I was approached by a agency, and they wanted a headshot of me with my dog, and actually I didn't have a great one, so we quickly had to cobble something together at home. So you're not always going to be 100% prepared. But yeah, I would say headshot, quick bio, make sure your profiles are up to date. And also in terms of the crediting, be really clear in your mind where you want to be credited. Is it your X account? Is it your Instagram? Naturally, I'd say it's wherever this photo or video is presented.
Melanie
How about you explain how people can learn more about yourself, Anna, and about HelloSocial? And do you have some download or some useful information that people can get from you that would help them with their going viral in the future?
Anna
So, well, my website is hellosocial.media. My Instagram account, which is where I hang out the most in terms of social media, is also @Hellosocial.media. Or I'm going to skip with on LinkedIn and on X, I'm @hellosocialLdn at the end for London. I do have a blog on my website about going viral. And sometime during the summer, so summer 2024, I'll be writing an update to that because I've had further thoughts about this whole thing that we've discussed today. But most of what I do is social media and some digital marketing training. So I offer that to freelancers and small businesses.
Melanie
I feel your passion.
Anna
And I love what I do. I love what I do. It's great.
Melanie
It's the best job in the world.
Anna
What I'm not going to launch is a course on how to go viral in three easy steps.
Melanie
Yeah, seriously. It's the hardest thing to do, isn't it? When a client says to you, I want to go viral, you're like, Oh, God, really?
Anna
You know then it's not going to happen. But if anyone wanted to talk about, Well, look, this situation is coming up, and I think actually I've got a good chance, I'd be very happy to talk to them about how to get your ducks in a row.
Melanie
Or dogs.
Anna
Or your dogs in a row. I can't teach you how to get some dogs in a row. Maybe that's the next challenge. They're more of a bunch. But yeah, I'd be very happy to help people-.
Melanie
Wicked.
Anna
Get sorted.
Melanie
Okay, well, thank you so much for coming on today, Anna. We really appreciate your wisdom, experience. For those of you that are listening who want to go viral, obviously, contact Anna. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.
Anna
I need to go and buy a magic wand first.
Melanie
Thank you so much again. We're going to be back next week with another podcast, but you know where to find us. You'll find us on all of our socials. You can visit our website, you can listen to all four and a half years of our podcasts and listen to our award-winning podcast. Tell your friends, tell your family, tell your boss. There's still lots to learn. We'll be back very soon. Bye for now.
Esther
Bye.
Anna
Bye. Thank you very much for having me on.
Melanie
So, going viral, Esther.
Esther
Oh, it's the easiest thing in the world, Melanie, don't you know?
Melanie
I think we should say Oh, no, no, no, not at all.
