Making My Dog Go Viral

Marketing Plan Objectives

  • At least 1000 views on imgur
  • Gain 10 followers on Twitter
  • Gain 15 followers on Instagram
  • Twitter Impressions up by 15 %
  • At least 5 website clicks via my Instagram bio

Outcomes/Analysis

As my final engagement number, I received 800+ views on Imgur. While I didn’t reach my total goal, I set my goal high on purpose, so that I would strive to reach a number I would be happy with. The number wasn’t 1000, but I am pleased with the results.

I gained 5 followers on twitter.

I gained my goal of  15 followers on Instagram. Posting stories about my meme seemed to generate traffic to both my meme and my Instagram page itself.

I learned that tracking impressions wouldn’t allow me to get as accurate a comparison on twitter analytics. However I was able to compare engagement rates and link clicks. The week before my engagement rate was 0.3% and I received 0 link clicks. The week I posted my web card, I had an engagement rate of 6.6% and 201 link clicks. The following week my engagement rate was 3.2% and I had 1 link click. Clearly my promoted tweet increased engagement on my page and contributed to my views on imgur.

I finally received exactly 5 link clicks on my Instagram page as a result of my promotion in my Instagram stories.

 

All this was set in motion by a dog in a hat:

 

Girls who watch sports >>>

 

This sweet, perfect dog was shared with the masses with the help of a twitter web card:

The web card was promoted using a budget of $5:

Web Card Spend

My web card, as mentioned, generated over 200 link clicks. This doesn’t account for the majority of my views but it is a substantial number, especially given the relatively small budget and the two-day time span during which it was promoted. I promoted to the “dog twitter” community, and also to a “college humor” type community which I think benefitted my post because it appealed to two specific audiences, but two audiences that are different from each other.

While the twitter web card did drive some traffic to my meme on imgur, for the most part, I believe it received the most engagement from the imgur community itself. This I think is in part because of the tags on imgur. However,  I’d like to believe that the quality of my content helped generate views. I believe it had the right combination of relatability and “cute dog” that the internet seems to call for.

The meme that I finally used for the assignment is different from the meme that I initially submitted. This ended up being the biggest key to my success in generating engagement. At first, I stubbornly thought my original meme would work, but I’m now glad that I changed it. Out of curiosity I posted my original meme on imgur to see how it would stack up, and in the same amount of time it only received around 300 views. This seems to pale in comparison to my final meme which received 0ver 800 views. However, even 800 views isn’t truly “viral.” This taught me two valuable lessons:

  1. Not everything I come up with is comedy gold, and
  2. It’s very, very hard to go viral.

 

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