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From cute animal videos to memes, there is no way of knowing what is or isn’t going to go viral. However, certain insights can be helpful in strategizing how to best position content to go viral. Recent social media trends indicate that appealing to positive emotions is key to driving user engagement. Seeking to invoke joy, make people laugh and even inspire awe, viral content offers original and interesting ideas and perspectives that connect with online users on a more human level.

With all of this in mind, I evaluated my following on Twitter in order to gain insight into the type of content my followers frequently share, retweet or “heart.” Recognizing that the overwhelming majority of my Twitter followers are family, friends and acquaintances, I began to understand why the tweets reflecting my genuine voice tend to be the ones that boast the highest level of interaction.

Once the intended audience has been identified, user-generated content can then be promoted with approaches tailored to the specific social media channel. For example, on a platform such as Twitter that limits users to 140 characters, it becomes more important than ever to make sure that each and every letter and space counts. With around 500 million tweets sent per day, it is no wonder why it can be so difficult to break through all of the noise.

With Thanksgiving around the corner, most college students are eagerly waiting to head home to see their family for the holiday break. In all the excitement and anticipation, it is the perfect time to play on those feelings of longing to be back home with those you love. Considering there is a huge opportunity to amplify the messages to spread within the Syracuse University community as well as beyond as a result of relevant hashtags. In one way or another, everyone has their own unique relationship with members of their family and can find ways to connect with content that encourages them to share their own moments of family fun via their own social platforms. Employing tactics such as creating calls to action inspire response from engaged followers. In meme-style fashion, the image I created highlights family members of varying ages all discovering similar talents, skills, interests and passions. To all my followers, it should not come as a shock to see the photo, but it would surely be welcomed as a funny surprise.

In addition, there are several other minor things I plan to do in order to reach my goals of attaining at least 30 retweets or “hearts” on Twitter and at least 30 pins or favorites on Pinterest. For example, by tagging the other two people in the picture—Jeri Gelb (@jerigelb) & Jamie Gelb (@JGelb0114)—in photos and tweets shared on Twitter throughout the duration of the social media campaign, I expect that they will actively engage with the content by retweeting and sharing with their followers, thus amplifying reach.

Ultimately, my aim is to encourage people to reflect on their relationships with loved ones as well as to share the content in order to spread the message of good ole fashioned family fun.