99% of People FAIL To Go Viral Because Of This.

I spent the last 20 years decoding one thing, and that is how to make content go viral. I've built systems that have generated over 60 billion views, grown audiences past 100 million followers, and driven more than $1 billion revenue. But here's the thing. 99% of people fail to go viral not because they're lazy, not because they don't care, but because they don't know the three things that I'm about to show you. Number one is thinking that watching a lot of content equates to to creating great content. So today, we have to make a massive mindset shift. We are all professionals at consuming content. We consume content on a daily basis. But now we need to make that shift to not just passively consuming that content, but to start looking and watching content with a professional creator's mindset, a professional creator's eye. So, for example, I eat at Chipotle every day. I eat at Chipotle so much that that the minute I set foot in the store that I go to every day, the staff starts making my order. Even if there's other people in front of me in line, they just start making it because they know exactly what I want because I eat the same thing every day. Now, just because I eat Chipotle every day does not mean I know how to make it. I don't know the right temperatures, the right spices, the right ingredients. Social media works the exact same same way. People are consuming, but they don't know the recipe for success. And great content is like a great dish. It follows a proven recipe. So number two is understanding formats. So what do I mean by a format? So a format is a very well researched, repeatable structure that you can insert your message or brand into it to have proven, repeatable success. So think of it almost as a blueprint that you find by consuming content that has demonstrated success over and over again. Now, when we look at formats together today, I want you to pay attention to more the context, the structure, and less the content. Because the content can always be swapped out with something else. So what is the difference between a format and a trend? Because I know a lot of you have probably heard follow trends, use trends, or even seen those annoying videos. If you use this trending song, you will go viral, when in reality, 99% of the people that try that don't go viral. So the big difference between a trend and a format is trends are fleeting versus a format. Leverages storytelling, and stories are not. So let's think about this analogy. We are going to learn a musical Instrument. And there's two directions we can take. We can, we can take the trend route or the format route. Now, the trend route would say week one, we're going to start with the piano. But then week two, we're going to switch to an entirely new instrument, the drums. And then week three, it's going to be the guitar. And then week four, it's going to be the flute. We're constantly shifting directions so we're not likely to master any single instrument versus the storytelling and format route is we would pick one, let's say it's the guitar. And we would spend six, six months mastering every nuance that it takes in terms of playing the guitar. Now at Hook Point, Mike, the company that I founded them CEO of, we have proved this all out because We've done over 10,000 hours of research into what and why things go viral. And through that research, we've analyzed over 300 storytelling formats. And we see time and time again that formats are the key to consistent success versus trends. They're just completely fleeting and they're just going to lead you to a dead end. So now let's dive into some examples of formats. I'm going to show you three different examples of formats and again, I want you to keep in mind a few things. Number one, these aren't meant to be suggestions. They are just examples. Again, at Hook Point, We've analyzed over 300 of these storytelling formats. In addition, as we look at these formats together, again, don't pay attention to the content, but more the context. Because any one of these formats you could plug in any type of subject matter and it would still work. So let's start with Alex Dunplesky, a good friend of mine and a client of ours at Hook Point, using what's called the man on the street format. And it's pretty self explanatory. You approach a random stranger on the street and you engage with them in some way and the story unfolds. So let's watch Alex, who's a photographer, use this format. So this video has 92 million views and Alex has used this format to accumulate over 20 million followers across his social media channels. So just to prove the point further, we've done research on over 10 variations of the man on the street format. So there is an account called School of Hard Nut.

They tell you need 20 to 50 grand to get started. That's just find a way to save fifty to a hundred dollars a week starting out. Let compounding do the rest. And number two, you have to change your Mindset, when you get money, rather than thinking about what can I buy, think about how can I invest it. And number three, swap out three. Time sucks. You know what they are, and use that time to learn two new skill sets. If you do this for three to six months, you can easily add two more income streams and you'll be on your way. Okay, all right, so we have the plan. Let's go.

So again, Robert Croak, beautifully using the walking listicles format, built an audience of 1.8 million people across his social media channels. Again, these are just three examples of formats. There are hundreds out there, but hopefully now you can start seeding your idea of like looking out for these formats as you are now shifting that mindset, that just consuming content, to that of an expert content creator. So before moving on to number three and the number one reason people fail to go viral, I want to point something out and that is really about breaking the mold. Because when a lot of clients come to us, they are typically looking for an apples to apples comparison of a format or content that has proven successful. So typically what they're doing is they're looking at their direct competition, they for answers and clues on what to do. Now, the challenge with that is 99.9% of the time, your competition is not killing it with social media. They're probably falling into the same traps and making the same exact mistakes as you. So as you start searching for your formats, keep an open mind. Look at other content creators in other industries. So, for example, if you're a business coach or you are a nutritionist, look at other experts, maybe look at financial experts, maybe look at a meditation guru or a meditation app or something along those lines. Because again, the context is more important than the content. As we have just seen him talk through, you can apply other content creators, other businesses and other niches to and using that same format to your specific message, to your specific content. But if you're looking for that direct apples to apples comparison of a format, typically you are going to struggle to find something that is going to drive the results that you have. So I really want you to make another mindset shift to really look at the larger ecosystem of what is happening on social media and how you can take those learnings and apply it to your specific brand. So. So there is a massive misconception and you may be actually thinking this right now. Brendan, this concept of a format sounds cool, but it sounds really restrictive. I think it's going to restrict my ability to be creative because I want to be original. And I want to be authentic. So in reality, formats unlock creativity. Now, I learned this when I started my career in the film industry helping movie studios build the first ever social media campaigns. Now, if we think about any movie that's been made over the past hundred years, almost all of them follow the same format, the same structure. Movies are very formulaic. Now, if we think about one of the best storytellers, the best directors in the world, Steven Spielberg, and we look at his movies, he's made movies like E.T. and then a movie about Abraham Lincoln. He makes a movie about eating a man eating shark in Jaws and then he makes Indiana Jones. They couldn't feel distinctly different from the story that's being told. However, they are following the same format, they are following the same structure. He's using the three act structure to tell those stories. But when we sit down, we're not thinking, oh man, Steven, that guy's using the 3x structure again, I'm going to be bored. No, you're immersed in the creativity that he is using to master that formula to tell the story, the creative story that he wants to convey to audiences. Now, the exact same thing applies to social media. Again, the format. We just walked through three examples. A format gives you the structure to deliver your unique message, while the context within that format gives you the creative freedom to truly make it your own. So the idea here is we don't want to reinvent the wheel, we want to innovate within it. So master the nuances within a format, like a director like Steven Spielberg, who leverages this structure to hone in his creativity and tell amazingly transformative stories. Now, you may be asking, well, Brendan, how do I actually find a format? So at my company, Hook Point, we developed the Hook Point Format Finder. So the key here is to not find one viral video, but identify repeatable success. So we want to see when this viral video comes up in our feed, did this same creator use that same format structure five to ten times successfully? Then we want to ask ourselves, is there a true clear structure that is driving this success? And does the storytelling, pacing or editing that they're using follow a repeatable pattern? So I want to actually show you this in action. So we're going to do a little bit of a walkthrough exercise here and let me pull this up on my screen. So we're going to actually do this together. So we've got nine videos here and they are all dog videos. So I'm going to start with like the easiest thing possible, which is cute dog Videos. Now, most people think all cute dog videos go viral, but in reality they don't because they don't all follow formats. So we have nine here and we're going to try and see if one of these have a repeatable pattern. So I'm going to choose this one because it has over 5.1 million likes. Now that. That's a lot of likes on a video. So what we're going to do is we're going to watch this video and then I want you to jot down on a piece of paper, think through. Do you believe that this is a repeatable storytelling format? Wanted to give you a quick update. Kai is a big humper. He's overstimulated, literally humping everyone and a lot of so pretty cute and funny story. So how would we do this? So we see this video come into our feed, that's 5.1 million likes, a ton of engagement. So the next step we would do is we would click on the icon of the person that created this video. And now what we would do is look at the other videos that look similar to see if there's repeatable success. So in this we've got another one with 18,000 views. The first video did 25 million views. That is a crazy number. But the second one, only 18,000 views. The third one 4,500, and that fourth one, 2,000. So as cute and funny as that video was, it's just a one off viral success. And this content creator only has 7,000 followers. So it's not an example of a repeatable storytelling format. So let's go back to those nine and this time I'm going to choose this video. Now, it's got less likes as 1.2 million, but you know, let's see if it is. So again, we pull up the video, we watch it, and then we're going to click the profile icon of the creator. So we just watched the video. So jot down if you need to pause and think about it. But do you think that this video is a repeatable format? So again we watch that video, we're going to click the profile icon and go to the profile. So this is pretty insane. So I see another video with 99 million views, 54 million views, 28 million, 82 million, 39 million. I mean, that's a ton of views. This is definitely a repeatable format. And this account has over 2.6 million followers. So the lesson that we can take away here is that not every viral video is a format and not every account is A reliable reference. So this is where a lot of people make a mistake, is they see one viral video and then they think, well, that is a repeatable format. I am going to try that. When in reality it turns out to be a trend and not something that has proven to have success time and time again. So now how do we actually choose the right format for you? So obviously you're not going to do the dog video format unless you're selling pet products or things of that nature. And maybe one of the three examples of are not the right fit for you. And that's okay. So there's two specific key questions that I want you to ask yourself. So if you don't press pause, get a piece of paper and a pen to write these down, because it's really important. The first question is what are the resources that you have available to you? Because I don't want you to extend beyond your resources. If you remember when we watched Mark Tilbury, he's literally holding up his, his, his own phone and walking around the block. If you don't have a big team, if you don't have fancy cameras or equipment, we'll start with a format that matches the resources you have. If you don't have people working under you, then again, take that into consideration when you're choosing a format. Next, how much time do you have available to execute on content? Because that will dictate the format to use. It'll dictate. Am I going to go after short form or long form content? Now the second question which is critically important is what excites you? Because enjoyment fuels consistency. I want you to pick a format that you absolutely love. Again, We've analyzed over 300 formats. There are so many to choose from. And that's why I said the ones that I was showing you are just examples and not necessarily suggestions. So make sure that as you're doing the research, as you're looking for your format, think is this something that I would enjoy doing over the long term, the long run? So number three, and the most important, this is why 99% of people fail. They skip this step. It is analyzing your format, understanding why does it work. So if we look at going back to Robert Croak and the walking listicles, I. On the surface it seems really simple. Like you just walk around the block and you give three pieces of advice speaking into the phone. But the reality is just because we consume that content doesn't mean we know how to create it. There are a lot of nuances in terms of these formats. Actually succeeding. So just watching this format, watching Mark Tilbury do this in, is not enough. We need to study, practice, and refine it to make it your own. So this is where our secret weapon comes in, and I'm going to share it with you today. So my company, Hook Point, has built a proprietary method for decoding virality, and it's called gold, silver, and Bronze. So, basically, what we do is we take a specific format. Again, we can go back to Robert Croke and Walking Listicles. And what we would do is we want to understand what are the qualitative differences, what are the things that he's doing, the storytelling things that drive up the performance versus the things that drive down the performance. So the way that we would do this is we'd open up a Google spreadsheet, and we would take 5 to 10 of his highest performers, the ones that are generating 5, 10 million views. Plus, like the video that we watched on, generated over 27 million views. So we know what the high ceiling is. We look at 5 to 10 of those, and then we would put 5 to 10 of the average performers and 5 to 10 of the low performers. So the low performers are like, in the hundreds of thousands of views. So we call this the gold, silver, bronze process. The gold is the high performers, the average is the silver, and the underperformers is the bronze. And what we do here is we watch all of the high performers, and then on the other side of the screen, we watch all of the low performers. And what we're trying to look for is these qualitative differences that are happening in those high performers that are not showing up in the underperformers. So these can be a number of different things. It could be things like pacing, tonality, facial expressions, reactions, editing, titles, captions, these types of storytelling elements. Now, at Hook Point, we've looked at over 1,000 thousand of these. Now, typically, for each format, we break it down to, like, three to five of the most important to, again, really understand what makes this format successful when it generates tens of millions of views versus what makes it unsuccessful when it generates less than 100,000 views. So now let's do a little exercise together to kind of show you this in action. So we're going to look at another content creator, Dr. Julie Smith, who's a clinical psychologist, and she uses the visual metaphor format. So, again, this is another example of a format. And the visual metaphor format, as you'll see, it includes three key elements. There is an abstract or complex topic, a visual representation of the topic, like using physical objects and then a verbal explanation of the topic. So let's watch an example together of Dr. Julie Smith using this format. This video generated 9.3 million views.

Don't make this mistake. When you're working on your own happiness, imagine this is you and this is your life. But like most people's lives, there are problems that can make it toxic. If a fish is living in a toxic environment, eventually it gets sick. So you take her out of the dirty water and put her in a new tank for a while. Kind of like how you take a break, you go on holiday for a few weeks into a new environment, and it helps. Everything gets better and feels great for a while until you return and go right back to that toxic situation again. And it doesn't matter how clean the water was on your break or how refreshed you feel, eventually you will get sick again. If you want to thrive in the long term, you have to focus on cleaning up the environment that is affecting you every day. I'm a psychologist. Follow for more.

So we've identified a format, visual metaphor format. We've seen that this video is generating 9.3 million views. Now, again, most people would just stop here and be like, I know what she's doing. I can do this. I'm just gonna create a visual metaphor and play around with different things and break down my expertise. But as we've seen, 99% of people fail because they stop here. So let's take it a step further and start integrating that gold, silver, bronze process. So the way that we're going to do this, we're going to do a little bit of an exercise together. We are going to play two videos, both from Dr. Julie Smith, both using the visual metaphor format. And I want you to determine which video performed better and why. And then I'm going to reveal the results. And we're going to do that analysis of what happened in the high performer. So versus what happened in the low performer. So let's dig into the first video.

Now, imagine this is you, and these are all the bad things that happen to you. So each one represents a memory of traumatic experiences that you've been through. And as you go about your life, the thing seems like it's overflowing. Memories just keep falling out when you don't want them to, emotionally overwhelming you, and you can't seem to focus on the rest of your life. So what can we do about it? Well, I'm a psychologist, and this is what happens in trauma therapy. First of all, a therapist would gear you up with all the skills that you need to manage just how painful those memories can be. And then you take one memory at a time, carefully open it up at your own pace, and allow you to process that memory. And then you can neatly fold it up. You do the same with the next one and the next one one, until what you're left with is a neat little pile of memories that fit neatly at the bottom, leaving you more capacity to focus on the life that you want to have today.

So that's the first video. Again, we're going to watch the next video and start thinking about which one performed better and why.

Imagine for a moment that you're stood in front of a busy road with traffic going both ways. Each of those vehicles represents a thought or a feeling coming in and out of your mind. Now, you might be like most other people and spend a good deal of your time in the middle of that road trying to direct the traffic. There are some thoughts you want to hold on to, right? And there's others that you want to push away. But doing that causes more stress because the traffic just keeps on coming. Now, if I asked you to just step back from the curb and watch the traffic instead of trying to control it, just allowing it to pass and watching as it goes, that would be the process of mindfulness. When you notice that you're trying to hold on to certain thoughts and push others away, see if you can step back from the traffic and let it pass.

So before I reveal the results, if you want to take some time to think about which one performed better and why, click the pause button. But for those of you that want to dig in, I'm going to reveal the results right now. So that first video with the waste paper baskets did 12 million views, versus the second one with the cars did 130,000 views. This is why it's so critically important to do this exercise, because we have the exact same creator, the exact same format, but over 11 and a half views. 11 and a half million views in performance difference. So now let's break down the qualitative elements, the contextual elements that made up the difference. And it's just a one off viral success. And this content creator only has 7,000 followers, so it's not an example of a repeatable storytelling format. So let's go back to those nine, and this time I'm going to choose this video. Now, it's got less likes as 1.2 million, but, you know, let's see if it is. So again, we pull up the video that Massive performance. That massive performance discrepancy. So we have four of these qualitative elements here. So let's start with the first one, which is active metaphor. So as we can see in that high performer, we watch it and then we're going to click the profile icon of the creator. There is a clear visual story that is happening that involves the manipulation of the object, which is the waste paper baskets and the paper. It's. So it's demonstrating the topic of. Of the video, which is trauma versus the. The underperformer. Instead of using an active metaphor, she's just asking us to imagine the actual scenario that's unfolding. She doesn't actually manipulate or play with the object on the table. The next one is tension. So I want to point out that. So we just watched the video. So jot down if you need to pause. A lot of these qualitative elements will happen on a subconscious level. So some of these will happen within a split. Think about it. But do you think that this video is a repeatable format? So again, we watch that video, we're going to click the profile icon and go to the profile. So this is pretty insane. So I see second of the visual coming on the screen. So in the high performer that there's. Within the first four seconds, there is a clear visual problem with the overflowing basket of papers. And it's another video with 99 million views, 54 million views, 28 million, 82 linger on the screen. So it creates an immediate tension on the other side of the screen for the viewer with the million 39 million. I mean, that's a ton of views. This is definitely a repeatable. The. The underperformer. There isn't that clear visual problem. So there's no visual tension format. And this account has over 2.6 million followers. So the lesson that we can take away here is that not every viral video is a format and not every account is a reliable. Third qualitative element is the potential energy. So in that high performer, within that first second with the basket and pile of papers on the table, and it hints to the viewer that's going to be some type of interaction versus the underperformer. She doesn't even reach for a car or imply that there's going to be some type of action. All she is really promising is there's going to be some visual story, but a viable reference. So this is where a lot of people make a mistake, is they see one viral video and then they think, well, that is a repeatable format. I'm going to try that. When in reality it turns out to be a trend and not something that has proven to have success time and time again. So now how do we actually choose the right format for you? So obviously you're not going to do the dog video format unless you're selling pet products or things of that nature. And maybe one of the three examples are not the right fit for you, and that's okay. So there's two specific key questions that I want you to ask yourself. So if you don't press, pause, get a piece of paper, and a pen doesn't unfold, then the last one is cleverness. So in the ways the high performer using everyday objects to explain trauma is very clever. So she's using, you know, we all have waste paper baskets, we all deal with paper. And because she's using an everyday household item to explain this topic, it's really clever and it makes us think, ah, that is, that's a really good story, that's a really good way to explain that versus the underperformer there. Instead of having this unexpected smart demonstration, she's just asking us to tend to write these down because it's really important. The first question is, what are the resources that you have? Do a lot of the work by imagining her metaphor that she's explaining to us. So we just completed this exercise and 99% of content creators don't do this available to you because I don't want you to extend beyond your resources. If you remember now, at hook point, we wouldn't just take two videos and do them side by side. We, as I mentioned in the gold, silver, bronze process, we would take 5 to 10 of those high performers and watch them against 5 to 10 of the low performers. It's a pretty extensive process. When we do it for clients, it typically takes us like anywhere from like 12 to 15 hours to really break down a format for a client. So watch Mark Tilbury. He's literally holding up his, his, his own phone and walking around the block. If you don't have a big team, if you don't have fancy cameras or equipment, we'll start with a format that matches the resources you have. If you don't have people working under you, then again, take that into consideration when you're choosing a format next, how much time the actual strategies that we can take away here are. We want to find the right format for you. So what are the resources that you have available? Don't stretch beyond those resources. Then once we've identified that format, we Want to understand what drives success and also what drives down success so that we can avoid common mistakes. So this process do you have available to execute on content? Because that will dictate the format that you use. It'll dictate. Am I going to go after short form or long form content? Now the second question which sets you up for repeatable success, not luck. So 99% of people fail to go viral. Not just critically important is what excites you because enjoyment fuels consist because they lack talent or effort, but because they don't know the three points that we've just covered. Number one is watching content isn't the same as creating great content. When you make that mindset shift from passive consumer to expert content creator. In terms of tensey, I want you to pick a format that you absolutely love. Again, we've analyzed actually paying attention to what is happening and why in social media. Number two, formats are the foundation of virality. Trends fade formats scale, they unlock creativity, not restrict it. Number three, analyze content is the secret weapon. The gold, silver and bronze process method turns guesswork into repeatable success. Again, it's over 300 formats. There are so many to choose from. And that's why I said the ones that I was showing you are just examples and not necessarily suggestions. So make sure that as you're doing the research, as you're looking for your format, think is this something that I would enjoy doing over the long term, the long run. So number three, and the most important, this is why 99% of people think this is where 99% of people stop and fail. If you start integrating that, you are on your way to an expert content creator. So if you take anything away from this video, let it be this virality, it's not about chasing luck, it is about mastering a system. Now this is the same framework my team and I have used to generate billions of views and grow audiences into mail. They skip this step. It is analyzing your format, understanding why does it work. So if we look at going back to Robert Croak and the Walking Listicle, the millions and help creators and brands break through the noise. Now it is your turn. So I am truly grateful for you tuning in today and watching till the end of the video. As a big thank you, I want to give you access to my third book for absolutely free, the guide to going viral, which dives into everything that we cover today in extreme depth. So if you just scan this barcode on the screen and you'll be able to get that book for absolutely free. Again, thank you. And I look forward to seeing your content in my feed soon.