The eBiz Blog

It’s the dream of every blogger or website owner to have a post go viral. After all, the whole point of establishing your site is to share your ideas and/or products with the masses. When something touches a nerve — perhaps you write something especially eloquent or have a fresh take on an old topic — you want to make sure that as many people as possible see it. Perhaps more importantly, you want to make sure that the Internet users who come from your viral post like the rest of your site enough to stick around and make repeat visits down the road.

That’s why it’s important to be prepared for one of your posts to go viral. Being caught unaware when your content gains traction could mean that the first impression that visitors get when they visit your site is a negative one, and you’ll lose out on the benefits of that increased exposure.

Since you never can tell when your content will go viral, despite your best efforts, it’s best to always be on alert and ready so you can spring into action as soon as you catch wind of a popular post.

Purchase Adequate Bandwidth

When you’re choosing a web hosting service for your site, plan ahead for a day when you might have viral content. That means paying close attention to the bandwidth capabilities of the service. You might be able to build a site for free, but how much traffic can the site handle? You want to make sure that the site will not load slowly or crash when hundreds of people attempt to access it at once. Confirm that the site host is capable of managing significant spikes in traffic and won't block access to your site if you unexpectedly hit a bandwidth cap before you sign a contract.

Our server can handle unlimited traffic and we don't block access to your site if you suddenly get a traffic spike that hits the targetted bandwidth limit for your account type. Your site will remain accessible and if the increased traffic is going to be a permanent thing then we can offer options for the higher bandwidth usage.

Design Your Site Effectively

Web design best practice dictates that anyone who lands on any page of your site should be able to immediately determine who you are and what you do. Every page of a site is a potential entry point and you should keep that in mind when designing the framework and layout of your site design. Does your site meet those criteria? Are visitors able to get more information easily? Take advantage of the increase in traffic by making sure that sign-up boxes for newsletters are easy to find, and make it easy for visitors to connect via social media as well. Everything on your site should be seamlessly integrated, so visitors can easily access all of your content.

Be Present

When content goes viral, there’s usually some feedback, both positive and negative. Pay close attention to what people are saying, both in the comments on the post, on social media and via e-mail. Respond to comments and questions as quickly as possible, even if it’s just an acknowledgment or word of thanks. Since a lot of viral content has a tendency to cycle around several times, consider turning off the comments on blog posts when it reaches critical mass, or add a note to the end of the post noting that the response was great and that you won’t be able to respond to comments. It’s especially important to be aware of what’s happening and responsive when you receive negative feedback. Ignoring backlash or blocking negative comments will only earn you the wrong kind of attention.

Be sure to use analytics to find out where the majority of the new traffic is coming from. If another is linked to your blog post or other content then there could be public discussions going on about it at that other site. Getting involved in the conversation there can be very benefitial as well. Just be sure to keep it positive and cordial from your end.

Going viral can give your business a huge boost in terms of web traffic and credibility, but only if you handle the attention appropriately. Develop a plan for handling viral content, and you’ll be better prepared to leverage your 15 minutes of fame into something even bigger.