Go viral or go home? Why brands need to rethink their approach

Once upon a time, all that an advertiser would want is a creative ad campaign that resonates with the masses and creates recall and value for the brand. Today, it's a different story. Agencies have been putting creativity in the backseat to cater to client demands for "viral" campaigns instead.

With technological advancements like improved tools to scale up campaigns and efficient media to reach audience digitally, demands for virality has gotten more and more strident in recent years from the advertisers, much to agencies' chagrin.

In the race to chase numbers and eyeballs with a viral campaign, agencies are being tasked with finding a fool-proof course to make the campaign go viral. But is there a way to predict virality?

Not too long ago, the Zomato-Blinkit billboard campaign became a gold standard in viral campaigns where brands across categories hitched their wagons to it. The sharability and humour contributed to the immense virality of the campaign. Was Zomato privy to an arcane algorithm to ensure that the campaign went viral? Not likely. Can any agency worth its salt make an ad go viral with just enough creativity? e4m asked experts.

Russell Burrett, Chief Experience Officer at TBWA\India, answered, “First off, let’s be very clear that creativity is a tool, a weapon, a solution. Whereas virality is an outcome. No one can deliver truly viral content on demand. But sure there are a few ingredients that can go into the mix to help an idea go viral."

He explained further: "Go to where the people are. That really means talking about things that are culturally relevant, using people who will have a cultural cache. Try and figure out why people will share this content and dial that bit up. It may still not go viral, because it’s still an outcome, but these ingredients can definitely help.”

Ajay Gehlaut, Ex-Dentsu, Group Chief Creative Officer, pointed out the absurdity of clients making such demands. “It's been going on ever since the word viral came up, ‘make a viral video.' You cannot make a viral video; you can make a video and hope it goes viral. You cannot hope for virality, you can make a good piece of communication. Usually what goes viral is the lowest denominator.”

Similarly, Shivil Gupta, Creative and Strategy Consultant, added, “Today everybody wants to be in the news at any cost. But when it comes to a brand we need to understand that consumer always associates themselves with the goodness of the brand. Asking creative people to think of an idea while keeping the virality factor in mind is a dangerous path. Remember there is a thin line between famous and notorious.”

Azazul Haque, Chief Content Officer at Media.Monks believes that demands for virality can often work to the brands' detriment. “In Advertising, creativity has a purpose, it is purposeful communication for the brand to awareness or increase sales. When brands say virality, everything takes a backseat. It doesn’t hamper the creative as much but it hampers the objective. Many times clients say - forget the objective, and then they want any random thing to happen," he rues.

“I think it loses the marketing communication objective more than it loses the creativity because then you’ll have to be contextual, and topical so that it goes viral. I think that brands that have nothing to say, end up saying they want to make something viral. I think the push for virality makes the brand lose perspective.”

It is an important factor for campaigns to reach the target audience and become a part of dining table conversations, brands should not pressure creatives to come up with a viral campaign because as spoken above by the experts, virality is the byproduct of creativity, strategy, medium and many other factors. Experts advise brands to go after creativity than being part of the rat race.

Aalap Desai, CCO Dentsu Creative West and Dentsu Creative Experience, India, said, “The word 'viral' is highly ambiguous. I feel people use that as a crutch to compensate for parts of the brief they can't answer questions for. It cannot be planned or figured out completely. You can only hope that what you create goes viral. You cannot guarantee that it will every time.”

“One thing that is guaranteed is that if we create something that has craft in it, it will be shared and appreciated. Craft might be the idea or the way it's made. But if the idea is made well, people appreciate it. It's a lot like Bollywood. We are not supportive of movies like Shehzada but we are super appreciative of movies like Kantara. Did the filmmakers of Shehzada plan it to be a flop? No. But did they create a flop? Yes. The same applies to advertising. Let craft and creativity breathe and the viral requirement will be fulfilled as an after-effect. You can't start with it.”

Similarly, Barrett said, “We are in the business of creativity. We aren’t in the service industry or the consultation business. Service and advice are very important parts of our business, but it isn’t the core. Creativity isn’t an indulgence, it’s our very reason for existence. Though I want to call out the difference between creativity and the creative department. Every department is in service of creativity. You can’t be In advertising and not be creative.”

Gehlaut wants brands to understand where they stand and act accordingly. He said, “Make sure to be consistent, virality is something to talk about at parties. It builds only conversations, I don't know how it helps. First, know your brand, then build it in every touch point, and put it in every piece of communication.”

Haque says that if the brief starts with ‘let's do something viral’ then the brand has to rethink its purpose. He said, “Virality is a fluke, and one should never run after flukes. Running after such short-term fame won't help a brand in the long run. If ‘Let's do something viral’ becomes your brief, the brand has lost its purpose. There have to be reasons to go after it.”

Gupta rounded it up by saying that if the brand communication is genuine that it will surely have the potential to go viral. He said, “Better we should try to come up with genuine ideas which complement the brand. We are in a business where a real challenge is our talk of the town concept should also be discussed at the dining table among the family members. Idea achcha hoga toh charcha zarur hogi.”

In older times, when data technology wasn’t handy, brands used tactics to measure the success of their campaign through various touch points, and an increase in sales was one of them. Virality may help to create awareness among consumers, but does it really help to spike sales, which is the end goal of any business, is still a conversation out there.