Social Media Marketing – Oppa Viral Style?

Any mainstream media exposure is good for public recognition, right? As marketers, raising brand awareness is our primary objective in the digital age, and "going viral" can assist us with this.

However, what actually makes something garner the interest of tens of thousands of people virally at once and, are the 15 minutes of fame worth it?

Let’s observe viral marketing in relation to Gangnam Style's success. Can you remember a time when it was everywhere, and then suddenly it wasn’t anymore?

Released in 2012 under YG Entertainment by Korean musician – PSY – Gangnam Style was a music video that unexpectedly took social media by the storm. Breaking numerous records at its peak, it was inarguably a great impact on streaming culture as we see it.

So, what made Gangnam Style a viral sensation across the globe, in comparison to other English sung K-Pop ventures (e.g., Wonder Girls’ The DJ Is Mine)?

According to Kaplan and Haenlein, there are three conditions we must consider when creating a viral phenomenon:

· The right message

· The right messengers

· The right environment

The Right Message

Language was never an obstacle in spreading Gangnam Style’s success. Albeit sung in Korean, music is a globally spoken dialect. The tune was entertaining, the video was engaging, the choreography was quirky and the chorus was punchy – who can ever forget the iconic phrase “Oppa Gangnam Style”?

The Right Messengers

With PSY’s domestic success, the cameo of reputable South Korean celebrities in the video, as well as an audience of 2.5 million subscribers (circa Gangnam Style) on YG Entertainment’s main seeding platform (YouTube), there was already an existing community to push the song organically into mainstream social media consciousness.

The Right Environment

Alongside social media support, Gangnam Style saw substantive coverage on platforms including allkpop, Gawker and Billboard, along with Twitter mentions from celebrities including Katy Perry. These interactions collectively saw the video receive an organic spike in mainstream media traffic which all-inclusively increases reputation, trust and acceptance.

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What can we take away from the viral sensation of Gangnam Style? Simple. If the message is engaging and there is an audience and a network to organically share the message, then the campaign can reach viral status.

Although Gangnam Style is not as impactful today as it once was, the extent of its of success upon its release was astounding. This one-off claim to fame truly put PSY’s name on an entirely new map.

“Every time I release music videos [now] there are so many people from many countries watching” (PSY).

Below are some of PSY’s newer songs. Do you think these had the potential to go viral?