Why you shouldn't “go viral” on YouTube (and what to do instead)

YouTube

Apr 25

Trying to grow your YouTube channel by going viral is not a good strategy. In fact, I wouldn't even call it a strategy, I would call it luck.

Why you shouldn't “go viral” on YouTube (and what to do instead)

Before I tell you why I think “going viral” is a bad growth strategy for your YouTube channel, let’s first define what the word actually means.

A "viral" video is a video that gets way more views than usual, often in a short period of time.

ChatGPT defines it like this:

”A viral video is a video that spreads rapidly and widely across the internet, typically through social sharing, because it evokes a strong emotional reaction—like laughter, surprise, inspiration, or outrage.”

In other words, you can't really plan a viral video.
If every video you made went viral, that would just become your new “normal”. It wouldn’t be “viral” anymore, it wouldn't be your new baseline.

Take MrBeast (Jimmy Donaldson), for example.
He’s one of the few people who can manage to go viral consistently (and that only happened after making hundreds of videos on YouTube over the course of 5+ years). His consistency eventually turned into a system.

Virality once is luck, while consistent virality is systemized content creation.

So instead of chasing a viral moment, ask yourself:
How can I create a repeatable system for getting views?

This is what I recommend:
☑️ Pick a niche (or create the niche if it doesn’t exist yet)
☑️ Design a video format for that niche
☑️ Commit to a realistic publishing schedule you can follow.

That way, you will eventually learn:
⏱️ How long it take to create a video (in that format)
📆 When you have to start to meet your deadline (your publishing schedule)
👨‍💻 How to plan around this to keep up over time
📈 What type of result you can expect (based on previous videos)
🎭 What your viewers like and don’t like

And from the outside:
▶️ YouTube will learn what your channel is about so that it can recommend your videos to the right audience
👥 Your viewers will learn what type of content they can expect from you

Now, you are collecting data for that format, in that niche, and over time, you can tweak one detail at a time and actually see what works.
You are now testing instead of guessing.

Then, you can gradually improve your content, detail by detail, based on your tests. And eventually, these improvements will result in a bigger reach and more views.

And because your videos are similar in structure, it’s easier to spot what’s working better than usual, and double down on that.

Focusing on one topic/niche also helps you level up faster.
And the better you get, the more you will stand out from the noise of average quality content.

🎞 Watch the video here!

Want more YouTube tips like this?

The video is a short snippet from my “YouTube Analytics Deep Dive” which is one of many video lessons inside my online program "Streamlined Creator".

You can get the YouTube Analytics Deep Dive here (or by clicking on the image below) and you can read more about my online program Streamlined Creator on the homepage.

Thanks for reading!