Why the Most Viral Brand Posts All Have 1 Thing in Common (It’s Not the Algorithm)

Founders and social teams can learn a lesson from these viral posts.

BY ANNABEL BURBA, EDITORIAL ASSISTANT @ANNIEBURBA

What makes a social media post go viral? While experts agree that there is some luck involved, you’ve got to be doing something right in order to create content that reaches millions, or even thousands, of views.

Knowing how to replicate social media fame is an extremely valuable tool for founders. Chattanooga, Tennessee-based startup Totem, for example, went viral on Instagram in 2024 after posting a video that demonstrated how to use its tracking device product to find friends at festivals and concerts.

Co-founders Chase Lemonds and Carter Fowler then set out to create a social media marketing engine that would ensure Totem would continue to go viral. It worked: the company has racked up 150 million organic views in less than two years and currently averages one post with more than one million views every 13 days.

“If you’re not taking the time to understand, to form hypotheses about why that happened, and then test them through additional content, then you’re going to lose so much potential,” Fowler previously told Inc.

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Knowing this, we asked several founders and marketers to share their most viral social media posts in order to see what—if anything—they have in common. It turns out, just about all of them had an element of humor, relatability, or both.

1. A relatable hand-drawn illustration

The business: Shipt, a Birmingham, Alabama-based retail delivery service

The post: An Instagram post that shows a hand-drawn illustration of someone cutting into a bar of soap along with the words, “Soap taste or not, you asked for cilantro not parsley,” plus a behind-the-scenes video by the artist

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