Viral marketing has become a major part small and large business success all over the world, and it’s easy to see why.

The global acceptance of social media as the preferred way to communicate – not only with each other, but also with businesses and services – has completely transformed the way that marketing campaigns are composed. Viral marketing completely levels the playing field for big and small businesses alike, giving everyone the opportunity to compete without any unfair advantages like there used to be in the past.

At the same time, viral marketing creation isn’t as simple or as straightforward as simply waving a wand and hoping for the best. You really need to tap into some key emotions to make your viral marketing campaign successful, and some of the most important emotions to tap into are represented below.

Fear

It can be argued that our society is the safest in human history, but is also the most fearful in human history – and a lot of that has to do with the constant barrage of negative and fearful advertising and marketing that occurs on a daily basis.

But all of that fearful, angry, and frustrating marketing wouldn’t be shared so often if it wasn’t so powerfully effective – and that’s why you’re going to want to at least consider tapping into the anger, frustrations, and fear of your target market to really catapult your viral marketing into entirely new levels.

Surprise

Now that the marketing playing field has been leveled completely, everyone (and we mean EVERYONE) has the opportunity to share their message with the world.

That’s great and all (and has changed the face of business forever), but it also means that there’s going to be plenty of noise and clutter that you have to rise above with your marketing to be successful.

This is where surprise and shock value comes into play. Because we have become so numb to “average” marketing messages – they say that each of us are bombarded with more than 6000 individual advertisements every day, and we have to almost block out all of them out just to stay sane – you really have to excite and intrigue people to capture their attention.

Controversy

At the end of the day, nothing courts as much attention (or as much media play) as controversy.

If you’re looking to kick your marketing into high gear, transform your content immediately, and practically guarantee that you go viral, begin to create more controversial content and you’ll be on your way.