Recently, a reel on my Instagram hit 1.5 million views and went absolutely viral. To this day I still have hundreds of likes flowing in per 30 minutes and there seems to be no end. It was liked almost 16,000 times, shared more than 27,000 times and commented on more than 800 times.
So here is a breakdown of what I learned when a reel goes "viral":
• A viral reel does not guarantee a viral business.
• People are sadly still politically divided and you can tell.
• Some people have no humor left.
• Fact checkers do indeed still exist.
• Influencers probably don't make much money.
• My subs barely went up (1.5 million views and less than 300 news subscribers? Come on, Instagram, we all know how much you censor accounts on here).
Here is my advice to you:
• Do your thing.
• Don't bother arguing with anyone on here unless it's really something you stand behind. Too much wasted energy otherwise.
• Don't waste your money on a course on how to make your IG reels go viral - because honestly it's not up to you to make that happen but AI algorithms. And a viral reel does not guarantee a viral income or a viral business.
• Put your time into other things and create something tangible, related to what you love.
• Go offline and enjoy the real world.
• Spread your message.
• And last: Do your thing. For real!
Therefore, what to do when you go viral.. ? Nothing.
Here are some statistics and facts:
My website visits only went up slightly
I gained less than 300 new followers on IG (with 1.5 million new views!)
I had virtually none or almost no new followers on Youtube or other related social media platforms from it
I barely gained any new mailing list signups
Over these past two months I've had two reels go "viral." One was around July (80,00 views) and the most recent one was posted a few days ago (over 1.5 million views).
Despite those reels reaching A LOT of people, still only a fraction of my ACTUAL Subs was reached (the latest one reached less than 1/3 of my actual subs, how sad is this?). And despite the shares, comments, likes, I grew only a fraction on that particular Instagram account (a few hundred vs. what should have been a few thousand).
What does this show me? Social media is not authentic and all about control and censorship. No matter how hard we try to take it back, the AI is pushing back very hard in return. However, it is possible to break out, even if nothing has really grown or changed on my account since the summer of 2020 (this is when I had around 5,500 subs and as you can tell - same number 3+ years later). The fact that something was even able to go viral on my oh-so-censored account is already astonishing in and of itself.
Am I sad, outraged or disappointed by these results? Perhaps a little. The results are not surprising to me because I've been dealing with censorship for so long already. All it shows me is that numbers don't matter and I personally won't be wasting my time on any course advertising for "social media growth," "how to blow up your online account" or all the other stuff that seems to be hip these days. Because I've seen first-hand that it literally almost does not matter when they put a lid on your account and you can barely break through it, at least with what meets the eyes.
Instead, I will continue to focus on organic reach, other types of marketing and simply being, posting and doing what my heart desires. And so should you. You never know what that real number is anyhow. You may be reaching millions but the Instagram/ Youtube demons will only show you 1-2 people. Move on and continue to live your life - numbers don't seem to matter anymore in a world where celebrities are buying fake bot followers, the real numbers are tarnished and we are being continuously deceived.
Are you interested in how to take your holistic and online business from hero to zero? Then check out my course here.
~Laura from Shamanic Self is a certified Shamanic Healer and Practitioner. I offer online courses and digital products that advance you on your spiritual journey.
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