Ever wonder how viral content creators predict the exact format that will blow up on their channels?
It looks like magic, but it’s actually very simple.
And you can easily replicate it.
The key to internet celebrity MrBeast’s success is that he studies “outliers” religiously.
Outliers are the videos on a channel that do significantly better compared to the rest.
If a creator gets a few hundred thousand views on their videos on average and you spot one with a million, that’s an outlier!
But you could take that same idea, replicate it, and it could still fail on your channel.
Why?
Because you can’t engineer virality with arbitrary ideas. But you can with a proven content format.
It’s precisely how MrBeast came up with the “one vs one million” format that generated hundreds of millions of views on his channel.
Over and over again.
About a year ago, he started noticing how make-up artists, gamers, and the like all started comparing something cheap to something expensive on their channels.
They were getting millions of views on a single video.
So he distilled these ideas into a replicable format and put his own spin on it.
He compared a one-dollar hotel room to wildly expensive stays around the world in his signature style: Hilarious reality TV.
The result? It’s one of his best-performing videos to date with 362M views.
It’s the same data-informed ideation process that allowed my team to generate billions of views for our clients over the years.
I find it mind-boggling how, in science, we rely on centuries of trial and error to guide creation.
But in content, we throw away millions of data points just so we can be original.
The truth is, there’s only one time you should aim for originality: When you’re adapting winning formats to your unique brand.
As MrBeast says, don’t copy and paste. Copy with taste.
In other words, don’t just try to steal an idea that’s already out there.
Instead, use it as inspiration and make it your own.
Take the “two characters, one lightbulb” format.
From financial advisors to lawyers and relationship consultants, creators across the board have jumped on this train.
A two-role skit played by the same person that demonstrates a big idea in their field of expertise.
These videos follow the exact same structure. Yet, they don’t feel repetitive because they all share fresh insights.
Remember, it’s the format that drives the message home. Not the other way around.
So instead of blindly following trends, identify outliers, see how they’re implemented in various niches, and then put your own spin on it.
Next time, we’ll dive into how you can leverage your strengths to win on social at literally any age.
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