The Magic Formula Behind Going Viral on Reddit for your Product Launch
Have you ever dreamed of going viral on Reddit? Of having your product or idea seen by thousands of people and generating a flood of sign-ups?
Well, I'm here to tell you that it's not as impossible as you might think.
In fact, I recently managed to do it myself, (almost) by accident.
With just a few simple steps, I managed to generate over 100,000 views for one of my posts, and I got 90 sign-ups for the launch of Kaptr.me in just one day.
It was an incredible experience, and I'm still buzzing from it.
But what's even more amazing is that I didn't have to do anything special to make it happen. I just followed a few simple principles, and the rest took care of itself.
So, if you're wondering how to go viral on Reddit, keep reading.
I'm going to share with you the exact steps I took, and I'll also provide some additional tips that I learned along the way, that you can use to create your own viral posts on Reddit.
The first step is to pinpoint the right subreddits where potential users might hang out.
I ended up with a list that many indie hackers will find familiar:
(I'll break down the analytics for each subreddit at the end, so stick around!)
90% of success is in your post's title (the hook)
For this part, I followed this simple advice that I found on Twitter, which was: "Find the posts with the most upvotes, and copy their style" - I know, this wasn't a very hard one to figure out.
I also noted that most of the posts that generate traction start with one of these 3 hooks:
And this is the title I came up with:
"I made this free app to build your personal dashboard with snapshots of any apps or website, that stay up to date automatically"
Here's the narrative I crafted:
Hi guys,
I've created a new tool called Kaptr.me.
With Kaptr.me, you can take a snapshot of any app or website, that stays up to date automatically.
It's the easiest way of building dashboards, without any technical integrations.
Here are some examples of how our users have been using the tool so far:
- Automating sales reporting
- Monitoring crypto market signals, sentiment, and news
- Building a personal productivity dashboard
- Sharing project updates with teams and clients
- Monitoring favorite surf spots (with webcam)
Quick question for you: what do you think of this project? And what would you use it for?
We've opened a free version of Kaptr.me for our launch. Check it out and let us know what you think!
And here is the video that I used for video-only posts: Introducing Kaptr.me
Answer every single comment you get. But be smart.
By "be smart" I mean, always leave 2–3 comments unchecked.
And when the replies from people slow down, leave a comment under these unchecked ones.
This is the theory.
But to be 100% honest, I ended up replying to all of the comments instantly.
We had just launched our product, and we were prioritizing valuable feedback over virality.
I'm the impatient type of guys that think that people would expect you to reply to every comment they leave on the post within 5 minutes. I don't think that's actually the case.
However, if you really want to get viral, don't be like me, and be smart when it comes to engaging with the comments.
Here's the outcome:
The lesson?
Engagement is the heartbeat of virality.
And yes, videos do wonders compared to text-only posts.
Based on these results, it's clear that the key to creating viral Reddit posts is to multiply the Reddit subs where you post your content (of course without being spammy).
If I had stopped at the first post, I would have ended up with approximately 95 views.
As you imagine, the post that got 122K views didn't go all the way up by itself. The strategy revolved around one key thing: engagement.
It also seems that posts that included video ended up getting a lot more views than "regular" posts. So don't hesitate to create one (if you haven't already).
I really hope that this will help some of you craft some amazing posts for the community.
And again, of course: I'm a beginner at this. Don't take my words for granted.
Experiment on your own.. And keep trying!
Hey man, what software did you use to make the walkthrough video on your website?
Hey Man, I used a combo of several tools :
Hope it helps :)
Awesome, I was struggling to find decent tools for such videos. iMovie never cut it. Will give these a go. Thnx!
Video content is critical for consumption bur I always feel so daunted by creating a video and getting it just right. How many versions of this video have you tried creating?
Hey mate ! If I have a small advice for you.. Just ship it ! Try creating one video using simple tools, and see how it goes ! If you get positive feedbacks about the video, keep it this way. Otherwise, try another angle :)
good post!
one more thing -
when launching on Internetisbeautiful - do not include the website link if it has payment gateway & pricing page connected in it otherwise you will get suspended
Yup.. Learned that the hard way. Ended up having a conversation about this in the comments, and the post was banned a few hours later. Great tips !
Really interesting thank you! Will have to test video posts and the comment strategy you mentioned. Have you tried r/entrepreneur ?
The first short-form case study i posted in there got 43.7k views, 26 upvotes and around 15 subs for my newsletter (I just plugged my website and not my newsletter)
Next time, I'll try a CTA to my subscribe page
Do you think time also matters?
Like right now, there are only 960 members online and later in the day, I see around 2000
Hey Cameron,
I gave it a try for another post. But didn't get much traction ! And congrats on getting 43.7K views. That's really great !
To be fairly honest, I haven't tried posting at a "pre-defined" time. But would love to have more data about this if you find some insightfull tips !
Taking notes here! Thanks for sharing
Thanks for the positive feedback mate :)
Hey Robin, congrats on the huge success! Did you share it across all subreddits at the same time or at different times?
Thanks for the support mate ! Yes, I shared all of the post around the same time. I saw a comment somewhere which suggested that the best timing would be during the week between 11am - 1pm EST.
But I actually just posted them one after another.
Curious to know what is the actual impact of timing on these strategies !
To make this post really valuable, please share the link to that Reddit post with us. Thanks.
Sure @SeaCat ! Here is is ! (the one that made 100K+ views ) : https://www.reddit.com/r/InternetIsBeautiful/comments/17lghp5/i_made_this_free_app_to_build_your_personal/
Unfortunately, your post has been removed by mod. Suspected of spam, or another reason? Self promotion on Reddit is a fine line to walk. I would definitively caution against posting at same time to several subs.
Yup, I didn't include that in the article, but you're right. I'm not 100% sure what got it removed, but i think it was about the commentaries. One guy asked me if he was able to pay via pay pal for his subscription. we ended up having a chat in the comments.. Maybe this wasn't tolerated unfortunately. :/
I saw that your post has been removed by the moderators of r/InternetIsBeautiful. Do you have more explanations about that?
Well done man! I remember seeing your product the other day and was very impressed.
Thanks mate for the support ! Hope you had a chance to give it a try !
You can also use this tool that I used to find out the keywords that will pique the interest of you potential reader.
The tool is decentool.com
This tool will go tru thousands of keywords based on who you are targeting and the target market and then do the analysis on which keywords will have the best traffic, trend , difficulty and interest ratio.
From that keywords you can know what to talk about that will attract the potential readers.
Try it out and let me know what you think.
Very insightful! Thanks for the 3 hooks example ("I made…", "I worked at…", etc.). I will definitely use it!
Hope it helps mate :)
nice
Congrats
Thanks mate :)
Thank you for this, Robin.
Hi Congrats on your success and thanks for sharing it. I'd like to know 'it seems reddit doesn't show the number of views on posts so how did you reach the number 100k?'
Humm, it does on my side :) Did you check at the bottom of your post ? I think it's only visible for the posts you create yourself !
and here I thought twitter is the most cfuked up app. Reddit allows insights only for 45 days from the date of posting on mobile only. can't view it on website.
Will you include the link of your website or product hunt in your post? I'm afraid that including a direct link may violate Reddit's self-promotion guidelines and result in your post being removed.
I did, but I think it's one of the things that got me banned at some point on some threads. So i'd be as carefull as possible with this.
I failed at launch, but I read your post already and I considered my past work. I found that I only got viewers but not users. I didn’t try enough. Your post show me the path to success. So, I must keep going.
Thank you for sharing.
Kat🫡
Hey Kat ! Congrats on launching anyways ! That's already a big step forward ? Feel free to share your product in the comment, would love to see what you are building at the moment :)
Hey Robin, congratulations on the huge success and thanks for sharing the process with us.
I do not have a video to introduce the product that I have been working on. Do you think a post with just the text would also workout? Asking for your opinion on this. Thanks
Hey Rabbal ! Considering the stats that i had, i would deffinitely recommend using a video. But i'm no expert here. I think that the video has been very helpful in my case, because the concept of Kaptr.me is quite new ( we don't have a lot of competitors in the market), and i think it helped people understanding the whole concept. However, if you're launching a product in a more mature market, i'm not sure you'll need a video :)
Awesome insights about how impactful video can be!
(Like many people, I feel a bit camera shy, but perhaps at the very least I can do a screenshare.)
Congrats!
Thanks mate ! :)
Amazing, great job! And the product is a fantastic idea. Gonna go use it to create a SaaS analytics dashboard now.
Hey Sam, thanks so much for the feedback ! Did you get a chance to create your dashboard yet ? :)
Can't wait for your feedbacks!
I'm thrilled to share a recent Reddit success story with you! By some stroke of luck, I went viral on Reddit and garnered over 100,000 views, leading to 90 sign-ups for my site's launch in just one day. Here's a quick rundown of the strategies I employed:
Identifying Key Subreddits:
Targeted relevant subreddits like RoastMyStartup and EntrepreneursRideAlong to maximize visibility.
Crafting a Captivating Hook:
Developed a compelling title infused with emotional value, following successful post patterns.
Engaging Content:
Shared a narrative introducing my site, emphasizing its features and use cases.
The Art of Engagement:
Prioritized immediate responses to every comment, valuing feedback over virality.
Dissecting the Results:
Experimented with both text and video posts across diverse subreddits.
Found that video posts and active engagement played a pivotal role in achieving virality.
The main takeaway is that engagement is the heartbeat of virality, and videos tend to outperform text-only posts.
247laminatingcom
Kaam Deir.
Brilliant, thank you for this post!
Thanks for sharing these insights – I'm definitely going to try some of these tactics for my next launch!
Nice ! Let me know how it goes ! What is the project you are working on at the moment ? :)
I'm working on a Paint by numbers store.
Reddit maybe a good channel. I just commented a little post, that bring some visitor to my website yesterday.
Nice ! Care to share the stats ? :)
Great points.
But along with 100k views how many subscribed users you got?
Hey @pentaclay, by subscribers, do you mean "sign ups" or actual paying users ? :)
Any paying user actually? :)
To be 100% transparent, it brought us (according to analytics) 1 paying customer so far. :)
But you never know how many paid customers it will generate in the long run.. Hopefully more than that ahah :)
But at the end of the day, as we were just launching the product, we needed more feedbacks than actual customers.. Hopefully continuing improving Kaptr.me based on the feedbacks will help us improve this conversion rate !
If you have any suggestions, I'm keen to hearing them !
And how many sign-ups? We can bring traffic to the website, but we need actual paying customers instead of traffic.
That's why I was asking how many sign-ups or paying customers. Yes that are good for SEOs, backlinks etc.
100K views on the post - around 500 website visits - 90 users - 1 paying customer :)
Hi, do you have plans to market the product more?
Hi, I do, it's just the beginning. We're starting small on marketing to gather feedbacks from early users first :)
Once we feel that the conversion rate is good enough, we'll start accelerating on marketing ! Keen for any advice if you want to share what you think !
I found that content marketing works pretty well. But my problem is I have a really hard idiosyncrasy to writing content. So, I'm trying to figure out how to minimize my own efforts on it and still have good results.
Thanks for the clarification. Now that's a good number. 😊
This comment was deleted 3 months ago.