
Casey Neistat’s Viral Marketing Strategy - nate
https://medium.com/the-set-list/viral-marketing-77aa2fc94b95
======
notatoad
I think there's another aspect here that the author is missing: break
expectations, but do it in a way that confirms existing biases.

It's not just "this thing people believe is wrong", but "this thing people
believe is wrong, _but you were never one of those people, were you? you and
me, we 're more clever than that_". breaking expectations in a way that makes
people feel stupid for having those expectations in the first place isn't
going to win you an audience.

\- snowboarding with the NYPD: haven't you always wanted the roads to be shut
down for everybody else, and you were the only one allowed on them?

\- Bike Lanes: authority figure doing something stupid, gets called out for
it. everybody's got a bit of an anti-authority streak and can sympathise with
this

\- Make it Count. spend a big company's money on your personal travel? who
wouldn't want to do that.

\- Bike thief: it's easy to see how viewers would like to feel they'd be
better than all the people who ignored the "bike theives"

\- iPod’s Dirty Secret: doesn't everybody wish their electronics lasted
longer, and harbor a suspicion that the big rich tech companies are ripping
them off?

~~~
puranjay
I was just going to say the same thing.

It works even better when you play up to a small group's beliefs. Or even
better when you confirm something a larger group aspires to, but wants an
excuse to get out of.

The bike lanes video is the perfect example.

\- It plays to the belief of bikers that the city doesn't care about them and
keeps ruining bike lanes. "SEE?! How difficult it is to be a biker in NYC?
This is what we deal with everyday!"

\- It plays to the belief of people who _want_ to be bikers (it is a healthy
hobby after all), but want a convenient excuse for it. "SEE!?! This is why I
don't bike - there are obstacles everywhere!"

There's something of the hero/martyr complex in there as well ("I'm a hero
because I bike to work despite all the obstacles")

Same with the iPod video. It confirms the biases of the Apple haters (and
there are plenty of them) as the company being closed and anti-consumer.

------
ibudiallo
There is another thing Neistat likes to portray in his video that I think
makes him even more popular: The illusion of amateur.

His videos seems like they can be shot by anyone. But try skateboarding in the
middle of a busy New York street with cars going in both directions while
holding a heavy tripod camera on one hand, a remote on the other, and talking
to the camera and saying hi to fans on the street, and finishing that
narrative you started two miles ago all at the same time.

~~~
bb2018
I have probably only seen 4-5 videos of his in my life but I did once see a
man that look like him flying a drown around the beaches of Santa Monica. I
cam back an hour later and he was still there flying a drone.

I was pretty sure it was him and followed his videos for a couple more weeks
until a video of him in Santa Monica came out.

I am not into vloggers and agree most play up their amateur status but I was
still impressed by the hands-on dedication he was putting into getting one
shot.

~~~
PascLeRasc
It's especially impressive when you consider that for all the shots in his
video where you see him come into a building or ride up and pick up the
camera, he has to first go there and set up the camera. Repeating everything
like that takes a lot of dedication.

~~~
rorykoehler
It is his job. I'm not an expert on the latest tech for cameras but surely
they have remote activation tech now (wifi?)? He could just set it up before
he leaves and activate it when he is about to arrive?

~~~
kkarakk
have you ever tried leaving an expensive camera anywhere in new york? that
thing would be gone in an hour

~~~
rorykoehler
Even in his studio?

~~~
kkarakk
seeing as how he uses a different shot everytime of him entering his studio -
your point is still moot

------
IAmGraydon
I think the author and commenters here are missing something. To make
something viral, you have to make it addictive. To make it addictive, you have
to make it rewarding. To make it more rewarding than the rest of the
competition, you have to make it unique.

The fact that he's "breaking expectations" is what makes his content unique.
What makes it REWARDING to watch is that it allows viewers to live vicariously
in situations that they would never have the guts (for lack of a better word)
to do themselves. Defying the NYPD. Proving the cops wrong. Sticking it to a
big corporation like Nike. Being a thief and getting away with it.
Again...sticking it to big corporations - Apple. Have you noticed that every
one of these gets one over on the entities that most people feel keep them
down? Nothing is more rewarding than winning, and his content lets people
vicariously feel what it's like to win over the thing that they really hate.
They thing that they subconsciously blame for all of their problems. The
authority. The man.

This is what the author has completely missed. I could make a video where I
turn on a light switch but instead the radio turns on. That breaks
expectation, but it is not rewarding. If you want the viewer's reward system
to fire, you need to engage their mirror neurons. You have the let them see
you doing something they wish they could do. You have to get them to feel
reward that they find missing in their lives. THAT is the real key to viral
videos.

~~~
denlekke
the living vicarious value is huge. it's not just "wouldn't have the guts to
do" though. it is about not having the wealth, time, energy, or ability to do.
his video portrays a life of a wealthy man who gets to have fun and behave
like a kid. a dream that appeals to many people.

------
soegaard
"How to Casey Neistadt a VLOG" by Sara Dietschy.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVC6WO_SEmw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVC6WO_SEmw)

~~~
TaylorGood
Which, put her on the map as a Vlogger.

------
j7ake
The strategy is simple to put into words, but it is still extremely difficult
to implement into practice. If it were simple to put into practice, then
Neistat would not be distinguishing himself from others.

~~~
nate
Definitely! I tried to convey that in the article: "And though it is still
hard, and potentially risky, if you filter your ideas through this lens,
you’ll get much more impact from your own ideas."

I totally agree. I was just telling someone else on Twitter about this topic
but I have many more marketing campaign ideas that pass the smell test of
"will this break expectations" but they make me stressed to pull off. They
risk life, property or reputation. So yeah, they can be super difficult. And
they don't just come to me overnight. The campaign I mentioned in the article
took me months to execute on the way I wanted to.

Edit: And one more thing I'd add. Putting more work of ours through the filter
"will this break expectations" doesn't have to have as lofty of a goal as
Neistat level virality. I think most of us asking this of our blog posts,
videos, apps, etc. would vastly improve the success of our work to a degree
still plenty big enough for us.

~~~
icpmacdo
You did a comedian's in cars getting coffee for tech with the npm creator
right? Please do more of those with other tech people.

------
rbreve
Not only that but Casey is also a great story teller, filmmaker and editor,
they way he makes his videos are incredible. He makes mundane things look
cool.

~~~
gniv
Yes, exactly. The article points out one aspect of Casey's videos, but I think
it's a minor one. Casey is probably as talented as the most talented directors
in Hollywood. So asking what makes them viral is like asking why a director's
movies are successful. (It's a useful thing to study, but it's a difficult
endeavor.)

------
mrhappyunhappy
A while back I would run affiliate offers of different variety on Facebook and
I discovered something interesting. A lot of times it wasn’t about a
particular spin on the subject you are trying to promote, and more about how
many people like and share your comment at a continuous rate. My suspicion is
that it takes a few special accounts to share content with a few more special
accounts and do this just enough times for things to go viral. What do I mean
by special? Accounts which have friends/followers with the same mindset who
are likely to also share the content. It’s like going out in the forest and
walking into 5 spider webs in a row to get really pissed. It takes a
consecutive successful event chain to trigger a viral reaction.

I put this theory to the test by promoting the same exact affiliate message
under the guise of some fun content several times over the course of the week,
at different times of the day. Results were almost predictable. One message
might go viral if shared at a time when more people were sharing as initial
“seeders” (basically your content is shared quickly at first). Another exactly
the same message would not take off when the seed rate was too slow (likely
due to uninterested people who were shared to from likeminded people). I could
get 2 out of 5 identical messages to go viral given a fast seed rate with some
luck.

------
alexashka
There's a great deal of luck involved. Casey is a curious case of someone who
is not interesting, deep, gifted or talented at anything, and yet has a
massive audience.

With Casey, he was doing online video, when so few people were, that anything
could become a smash hit. His other hits have to do with him already being an
established name.

It is not unlike Dan Bilzerian - except Dan openly admits he got very lucky to
end up where he is at, and so there aren't articles being written on how to
become the next Dan or use his 'poker strategy', or maybe there are, I
wouldn't be surprised :)

~~~
packetslave
Disagree strongly that Casey is "not interesting, deep, gifted or talented at
anything". He's a professional filmmaker who did plenty of TV and commercial
work (including selling an 8-episode TV series to HBO) before ever getting
into YouTube.

His "secret" was bringing his experience with professional cinematography and
production values and applying them to a medium (vlogging) that had
historically been very much an amateur game.

~~~
holografix
I have watched a few of his videos through my partner being a bit lonely
without a job since we started living in a new country without knowing anyone.

He does a great job of being conversational and mostly positive. It definitely
gives lonely people a boost.

Plus he took a chance at the right time and to paraphrase Peter Thiel “why
compete with the herd and try to squeeze through a tiny window? Just walk
around and go through the large gate no one has noticed or thought glamorous
enough”.

The world is littered with pretty good videographers, Casey is a pretty good
one that walked through the big YouTube gate instead. Now their are countless
sheep following suit.

------
burtonator
> We as a company should always grow. How about instead we start firing
> customers?

Joking aside, I actually do this...

We will sometimes have irrational customers and they DO impact our bottom
line.

If you have customers that constantly waste your time, ask for refunds for
insane reasons, complain about features you don't have and never promised to
implement - just fire them.

This is one of the reasons Terms of Service exist as well. Sometimes you have
a customer who tries to do something evil and you just have to fire them.

------
jameslk
Virality seems to be correlated with things that evoke emotions. Breaking
expectations can trigger emotions such as awe, shock, curiosity and anger.
Other things go viral too, such as things that make us laugh or make us feel
happy. To focus on just breaking expectations is missing the point.

------
ilovecaching
Are people so obsessed with monetary success that they'll sacrifice the joy of
programming and computer science to watch Casey Neistat's vlog four times in a
row? I guess my priorities are totally out of order.

I personally loathe sleazy marketing and the burlesque tonic people like
Neistat feed to the public. It's an embarrassment that his name makes it to
the front page of HN, when the post about XDP I was reading early today still
has half the points. We're completely obsessed with the wrong things.

~~~
cstrahan
> Are people so obsessed with monetary success that they'll sacrifice the joy
> of programming and computer science to watch Casey Neistat's vlog four times
> in a row? I guess my priorities are totally out of order.

Alternative take:

Programming is a job, and an often frustrating one at that. I could be be
programming all day, and every bit could help push my career (and financial
success) forward... but I'd rather not be obsessed with monetary success, and
instead choose to relax to video or two of whimsical goofball doing his thing.

And I say this as someone who has contributed an awful lot to open source.

~~~
ilovecaching
I'm personally motivated by computer science for its own sake. I don't
understand the viewpoint that it's a path to a monetary reward. I am
incredibly lucky that someone pays me for it, gives me free snacks, and does
my dry cleaning, but before that I was just as happy in grad school eating
ramen, uncovering the mysteries of computation.

I see Neistat as junk food, empty calories designed to keep us addicted to
that which gives us no nourishment. What relaxes me is getting to code on my
own time, without deadlines. I don't care if anyone uses my code, I do it for
myself.

