Why Some Instagram Reels Explode (and Most Don't)

[00:02] after reel after reel after reel to Instagram just hoping that one of them will eventually take off, but you are freaking stuck in 200 view purgatory, well then lucky for you, you are watching this video. Without knowing it,

[00:14] you might be committing these deadly reel sins. Okay, they're not deadly simple mistakes that I think are backfiring on you. So in this video, I'm going to share with you two things that might make any reel go viral, what

[00:30] you're probably doing wrong, aka what's keeping you under the 200 view range, and at the very end, I'm going to share with you the three moments that every video needs to have if you want to increase your chances of going viral on

[00:46] Instagram. These three moments I have never talked about on this channel yet, and so I'm so excited to drop these nuggets here for you today. Um, now I want nuggets. Why did I say that? A huge thank you to

[00:59] ManyChat for sponsoring this video, and as always, timestamps are below. Use them if you need them. Let's jump into it. The two things that help reels go viral. Let's start with the basics here, and then throughout the video, let's

[01:11] and then throughout the video, let's build on top of these. So, viral reels, number one, know how to disrupt the scroll. I have a really hard time saying that word, disrupt disrupt disrupt the scroll. I think we all know by now how

[01:25] important the hook of your video is. I've been saying that you need to capture your audience in the first 3 seconds of your video, but honestly, you need to capture somebody's attention within the first millisecond that they

[01:38] land on your video. Viewers or scrollers are so desensitized to standard hooks and will immediately scroll past content that they don't immediately perceive as entertaining or something that they will get value from. Viral videos know how to

[01:53] use their hooks to disrupt someone's scrolling behavior. So, how do you do this? Again, there's going to be a bajillion different ways. I got to be one-size-fits-all. You're going to go viral with this, but I can teach you

[02:06] what I know and what I've seen works. And one way to do this, and this is the with hook layering. Now, the reason I'm starting with this in the beginning of the video is because I feel like this method has become common knowledge in

[02:19] the industry. So, for some of you, this might be review. And that's why we're haven't heard of hook layering, this is when you simultaneously use three hooks within those first 3 seconds. You have a visual hook, a text hook, and a verbal

[02:34] or audio hook. Your visual hook is what is happening on camera. This is the visual that is going to stop somebody's attention or stop their scroll, capture a viewer's attention. Visual hooks can happen in so many different ways. It

[02:49] could be you moving into frame, stepping into frame, spinning on your chair, putting your phone down, having pop-ups happen, or even like holding an iced coffee or food. There's lots of visual things that you can do to capture

[03:02] someone's attention and keep them watching. The text hook is the text on screen that somebody reads to capture their attention or stop their scroll. And the audio hook is something audible that a viewer hears that makes them want

[03:15] hook, this could simply be a trending audio that somebody recognizes, sound effects, or even saying like a bold statement up front. When we did a deep dive on my channel analyzing viral short-form videos, there was a lot of

[03:29] like exclamations as verbal hooks, like, "Oh my gosh!" or like a gasp, or like somebody screaming. So, there's a lot of like exclamations. Let's break down an example of this reel fast to go over the text, visual, and verbal. With this reel

[03:43] that I posted, the text hook is like, "Create your own video editing signature what they're going to gain when they watch the video. But the verbal hook, I wasn't repeating the same thing. I said, "So, I heard you want to edit videos

[03:57] asking, "Hey, how do I edit videos like this? How do I do the text pop-up?" So, complemented each other, and then visually I was kind of showing all these questions and pop-ups with like boop boop boop boop boop. Everybody asking,

[04:12] that's kind of example of how all three of those things can work together. These three hooks layered on top of one another increases the chances of somebody watching your reel all the way through, basically telling Instagram,

[04:25] "Hey, this video is worth watching." which encourages the algorithm to show it to more people. And then, if you could layer these three things together in a way that captures your audience's attention, then you can get a viral

[04:37] breaking this down, that's why I'm not going fully in-depth right now with this tip. So, if you want to see hook layering in-depth and explained laid out for you, then I definitely recommend watching this video next because that is

[04:52] dedicated to hook layering. Now, the second thing that viral reels do is that they spark conversation. Instagram pushes content that sparks conversation because engagement is engagement, baby. And if your video is

[05:06] getting lots of it, Instagram's not filtering good versus bad engagement. It's just going to see active conversation happening. When there is active conversation happening in the comment section, you potentially could

[05:18] get yourself a viral reel. Now, there is a push and pull aspect to conversation. a push and pull aspect to conversation. One is sparking conversation and getting the ball rolling, and then the other is you continuing that conversation. So,

[05:32] simply put, sparking engagement is inviting people to comment down below on your video or giving them a reason to comment, whereas continuing the comments, giving your post more engagement. Now, there's three ways that

[05:46] you could spark conversation on your videos. We have call to action, delivering extra value where someone has to comment to get like a reward, and then the third one is to talk about a polarizing topic or opinion. Let's talk

[05:59] about each of these. First up is our lowest hanging fruit. That's simply This doesn't even have to be at the end of your video, and we're not being vague here. We're not going like, "Oh, what do you think about this? Let me know in the

[06:14] comments below." Like we're not being vague here. We are saying things like comment the podcast that you have had on repeat the past few years. For me, Crime Junkie. That is all that I listen to. I can't get enough of it. Or tag your

[06:29] favorite brand that you would want to collab with down in the comments. Maybe even like what's the best mom advice that you've ever heard and has stayed with you for the longest time. Let me know down in the comments. If you could

[06:41] invite the viewer and give them an opportunity to talk about themselves, like their favorite things, lessons they've learned, their unique story, they are way more likely to comment about themselves than they are to

[06:54] comment about you. People love sharing their opinions. That's why so many people they don't want to be the face of the account, but they're going to eat it going to share their opinions in the comment section. Now the next way to

[07:07] spark conversation is to deliver extra value to the viewer. For example, if they are watching your video and it's about your five favorite AI tools to help content creators. That's already amazing and it's delivering great value.

[07:21] But then if you say in the video, "I actually created a free guide that has over 50 AI prompts that you could use to automate your business as a content creator. Comment the word guide and I'll send this to you for free." You just

[07:34] leveled up the value that they originally came for and increasing lots of engagement on your post because you're going above and beyond in helping them with not only, "Hey, here's five things." but here's also that next step

[07:48] that you can take. This is genuinely one of my favorite things to do, not just for like virality reasons, but because I love creating free offers for my audience. And every single time I use this sort of value strategy where I have

[08:01] a DM automation set up on the back end, that post performs consistently better than any of my other posts where I don't have DM automation set up. I'm not just saying that because I'm biased. I like love DM automation. I'm not just saying

[08:15] that. I literally I have the app on my phone. It's called Stanley. It's an app that connects with your Instagram and it helps you read your analytics, etc., asked it the other day. I was like, "Hey, can you analyze like my top

[08:28] see what's performing for me because I'm trying to figure out like what to post And the first thing Stanley identified for me, I have screenshots right here, my top performing content always had comment to DM automations set up. If you

[08:43] do not have comment to DM automations currently set up with your content, you are wildly missing out on such easily accessible engagement opportunities. I ManyChat, which I've been using personally since 2022, and who is also

[08:57] the sponsor of this video. ManyChat's the number one automation platform in the world dedicated to empowering creators by equipping them with tools that streamline marketing so that they could focus on creating. Within ManyChat

[09:11] when I have extra value that I want to deliver to my audience, I just set up a comment to DM automation where when someone comments using a specific phrase link to that resource, whether it's a guide, an affiliate link, a YouTube

[09:26] video, an article, a podcast. It could be anything. And that instant gratification that you give to your followers, they now associate that with you. And if you don't have a freebie or digital product to deliver, that's

[09:39] totally fine, too. Another option that you could do is to send personalized audio or videos to them. Because, yes, that is also a thing. Let's say your reel was about listing your top YouTube gear recommendations, and the call to

[09:54] action could be comment the word setup and I will show you my exact YouTube setup. Then, when somebody comments setup, they get a message confirming and in that video you could show them your setup. Now, when adding media to

[10:10] your Instagram automations, like voice memos or videos, it's important to follow the platform-specific guidelines to ensure everything looks and works perfectly. I'll put screenshots on the screen of what those are for Instagram.

[10:25] Now, when we talk about the push and pull of creating conversations, well, not only does the call to action in your reel spark comments, but ManyChat also will automatically reply to those comments after they've sent somebody the

[10:40] ensuring, basically, that you're getting more engagement on your post, and also making your job way easier because you don't have to worry about, "Oh, which comments have been replied to? Oh, did I

[10:52] they get the message?" Like, you never have to miss any sort of connection again. Again, anytime I have this setup on one of my pieces of content, the engagement just goes through the roof. So, one simple automation can turn into

[11:06] like this viral snowball. If you want to try out ManyChat Pro for free for 30 days, you could use the link down below with the code Modern Millie, and you I had said there were three ways that you could spark conversation. Call to

[11:20] actions, delivering extra value, and talking about a polarizing topic or opinion. The third one is where controversial opinions can work in your favor. Like, what sort of polarizing topic can you talk about? Do you have a

[11:35] contrarian take that could be worth sharing? Do you say Reese's or Reese's? It's Reese's and anyone who says otherwise, it's literally in the commercial. Reese's Puffs, Reese's Puffs. Peanut butter chocolate flip

[11:50] Reese's. Like if you could get heated talking about a topic, that's probably going to be a spark conversation worthy video. Or like if I were to say something like being a content creator is a real job. That's going to heat some

[12:04] people up. Or even like college just isn't necessary anymore. Some people are going to get triggered. That's going to spark some feelings and when people have feelings, that could mean some debate and debate means engagement. So you

[12:17] could talk about things like money, career, relationships, productivity, business, mistakes, unpopular opinions. Does the toilet paper go over or under? controversial about money or about health, like your health matters. Like

[12:33] that's a no-duh statement, but more like your unique take on crazy topics or widely appealing topics. So instead of here are three things that you could do if you want to lose weight. That's like a common intro to hooks statement.

[12:50] Instead of that, you could say something very polarizing like the only way you're to accept the fact that you have to track your macros. You know, like if you say that or like you have to count your calories. Like wild opinion like that,

[13:06] that's what I mean. Okay, now that we talked about like the two most common things that create viral reels, let's talk about why most reels fail and then we'll wrap up with those three moments every viral reel typically has. The

[13:21] reason why some reels for you might be failing is the hook. And to see if that your analytics. And if the graph looks something like this, your hook needs work. Have you cut out the breath of death where it's like that awkward pause

[13:36] So, filler words got to go. We're not starting our words with so, um, hey. Right? We're not saying, "So, hey guys. Today I wanted to talk to you about"

[13:49] You want to give somebody a reason to stay within those first few seconds. of hook. You have like the verbal hook, the text hook, the visual hook. But one getting the reach that you think they should be getting is that hook. Check

[14:04] the analytics and see if you have to rework it. Another reason why most Reels might fail is because they're failing at adding value. If your Reel looks like this, this means your hook was great, but you didn't really deliver on the

[14:16] beginning, or people just scrolled because they weren't resonating with the value. Value is one of those woo-woo words where what is value? What is the meaning of life? Typically, here on my channel I talk about there's like four

[14:31] associate videos with. You have educational, entertaining, relatable, inspirational. If a video isn't one of those things, people might just scroll. video, that's something you want to be asking yourself like how is this of

[14:46] value to somebody right now? Is this going to be educational? If it's not entertaining enough to keep their attention? Is it fast-paced? How's the editing? Is this relatable? Can someone else, my target audience, watch this and

[15:00] be like, "Oh my gosh, same. Yes, me." And then inspirational, when somebody watches that, do they feel inspired? Do they feel uplifted, motivated? Those are typically the types of value that people are gaining when scrolling. And if you

[15:15] are failing to identify which of those your video is hitting, your video is likely just flopping. It's important to note that value is absolutely subjective. Like what's valuable to you might not be valuable to somebody else.

[15:30] Like I will just binge watch any book recommendation video and I will just keep saving them and adding those videos that the book recommendations to like a want to read. And then I'll add those books to my list of TBR of like, oh, I

[15:45] this book. Like that's a whole activity for me. I love it. But my husband's not watch a book recommendation video. He doesn't even enjoy reading the same types of books that I do. So, you have to think about not just what's valuable

[15:59] for you, but who are you creating this for and what do you think they will interpret as valuable? Again, this is one of those things where it's like, blah blah blah. It's like, you won't know until you try. You won't know until

[16:12] you start creating and trying things out, which leads us to the next reason why some reels won't go viral and that's because most creators fail to try new things and create differentiation with their content. I see this time and time

[16:27] again where creators often post the same type of video over and over and over waiting for one of them to take off. And if it's not taking off and you're just doing the same thing but expecting different results, that's on you, boo

[16:39] Am I being mean in this video? Feel like I'm being mean. I'm not trying to be mean. We just we want to see content variety. You want to have content variety. You want to test different formats and different delivery types.

[16:55] you going to do voiceover? Is it B-roll with text? Is it a reaction video? Are you going to share like an industry update of a news article that's to lean into a trending audio? Like I want you to test so many different

[17:11] want you to test so many different content types. Virality is usually not random. I know there are these moments where creators are like, I really didn't just like the most casual video and I just posted it and it took off. That

[17:24] happens all the time. But also, a lot of the creators that you're following, like Mr. Beast, if you're following Mr. Beast, his virality is not an accident. He has a strategy. He knows what makes his audience tick and he didn't just

[17:38] like, if you go to the back of his like first ever YouTube videos, he didn't just keep doing the same thing over and over. He evolved his content over time these different cues of like, okay, well, this isn't working, so I need to

[17:52] try something else. The more you test, the quicker you'll come across the video types that are viral for you. Now, the three key moments that I feel like every video or viral video leans into and does really well is a hook, an itch, and a

[18:08] payoff. When you understand the structure, you start realizing that structure, you start realizing that viral videos are rarely about the topic itself. It's how the video is crafted. Some people weigh the importance of

[18:22] topic completely different and just going to depend on different educators and people that you follow. I don't think there's like right or wrong way. Personally for me, I believe it's not really about the topic itself. it went

[18:35] viral is not because of the topic, it's how the video was crafted. Because you could have the most boring topic in the world and still create viral content. doesn't matter what you want to post a video on, the topic you choose doesn't

[18:52] matter. It's all about how it's crafted. An example, and then I'll kind of break for example, I'm sure if you were like scrolling on Reels, you saw a video, this mom, maybe she's in her car, it's me, hi, I'm the mom in the car. I don't

[19:06] know. And I'm just came back from grocery shopping and I was like, oh man, this toilet paper is my favorite toilet paper." Or like, "Oh, I just finished grocery shopping and this is the toilet paper that I always get. I always get it

[19:19] for my family. It's just our favorite." Like, that's boring. That's a boring intro, boring topic. No one really cares about what toilet paper you got. But, if you craft it in a particular way where like you are unrolling the toilet paper

[19:34] and like you have it and you say something wild. Like, "No one loves an itchy crack." Like that packaging, people are going to care. They're going to pay attention. It doesn't matter how boring the topic was, it's about how the

[19:46] video was crafted. So, hook itch Oh my gosh, how funny. It's hook itch payoff Okay, hook. We already talked about the hook a little bit. So, let's go a little bit beyond hook layering. When you are creating a video, instead of thinking

[20:02] about?" Or, "What am I going to be teaching in this video? What's the payoff? What's the value going to be?" I want you to challenge yourself and try this. Not with every video, but maybe try experiment with it and try asking

[20:15] the very first thing that you plan. Try asking yourself, "What visual moment Before you even have a video concept in mind, just think about what would be like the most wildest visual hook. Something slightly confusing or

[20:28] unexpected or something that creates curiosity. For example, a simple one could be like drinking soda through a licorice straw. Like, that's intriguing. Or if you're pouring a gallon of paint over your head, very interesting visual

[20:43] hook. Opening a briefcase full of $1 bills, interesting visual hook. Those visuals immediately make the viewer think like, "Wait, what's going on here?" And that moment of curiosity is what's going to stop the scroll. That's

[20:57] the hook. Now comes the second moment. This is the itch. This is where you introduce a curiosity gap that makes the viewer want to stay till the very end. And I don't mean the typical line like >> And if you stay till the end, I'm going

[21:10] >> I mean, I do that all the time. I'm not like making fun. That's not what I'm talking about. That's not like an itch. That's more of like a summary or an introduction. An itch is when you plant a question in the viewer's brain that

[21:25] they think they thought of on their own. And now because they think they thought answered. It's like the itch that needs to be scratched. For example, if the didn't realize it at the time, but walking into this place ended up

[21:40] changing the entire direction of my life." The viewer is thinking, "Okay, well, how could a bathroom stall change someone's life?" If you're like filming in a bathroom stall, I don't know. And that curiosity is the itch. And the most

[21:54] important thing is that you don't scratch it right away. You don't deliver on, "Well, this is how it changed my life." You know, you let that curiosity kind of carry the viewer through the story, which brings us to the third

[22:06] moment, and that's the payoff. The payoff is when you finally deliver the payoff is when you finally deliver the answer to the curiosity that you created in the beginning. But, here's where a lot of creators get this wrong. The

[22:19] lot of creators get this wrong. The payoff shouldn't come after forever of filler content. It should come at the right time. Now, there's no like right time. I'm not saying like after 15 seconds or after 2 minutes. The goal is

[22:33] to deliver the payoff where the viewer leaves feeling, "Oh, wow. That was worth watching." And not feeling, "I just watched this whole video for that." Or

[22:46] even worse, they're not thinking like, "This video is dragging. Just get to the point." That's not what you want. You want to deliver at the right time where they feel satisfied. And again, like there's no magic formula here. It's just

[23:00] testing, trial, error, keeping the pace of the video as fast and short and long as it needs to be. Let me give you an example. A perfect example of this example. A perfect example of this structure would be something like this.

[23:13] to cross America in the next 30 days. So here with Ryan Trahan, he starts the video holding a penny and saying, "I'm going to travel across the country using going to travel across the country using only this." Immediately, curiosity. The

[23:27] itch is like, "Well, how far could you actually get starting with a penny? What do you mean you're going to travel the country using a penny? What do you mean?" That question sits in the viewer's brain the entire video and the

[23:41] payoff at the end, you finally get to see how far he made it and whether the challenge worked. The whole video is built around answering that question. This sort of strategy or craft is something that I've been so interested

[23:56] in and I'm actually doing an entire deep dive on a similar storytelling strategy in next week's video. So, make sure you are subscribed and you have your bell notifications turned on so you don't miss when I post it and I will see you

[24:11] in the next one. Thanks so much for watching. Follow your joy. Bye.