It's an economics term originally, but it applies to everything. In today's social media eccentric world, it's amazing how many people you can reach with a few "likes" on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, etc. Soon, the likes and shares start compounding, as 1st level impressions get tranferred to their followers and their followers followers. You can see how quickly a video can spread. Thus viral content.
We're not typically after "viral videos". We want lasting content that can stick around and represent your organization for a long time; but there is something to be said about reaching your audience and prospective clientele. It not only is good for business, but it cuts down on your ROI. Every next person who sees your video just cut the cost of the video exponentially.
So your methods of distribution are important to how many people end up seeing the final product. We recommend direct email campaigns with links to the video, strong use of social media (sending out at multiple times to make sure maximum amount of eyeballs), encouraging followers to like/retweet/share.
Our latest client has done this, taking advantage of their audience size and passionate base. With only a modest amount of shares in the first few hours, the post started to compound, and like a roaring wave began to gain steam. By the end of the first week, they had done something incredible, achieving several thousand impressions across all platforms, building more passion within their base, and showing off their new video which indeed captured that passion. This is exactly what we've set out to do!