[Watch me talk about this post with Michael Brandvold on the Music Biz Weekly Episode 195 on YouTube here or listen to it on Soundcloud here.]

YouTube is the number one search engine for music, so having at least one or two music videos up there seems like a no brainer, check-the-box item for an indie musician.

And once in a while, a music video from an unknown artist goes viral, giving them a huge boost in visibility.

As indie artists, we all feel the pressure to produce a stellar music video (or two), and we look with no small amount of envy at those artists who seem to get discovered overnight via their viral music video. But how is it done? Can you make a music video that is more likely to go viral?

I’m less interested in the viral videos by popular stars like Taylor Swift (Bad Blood) or Sia (Elastic Heart, Big Girls Cry), because those are undoubtedly supported by large online marketing efforts. I’m more interested in music videos made by relatively unknown artists with small to zero marketing budgets which nonetheless seem to have caught on and propelled those musicians’ careers forward in a significant way.

So let’s look at three recent examples.

How I Became The Bomb’s Ulay, Oh

This video was originally released in October of 2014, but it was very recently discovered and promoted by several blogs like Marie Claire and The Mind Unleashed. The story of the video footage as well as the music video’s sudden popularity is described succinctly in an article in the Nashville Scene.

As of this post’s writing date, the video has received over 3 million views. It’s the only video posted by the group on their YouTube channel, MrHIBTB.

Note that the original film footage, used reportedly with permission of the artist, came from Marina Abramovic e Ulay. It is a video of a unique and riveting Abromavic performance art piece at MOMA in NYC with a powerful back story about the relationship between Abramovich and Ulay. The original footage (without the HIBTB track) was posted in December 2012 and has received over 10.6 million views on YouTube. Marina Abromavic has interacted with many famous musicians, including Jay Z and Lady Gaga, but is relatively unknown outside of the art literati circles in the US.

HIBTB is signed to the Decibel Collective label (started by Olivier Chastan of INgrooves), and were a relatively unknown band, until this week.

Shannon Curtis’ I Know, I Know

I first saw Shannon’s video after encountering her on Twitter during the Thursday ggchat. She had been invited on the chat to talk about house concerts (she’s written a great little paperback called No Booker, No Bouncer, No Bartender, about how to throw a successful house concert that I’ve bought, read, and can highly recommend.)

Shannon’s video touches on the powerful and timely themes of depression, bullying, and suicide. It illustrates the power of music to shine a light on the darkness, dispel shame, bring us together in our common experiences and lift us up from the depths. Shannon uses the technique where people silently hold up cards with short phrases on them which was pioneered (in part) by Amanda Palmer.

Shannon has been active as a musician since 2006, and has released several albums, licensed songs for television and worked with many well-known producers. She is with the Saint Cloud Records label.

Shannon’s video was published April 7, 2015 and has received over 11,000 views at the time of this post.

Laura Sullivan’s 900 Voices

Laura Sullivan is a Grammy-winning pianist and New Age music artist whom I “met” via the indie Grammy artist Facebook group. Her album, Love’s River, won a Grammy in the 56th (fall 2013) awards cycle, and I interviewed her in January 2014 for my blog post about the Grammy awards process for indie artists.

Laura’s newest project (disclaimer alert: I am a participant in this video, but I doubt you will notice me amongst all the many collaborators) is an artfully edited mashup of many different global voices singing a fairly simple song Laura wrote. Laura did an amazing job setting this project up, soliciting participation from around the world from young and old, and then editing the many, many resulting hours of audio and video.

The video has even been submitted to the Guinness Book of World Records for most different languages featured in a released song.

Laura has released her music under the Sentient Spirits label.

As of this date, the video, which was posted April 9, 2015, has received over 410,000 views.

What Elements Do These Videos Share?

Let’s first assume you have a reasonably good song, with good musicianship and production. Now what can you and I learn from these three videos to help create a compelling (and hopefully viral) music video?

Here are the five elements I believe these music videos share:

1. They are all videos which are deeply emotional. They make you feel. Jay Baer (Convince and Convert) thinks this is the number one reason (of four) that videos go viral and I would agree.
2. They feature commonly shared human experiences and ultimately express uplifting themes. The theme of each video is externally focused and timeless, not trendy. These are not songs about the naked women, bottles in the club, pet tricks, or amazing stunts. The universal human themes of these videos mean they will have a large target market, because people of every age, race and culture can relate to the experiences they illustrate (love, depression and alienation, and global connectedness).
3. None of the videos feature the actual artists performing the song. This is in line with one of Jay’s other tenets, which is that the video not be overly promotional.
4. Two out of three videos were crowd-sourced (video footage came from others and was edited together by the artist/their team to fit the song). The Ulay, Oh song seems to have been written specifically about the (unrelated to the band) love story of two performance artists who encountered each other unexpectedly after many years.
5. The videos were actively promoted via social media with a concerted effort that focused on a network of blogs and social media influencers. All of these videos have benefited from an orchestrated campaign to promote them on sites like Twitter, Reddit, and Facebook. Laura Sullivan recruited all 900 of her video participants, created a Facebook page just for the video itself, and gave us all pre-scripted content to share via social media. I can personally attest that Laura has been politely, relentlessly and tirelessly promoting 900 Voices on social media since long before its release. HIBTB submitted to Reddit and other sites:

#UlayOh "Ulay, Oh" has been submitted to Reddit Give us an upvote, if you please: http://t.co/Sq7tJDp4Ik

— HowIBecametheBomb (@HIBtheBomb) May 31, 2015

So if, like me, you are pondering your next music video, it might be worth watching these three videos and figuring out how you can learn from them.

More to read about making your music video go viral:

• How To Generate A Viral Music Video In 5 Steps, Olivia Solon in Wired UK
• Controversial Tips on How To Make Music Video Go Viral, by Corey Koehler on MusicGoat
• 9 Ways to Make Your Music Go Viral, by James Moore on Independent Music Promotions
• 10 Ways To Make Your Video Go Viral, Karen X. Cheng

What do you think of these videos? Of the 5 commonalities I listed? Am I missing anything? I welcome your comments and feedback in the comments below.