How Wordle Went Viral (And What We Can Learn From It)

02/03/22 • 38 min

3 Listeners

You know it, you love it...maybe you’ve never heard of it. Regardless, it’s the first viral trend of 2022 and after a rough few years, embracing something as wholesome as a free word puzzle has felt uniquely refreshing. But what made Wordle the viral sensation that it is? And what’s the best way creators can capitalize on a free service without destroying what made it special to begin with?

Like every success story and every creator misstep, there are lessons creators can learn from the absurd virality of Wordle. From its simplicity and innocence to the big scary question of monetization, this app-less internet game is both fun and a rich topic for discussion amongst creators of every niche.

In this episode, Charli, Haley, and Miguel discuss the wonder of Wordle, why it went viral, how the creator of Wordle can sustain its virality, and what every creator can learn from the success of a free word game taking the internet by storm.

Key Takeaways

[01:07] - Have you heard?
- [01:30] - TikTok is testing a paid subscriber model for creators.
- [02:22] - Instagram is launching subscriptions.
- [06:29] - YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki wrote a letter to the YouTube community with a breakdown of YouTube’s priorities for 2022 and a recap of impressive creator stats from 2021.
[08:33] - Today’s main topic: what can we learn from the virality of Wordle?
- [10:59] - Wordle is an addictive game with no barriers to entry.
- [14:37] - Wordle has given people a lighthearted excuse to check in with one another.
- [15:26] - The sharing function and scarcity of a one-game per day limit also contributed to its virality.
- [18:05] - There’s a compounding effect on the relevancy of something by the size of its adoption. In other words, something can be very fun, but if it doesn’t become embedded within a cultural wave, it won’t take off.
- [18:57] - There’s value in something that doesn’t immediately concern itself with monetization.
- [19:41] - Wordle has a universality to it that creators can apply to their own services.
- [23:54] - Starting a consultancy, including a TiPJAR, and capturing email addresses are great ways to monetize a free service without sacrificing integrity.
[34:31] - Creator callout! Noah from ProvocaTeach is launching a new site and has learned to code.
[35:58] - A sneak peek at our next episode.

Quotes

[17:11] - “There’s something very interesting and special about the fact that this is a thing that’s going viral when the sharing link doesn’t include a link to the project itself. You have to be invested to figure out how to play it yourself.” ~ @charliprangley

[19:49] - “A lot of times we’re talking to creators and we’re asking them to niche down, get really specific to their audience and don’t worry about the size of your niche, and niche down, niche down, niche down. Wordle’s really interesting because it’s totally universal. Everybody talks, everybody uses words, everyone writes. So I guess my lesson for creators is: what’s universal inside your niche? What’s universal inside your small little audience?” ~ @haleyjani

[18:57] - “There’s value in the success of the thing itself and not thinking about the full monetized pipeline. If the creator had thought, ‘Before I release this to the public, what sort of thing can I build around it to make something that makes money?”; that would have made it less interesting to people, it would have created barriers for people, which then would have made it not as viral which then maybe would have made it never take off.” ~ @miguelp.img

Links

Key Takeaways

[01:07] - Have you heard?
- [01:30] - TikTok is testing a paid subscriber model for creators.
- [02:22] - Instagram is launching subscriptions.
- [06:29] - YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki wrote a letter to the YouTube community with a breakdown of YouTube’s priorities for 2022 and a recap of impressive creator stats from 2021.
[08:33] - Today’s main topic: what can we learn from the virality of Wordle?
- [10:59] - Wordle is an addictive game with no barriers to entry.
- [14:37] - Wordle has given people a lighthearted excuse to check in with one another.
- [15:26] - The sharing function and scarcity of a one-game per day limit also contributed to its virality.
- [18:05] - There’s a compounding effect on the relevancy of something by the size of its adoption. In other words, something can be very fun, but if it doesn’t become embedded within a cultural wave, it won’t take off.
- [18:57] - There’s value in something that doesn’t immediately concern itself with monetization.
- [19:41] - Wordle has a universality to it that creators can apply to their own services.
- [23:54] - Starting a consultancy, including a TiPJAR, and capturing email addresses are great ways to monetize a free service without sacrificing integrity.
[34:31] - Creator callout! Noah from ProvocaTeach is launching a new site and has learned to code.
[35:58] - A sneak peek at our next episode.

Quotes

Links

Previous Episode

Lots of Attention for the Creator Economy

When someone stumbles upon something different, it usually takes mainstream society a while to catch up. Understanding and validating the power of creators and the creator economy is no different. After years of creators forging their own careers despite judgment and confusion, the universe is finally catching on. And everyone wants in on the lucrative new economy that’s disrupting a $2 trillion industry.

But when did the power players of society finally take notice of the creator economy? How can creators best leverage this newfound validation? And will this normalization cause creators to lose sight of their original purpose? Good or bad, eyes on the creator economy will only expand.

In this episode, Charli, Haley, and Miguel dive into the recent Forbes article, To Succeed in the Creator Economy, Startups Should Address Creators’ Needs. The three discuss how creators should respond to the attention, why startups and businesses need a mindset shift when it comes to their relationship with creators, and what’s next for the creator economy all around us.

Key Takeaways

[00:54] - Have you heard?
- [01:40] - A TikToker is now the face of a Gucci-NorthFace collaboration.
- [02:28] - Instagram is testing allowing users to reorganize their profile grid.
- [03:23] - James Clear’s Atomic Habits was the #1 best-selling book on Amazon in 2021.
- [05:31] - Instagram is now allowing users to choose how their feed is sorted.
[08:20] - A recent Forbes article argues that startups must address creators’ needs in order to survive in the modern creator economy.
- [11:23] - Creating as a profession has become normalized and because of that, creators have the power to disrupt the mainstream media.
- [15:26] - When did society start validating the creator economy? When creators learned to monetize their business? Or when venture capitalists finally started paying attention?
- [20:23] - There are three things startups can do to solve challenges in the creator economy: mitigating creator burnout, tailoring solutions to creators, and viewing creators as design partners rather than just employees.
- [26:06] - Startups must also tailor solutions to a creator’s audience.
- [26:55] - Creators have to establish the precedent of demanding proper payment for their labor, regardless of how exciting a partnership may seem.
[31:05] - Introducing creator callout!
[32:56] - A sneak peek at next week’s episode.

Quotes

[10:33] - “The creator economy is just the economy now, and we are all living within the creator economy whether we are a creator or not. This is happening, this is the way the world is going. And so if businesses want to succeed in this new way of doing business in this new economy, then creators need to be considered as a key audience.” ~ @charliprangley[14:27] - “Whenever the business itself is surrounded around someone’s creativity or someone doing something themselves, I feel like people’s minds tend to go to this place of illegitimacy. And it’s important to remember that it’s very legitimate because there are entire markets out there that are built around creativity.” ~ @miguelp.img [21:24] - “That is actually really what I think doesn’t happen often enough is that creators don’t position themselves as partners, they position themselves as employees of this company where they bring so much value.” ~ @haleyjani

Links

Next Episode

Why Deliverability Matters with Alyssa Dulin and Melissa Lambert

2 Recommendations

There’s no better feeling than building a livelihood doing the work you love. For many creators, that means a life of painting, pottery, design, and left-brain thinking. But to succeed as a full-time creator, you have to get technical every once in a while. If you’re not a numbers person and shy away from the analytical aspects of email and business marketing, ConvertKit has a built-in set of technical experts ready to explain.

Enter Alyssa Dulin and Melissa Lambert, ConvertKit deliverability experts and hosts of the podcast Deliverability Defined.

So what is deliverability? In simple terms, deliverability refers to the number of messages reaching your inbox versus the spam folder. Just like the post office, even though a letter or package is marked as “delivered”, that doesn’t always mean it’s sitting in your mailbox ready to be opened. Luckily, there are ways to resolve email deliverability issues and here at ConvertKit, Alyssa and Melissa are pros at helping creators solve those issues and reach the inboxes of their subscribers.

In this episode, Charli, Haley, and Miguel talk with Alyssa and Melissa about why deliverability matters, how to improve your sender reputation, why removing subscribers from your list is actually a great strategy, and how to embrace life’s (and email’s) technicalities.

Key Takeaways

[01:06] - Have you heard?
- [01:46] - Wordle was acquired by the New York Times.
- [04:19] - An upcoming Apple update will turn every iPhone into a form of contactless payment.
- [05:28] - ConvertKit is conducting a survey about the creator economy.
[06:24] - Today’s main topic: Why Deliverability Matters.
- [10:28] - Deliverability means the number of messages that go to the inbox versus the spam folder. Mailbox providers won’t tell you where they place a message so you have to use other metrics to determine your deliverability such as delivery rates and open rate trends.
- [12:49] - ConvertKit doesn’t accept spammers or those with incredibly poor list health to protect the deliverability of other ConvertKit customers.
- [18:39] - Where your emails are placed is often based on your sender reputation. A “sender reputation” is determined by the “positive” and “negative” reactions of the people receiving your emails.
- [20:46] - When recipients engage with your emails (reply, click links, etc.), that’s a positive signal that boosts your sender reputation. Try to be creative with the strategies you employ to encourage engagement.
- [23:26] - Your sender reputation is tied to yourself as the sender as well as your ESP. However, your sending domain as the creator carries the most reputational weight.
- [27:20] - A DMARC record prevents spammers from using your sender domain or “spoofing.”
- [28:49] - Sometimes creators use a verified sending domain to help bolster and authenticate their sender status. To have an account with ConvertKit, you have to use a verified sending domain.
- [32:25] - Remove unengaged subscribers from your list every six months. It’s better to have a small list of highly engaged subscribers than a lengthy list of cold subscribers, for the sake of your deliverability and your bottom line.
[36:11] - Creator callout! Laura Vanagaite is an amazing illustrator and branding expert who recently had some of her illustrations shared by great influencers.
[37:12] - A sneak peek at our next episode.

Quotes

[18:54] - “Your sender reputation is very similar to a credit score. It’s very easy to damage and not as easy to build back up again.” ~ @mel_lambert_

[20:46] - “One thing we’ve been talking about a lot on this season of Deliverability Defined is those creative strategies to increase engagement. There are a lot of different ways you can encourage people to engage with your messages.” ~ @alyssa_dulin

[32:38] - “Keep a clean list. If you have never run any kind of cold subscriber re-engagement, if you’ve never cleaned your list before, that’s a really good place to start. You just want to make sure that you’re sending to the people on your list who are most engaged. And if you aren’t, that can sometimes negatively impact your sender reputation.” ~ @mel_lambert_

Links