Rage baiting. This is one of the most viral and
toxic tactics happening right now on the internet.
And I want to talk about and explore why people
use this tactic, how it's deployed, and why you should
avoid it by all means necessary. I will also be talking
about other viral tactics like satire, click baiting,
shit posting, and more in the 320
second episode of the Mindful Marketing podcast. But
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Riverside for yourself. Thank you, Riverside.
This is my 3rd time recording this episode.
I'm just having a moment y'all. But I wanted to thank you for all
of the support from last week's podcast episode where
I announced that I retired my services, and I'm a full time
content creator now. It's hairy scary, but I'm here, and I'm happy, and I'm
loving it. And then, of course, I sit down to do this episode, and I
recorded it not once, not twice, but
thrice. Thrice I've recorded this episode.
Yeah. I don't know why I'm sharing that other than, you know, I think it's
the realness of what we do. Sometimes
this stuff looks easy, and it's not. It's hard. And, a lot of
the reasons why I had to record this are, first, I had
some incorrect information, then I sat down to record
it and just halfway through, my brain stuttered, and I couldn't think of anything
else. So I've got an outline that I'm following for this episode.
If you're watching the video, you'll see me looking at my notes. That's why, to
help me stay on track. Also wanted to share the realness of it all because
that's that's what's behind mindful marketing. It's not showing up perfectly,
but just showing up. Alright. So rage baiting.
This question came in from threads. I've been having a lot of
fun on threads right now. And, someone asked me about rage
baiting, like how it works and why it works
so well. And I was like, oh, this is a podcast episode. So here we
are. Rage baiting is content that's specifically
designed to make you angry or frustrated in order
to drive engagement. Comments, likes, shares,
all of it. It's a deliberate manipulation of
emotions, and it works because rage is one of the
most powerful emotions humans can have. Research
shows that people are more likely to share content that makes them
angry, and algorithms obviously reward this. Mister
Al, the algorithm has no clue if you're commenting,
liking, stitching, sharing a video
or whatever because you're angry. It just sees all the likes
and comments coming in and he goes, oh, great. Let's show this to more people.
And so people create this content,
specifically because, they want to incite
rage. They don't care. There's probably some sort of mental health issue
behind it. They probably are seeking any
sort of attention, and so this sort of attention gets them what they want.
And, also, there is a monetary reason behind it.
Creators on platforms like TikTok, Instagram,
threads now even YouTube, they are paid based on how
many times their content is viewed and the more people leave comments and share it,
the more it's viewed. So because of all of
this, we're we're battling
against rage baiting. And a lot of this content is
staged. Okay. Staged or fake news or misleading
headlines. And a lot of this comes from
TikTok. And I talk about TikTok a lot on this podcast
because TikTok kind of shifted the way that social media
works. So before 4 years ago, when TikTok
rose in popularity in 2020 during the global
pandemic and economic shutdown, we all turned to our
phones and we discovered TikTok at that moment. A lot of us
did. And a lot of the apps now are echoing
what we see on TikTok. Prior to that, we followed people and
then we saw their content. Okay. Maybe we saw content
if our followers engage with them. So we're connected with somebody
and then they get, you know, a and b people were connected and
then person b comments on person c's account. Even if I don't know
person c, I may still see their content because
person b commented on it and I'm connected with b, not
c. Okay. That's how social media worked before
TikTok. Now with the TikTok effect, you're seeing
content rise in popularity that you would have never
saw before because of discoverability. A lot
of our favorite forms are leaning into discoverable
content, which is both good and bad. So on the good side, as a business
owner, we want people to be able to discover our content. It doesn't matter if
we have 10 followers, a 100 followers, a 100000 followers. As long as
it's great content, the algorithm usually favors that and it'll get
seen. On the flip side, the algorithm has no idea
if it's rage bait or not and also pushes out all of that content as
well. K? So the virality component
of TikTok is echoed across multiple platforms now. It's not just
TikTok. We've got Instagram reels. We've got Facebook. We've got
threads. I challenge you to scroll through your favorite social media app and make a
mental note of the people of the of the content you're seeing in your feed.
Is it from people you follow, or is it from people you don't?
Like, take a look at the balance of that, and you'll be surprised to see
that they've sort of boiled the frog on us. And we're now
seeing equal, if not more, content from people we don't follow
in our social feeds. And this is all because of the TikTok effect. Now
I want to talk a little bit about rage baiting and how it fits
into a family of irritating
content strategies, from satirical content all the way
up to rage baiting. I got to talk about the differences between these because
at the end of the day, they're there to get attention. And to be honest
with you, we are all on the Internet to get attention. I don't care what
anyone says. As much as they crap on influencers
and say, oh, they're just out here for likes.
Hello. That's what we're all trying to do here with our businesses. Right? We're
we want people to pay attention to the things we have to say. K? So
it's not about the fact that they're doing it for attention. It's the way that
they're going about it playing on our emotions in human
psychology. So satirical content. Satirical
content to me is the most innocent in this family.
It uses humor and irony to make a point or to critique something.
So it can provoke a strong emotion, but, generally,
it's done to encourage thoughtful engagement, not just outrage.
And generally you're in on the joke. Like, if you understand it, it's
satire. And I'm talking everyone's in on the joke. It's not like the
comment section is filled with people who are angry. The comment section is filled
with people like, oh, I see what you did there. There's a Facebook page that
I follow that does this, and I I tried to look it up before recording
this podcast. I couldn't find it. But it basically flips
patriarchal norms. So it'll say things like,
like, the creators of the page will say things like, you know,
that man should be careful of what he's wearing because
maybe he was asking to be punched at the face. You know,
something like that where you go, oh, right. Like, what you wear has
nothing to do with other people's actions. Right. And so it's things
like that that can really kind of flip your
thinking and it's intentionally satirical. Okay. I'm okay
with satire. Satire to me is fine
in small doses, but the creators of satirical pages
have to be very, mindful about how
they show up with the satire because it can lean into
rage baiting if you're not careful, if you're not making
sure that you're pointing out the joke and that everyone is in on the joke.
Okay? Alright. Next step in this family, we have clickbait
content. Clickbait to me is sensationalized or
intentionally misleading headlines just to get clicks.
Okay? So not necessarily angry,
but you feel like you've been gooped. Like, you feel like you've been tricked into
reading the post. Do you feel like you've been tricked into clicking a link?
You feel like you've been tricked into watching a video and it whatever
it is on the other side of the trick, does it match the hype?
Okay? Click baiting to me is another form of
getting attention. I remember this from the YouTube days.
Back in my YouTube days, there were a lot of ways that people would use
clickbait. One of the most popular ones was to use, like, a
traditionally beautiful person, usually female, on your
thumbnail video, usually in a provocative way. Doesn't
matter what your video is about, but that would get more clicks on the
video. Okay? That's clickbait. The purpose is to get clicks.
Even this video has nothing to do with this, you know,
sensual woman showing off her assets on the
thumbnail. K? Clickbait. I also think of,
like, BuzzFeed articles as clickbait where they'll
say things like, 4 shocking
truths about your toothbrush. Number 3
will blow your mind. It's like that kind of, headline where you're
like, okay. Like, is is a toothbrush really that
shocking? But then you're clicking it, you're reading it, and you're like, I knew all
of this. Anyway, so that that to me is clickbait. Okay? Then we have
shitposting. Shitposting is different from
satire and click baiting in that it is
intentionally random or highly absurd.
The point is to create confusion through humor,
and it is the chaos griblins of the Internet. But
to me, shit posting is usually harmless.
And it usually has a lot to do with like Internet culture versus,
emotional manipulation. Ship posting. I follow a few
ship posting pages, and I just love how random they are. There's one
person who I follow who, claims that
they, ship post intentionally to build their business,
and I still don't see the correlation. But I sure be looking at
those posts, and I'm in the comments because it's just chaos.
It's drama for the sake of drama, but it's harmless
for the most part. Okay? So that shit posting to me, to me,
it's like for a little giggle, for a little moment.
It's fine. It's fine. It's fine. Shitposting,
harmless. And there's a person who I follow
on threads who combines all of these, but I'm gonna I don't know if I
should say her name or not, but I'm gonna talk about her because a lot
of her posts to me are rage baiting. And rage baiting in
this family, again, specifically provoking
anger or frustration. The sole purpose of
rage bait is to generate outrage. K?
There's, like, an emotional manipulation there that to
me is damaging. And it is a fine
line to go from satire to rage bait.
Okay? Rage baiting is like, I wanna make people
angry. Satire is like, I wanna make people think. Click baiting is like, I
wanna trick someone. Rage baiting is like, I wanna make them, like,
explode. You know? So, this person, I'll say
her name. I'll put the link in the show notes. She's actually a journalist,
Katie Natopoulos. Not not Natopoulos.
Oh, I'm sorry, Katie. I said your name wrong. But I'll put her link to
her threads account because I followed her initially because of a
satirical post she did, and I believe it was around feminism,
and, you know, the idea of, paternal
leave and and mat leave. And, I can't I
could not find the post, so maybe she deleted it or maybe it was not
as far back as I scrolled. I scrolled back about 6 months, and I couldn't
find it. But, the post had a lot
of people in the comments who didn't get it. And so this is the
reason I followed her because I was like, oh, this is funny. I hit follow.
Then I went to the comments and I was like, oh, people actually think this
is real. And they were getting heated. When I say
heated, heated. Heated
about this concept of women taking time
off and men taking time off after having a
baby. And me, you know, having just had a
baby, having taken mat leave twice now, was interested in the
conversation. The amount of men in the comment section who were
just angry at the implication that they should
be hands on with their children was wild to me. Absolutely
mind blowing that she would, suggest that in her post.
So this Katie, person, who I don't really
know, frankly, I just follow her on threads, has an interesting
satirical account that often slips
into rage bait. And she does this
very intentionally. K? I know she's a journalist. I've seen her
articles in places like Business Insider. And yet,
most of what she posts is intentional
to enrage people or to incite some sort of response for
them. So I'll give an example of what I did find. One of her recent
posts I did really well. Do y'all remember, the
dress, the infamous dress? Is it white and gold or is
it blue and black? Well, she posted this
3 days ago, basically reinciting this. And this to me
is a shitpost. Like, this is why I'm saying she's a perfect example of all
of these. It could be Sataira. It could be a shitpost,
but she posted a photo of the dress, the dress, the white and
gold, the blue and black with the, I believe, the original caption that says,
wait. Help me check something. What colors are these dress? My
friend says it's black and blue. I see white and gold.
And the comment section is full of people who are
in on the joke. Right? They they understand that this was Internet
culture from years ago. And then there's a bunch of
people in the comments who are like, I don't get it. And then
there's some people who are actually chiming in and trying to
say if it's white or gold or
blue black and blue. And, of course, Internet culture things
are popping up. Like, someone said Laurel, and I was like,
woah. I forgot that that was a
thing. Or yachty. Do you hear yachty? Do you hear Laurel? This was
Facebook virality back in the day. Right? Innocent shit
posting. But some of her posts lean
towards rage baiting. So she
posted this PSA back in May for male journalists
calling them out and saying, when you, we can see you reply,
fire emoji to Instagram models several times a day
here on threads. You don't need to stop. By all means, enjoy, but it shows
up on the feed. And the
comment section is mostly people, like, in
on the joke, but some people aren't.
Some people aren't in on the joke, and some people are
getting angry. They're getting angry. Like,
oh, what if this was a female? How would you feel?
And so to me, the this is,
the danger of this thin line,
very thin line between satire and rage baiting.
All of these tactics aim for virality, but the key difference
is the emotion that they trigger. And we can't control people's
emotions. So if you have an account like this, it could be very easy to
slip into rage veining. And that's the most harmful one to
me because it relies on negativity and completely
dismisses the curiosity, the humor, or the chaos of
of the other good parts of the Internet. Now
I don't know if any of you are considering rage baiting or if
you're a marketer and your clients are, but I do have to talk about the
long term consequences of this strategy. First
of all, it can have, negative impacts on your
brand long term. While short term engagement is
great, these tactics erode trust.
And I think satire, shit posting, and click baiting go into
this category as well. Rage baiting being the
most extreme version of this because people
feel manipulated. And that manipulation,
reduces credibility. It harms relationships with your community.
It's just not a good feeling. Like, no one wants to feel like they were
tricked into something. There is a
TikToker, Winter Zezus, I
believe, is her last name. And, she creates
these fake scenarios in her content
that half the comments are like, oh, is this
real? You know, some of the comments are like upset on her
behalf, and then the other comments are like, it's fake. It's
fake. And her community keeps saying it's fake. Right? And she
has over 92,000,000 views on her
videos. 92,000,000 views on her videos by creating these fake
scenarios. Things like she'll pretend to be at a restaurant
eating some food, and you'll hear a voice off camera come up and
interact with her in a rude way or something like
that. And she doesn't say that it's satire at
all. Her account just says she's 23 and she lives in
New York City. She doesn't explain
it at all. And so a lot of people think it's real and
she's creating rage bait to get paid because TikTok has a
creator program and, the more people like, share, engage
with her video, the more she gets paid. Her top viewed video is has 26,000,000
views. 26,900,000 views. That's
wild. Right? And so short term, she gets
paid, but long term, my brain can't help but go to what are what
are you doing? Like, where is this going?
Yeah. I think it could be very harmful for your brand. Second thing is I
think there's a huge mental health component with rage baiting and the
way the algorithms are today. Constant
exposure to these rage inducing content pieces can
negatively impact mental health, and you can very easily slip into a
loop of only saying rage bait content. And this happened to
me, briefly on TikTok. So I really
enjoy TikTok. Their algorithm, chef's kiss, love it. But early days,
TikTok didn't understand the difference in the style of cooking videos
that I like, and I love watching people cook. I
don't know what it is about. I don't know what it is. I just love
it. Give me a recipe. Let me see you start with, like, the scrap the
the ingredients and then come up with something beautiful. I love it.
However, there are these videos of people intentionally making
terrible food so that people in the comments leave comments
on it. I'm talking they'll take a burger, they'll wrap it in bacon, they'll deep
fry it, They'll put ice cream on top with sprinkles
with fireworks coming out of it. And by the end, you're like, what is
happening? I can't tell you how many times I told
TikTok, click those three little dots. Do not give me this
content. I like cooking videos. I don't want rage bait. Now
TikTok understands me, and I'm in a very happy place with the algorithm.
However, some people watch those videos and don't understand that the
creators behind those videos are intentionally crafting
these stories that are designed to
incite their rage. Like, no one really is
creating a hamburger covered in bacon, deep fried, add ice
cream and sprinkles with fireworks at the top, and then eating it. They're not
doing that on a daily basis. They're doing it because you're watching the video and
you're getting upset. And the thing that was upsetting me was the amount of waste.
They would, like, not just create 1 burger. They would do this for, like,
20 burgers at a time, and the amount of waste was truly
upsetting to me. I was getting upset. I could feel my emotions rising. And so
I want you to know, like, as you're watching content online, this goes for
anything. Just know it's all fake. Right? Internet is fake.
Okay? And it can you can actually harm yourself.
You can harm your mental health the more you consume these videos if you don't
recognize the toxic environment that's created by people
with these this content and then the algorithm because we're
rewarding it by reacting to the video.
So to break the negativity, I do recommend you
recognize this, and I wanna talk about how you can steer
clear of these tactics as
well as of these videos as a consumer. But
from a marketing perspective, my mindful marketers out here, I we
need us to unite and create positive content.
I'm on a personal mission to do this right now. I do
not love the content that is designed to provoke
outrage or to make people angry.
I don't like canceling content or cancel culture calling
people out. To me, all of that content
is a slow spiral into a very unhealthy
mental health place for me. And so my mission
is to, create content that inspires, you know,
curiosity and and joy and,
thoughtful, meaningful conversations or moments
of connection and levity, moments
of I feel seen. And, so
recently on threads I posted about crocs because
I, always thought Crocs were ugly and they still are. I still believe
that they're ugly. However, my mom came to visit and I actually tried
on her Crocs because my feet grew in pregnancy and I'm
now the same size as my mom. And I tried them on, slipped them on,
and I was like, woah. These are comfortable and so light.
And that was 3 months ago, and I haven't stopped thinking about it. And I
finally bought my pair of Crocs, and I went to threads to talk about it.
And it felt like one of those unifying moments where in
the grand scheme of things, it doesn't make a difference.
It didn't, you know, build my business. It's not selling
anything. It's not adding any value,
but it is a moment where I got to connect with people. You
know, people who, you know, may not have commented on any other post were
commenting about their Crocs. Most people were team Crocs, to be honest.
There were a few people who were, like, never in a 1000000 years. I was
like, okay. Talk to me after you've tried them on.
There were some people telling me about the little I think they're called giblets that
you that you put on there, and I I have not got that far yet.
I just have one pair, my first pair, and I will tell you my my
2 year old wants her own pair as well. And so it was just one
of those moments where I was like, this to me is one of the beautiful
things about community on the Internet. It's not about
always selling something or promoting something or trying to do something like that. To
me, it's about those moments of connection. So focus on the
positivity, key here. Also, if you're a marketer
like myself, I'm on a mission to educate people on
on what's rage baiting, what's even, like
satire or shit posting. Because
to me, it's up there with, like, a scam, in that people
who don't know may get taken in by it, and I don't want them to
be manipulated in this way. It's the same reason I post about the
Facebook scams. Every time I get one in my email inbox, I post
about it and say this looks like it came from Facebook, but it's not. And
here's how you can see that it isn't. Things like that. I
just I'm on a mission to educate, and I I encourage you to do the
same with your community. And then also set your own boundaries. As a
content creator, as a business owner, just be mindful of
getting caught up in the temptation of virality.
And there's the there is another thin line between a
hook and clickbait. And to me, a hook
accurately reflects what's happening in that content piece,
whereas clickbait doesn't, and it's just a
trick. And ragebait is just to make people angry. So,
definitely avoid those quick wins of building anger in
in favor of having, like, meaningful conversations with people.
So that's my episode on rage baiting. What do you
what do you think about all of these things? I love conversation
about this. You can hit me up on threads, on Instagram DMs.
Let's continue the conversation there. Next
up, I have an amazing interview next week all about
blogging and is it dead. So this is another threads conversation. People keep
saying blogging's dead. Is it? I don't think it is. And I will
be talking to some experts next week about that. Also, if you're in
the Savvy Social School, we are hosting a live workshop
next week, profit from your POV. It is brand new
content coming to you hot from my marketing
strategies. I'm excited to bring it to you all there. In
the meantime, make sure you rate and subscribe to this podcast on
Apple Podcasts and Spotify. I just saw we have 4,000
followers on Spotify. I had no idea that we had that video over
there. So thank you for listening to the show. Leave your rating. It
helps more wonderful people like you find us so that we can be in
community together. I'll be back next Tuesday with another episode. Bye
for now.