What Getting 3 Billion Views Taught Me About Human Psychology

I've generated over 3 billion views for some of the most boring brands you could think of, brands that sell instant ramen, software tools and cell phone plans.

After years of doing this across dozens of clients, I've come to believe one thing: making viral content has nothing to do with the content itself. It has everything to do with how the human brain works.

Every scroll, every share and every follow is driven by psychological triggers that fire in the first half second someone sees your content. Once you understand those triggers, you can make almost anything go viral, even something as simple as instant noodles.

These are the 6 principles behind those 3 billion views.

Made for

• Founders who think their product is too boring to go viral.

• Marketers whose brand videos look great and get 200 views.

• Creators who keep posting and can't tell why some videos work and others die.

TL;DR

Virality is psychology. Use formats people already know. Open a curiosity gap without leading with the product. Sell what the product means to people instead of what it is. Put a credential in the first 2 seconds. Give people a reason to share. Tell it as a story.

Below are the 6 principles, the client work behind each one, and how to tell which one you broke when a video flops.

The product is almost irrelevant

For my first 2 years, I made the most beautiful cinematic food videos I could. They got 200, 300 views. I kept thinking the fix was a better camera, a new editing technique or a more original idea.

After 3 billion views, I think about it differently. What matters is whether you understand the person watching.

Principle 1: Your brain decides before you do

People don't choose what to watch. Their brain chooses for them, and it happens in under a second.

When you scroll, your brain runs a fast filter. Before you're even aware of it, it asks 3 questions:

1. Have I seen something like this before and enjoyed it?

2. Is something unexpected happening right now?

3. Does this have anything to do with me or my life?

If the answer to all 3 is no, you scroll.

This is why original content fails so often. When your brain meets a format it has never seen, it doesn't get excited. It gets confused, and confusion is the fastest path to a scroll.

When it sees a format it already knows, like a reaction video, a challenge or a walk-up-to-a-stranger setup, it reacts differently: "I know what this is. I've liked this before. Let me watch it."

There's a name for this: the mere exposure effect. The more you see something, the more your brain starts to like it.

It's the backbone of what I call the format steal. You never invent content. You find a format that's already pulling millions of views, and you put your brand inside that structure.

How we used it for Buldak

When I started working with Buldak, the Korean instant ramen brand, they had about 300,000 followers on TikTok, and they were stuck. The content wasn't going viral anymore, and follower growth had stopped.

We moved the content away from manufacturing and ingredients and into formats that were already going viral in the food space, like spicy challenges and reaction videos. Then we put Buldak right in the middle of them.

In 12 months, the account grew to 1.8 million followers on TikTok and over 900 million views. Nothing about the product changed. The format did the heavy lifting.

Principle 2: The curiosity trap

I've analyzed hundreds of brands, and the one thing they keep getting wrong is leading with the product in the hook. The moment they do, the viewer's brain files the video as an ad, and the viewer scrolls away before a single thought forms.

The way around this is the curiosity trap. When your brain senses a gap between what it knows and what it wants to know, that gap is uncomfortable. It feels like a mental itch, and your brain won't let you scroll away until the gap is filled.

That's why the best hooks are never about the product. They trigger curiosity, disbelief or identity recognition, which is the moment a viewer sees themselves in the video.

How we used it for Stan

For my first video for Stan, an all-in-one platform for creators, I didn't open with the software. I found a format that was already blowing up: the "how much do you pay for rent" office tour. We used the CEO's story and his office as the location.

That first video got a million views on TikTok and over 5 million on LinkedIn. Over the next few months, the same approach generated 20 million views for the CEO's personal brand.

The hook was about something the viewer was already curious about. The product showed up naturally once they were watching.

Open the curiosity gap in the first 2 seconds, and the viewer is committed to finishing. Close it too early, and they leave.

Principle 3: People don't buy the product. They buy identities.

There's a concept called means-end chain theory, and it changed how I think about content. It says every product has 3 layers:

1. Product attributes: what it is.

2. Functional consequences: what it does.

3. Psychological values: what it means to the person's identity and emotional life.

Most brands only talk about layer 1. Your brain doesn't care about layer 1. It cares about layer 3.

Take a supplement brand like AG1. If you make content about the supplement itself, you're stuck in layer 1. Keep asking why someone actually cares, and you land on something real:

• The supplement leads to a healthier body.

• A healthier body leads to better energy and mood.

• Better energy and mood lead to "I feel in control of my body and my life."

Now you're making content about sleep, stress, discipline and wellness. That's what the viewer cares about, and it gets past the part of the brain that flags content as an ad.

When your content speaks to identity instead of features, the viewer doesn't feel sold to. They feel understood.

Principle 4: Authority is a shortcut the brain can't resist

Social media is shallow. I don't mean that as an insult. I mean it as a biological fact.

Your brain doesn't have time to judge every piece of content deeply, so it takes shortcuts, and the biggest one is authority.

When you see a credential in the first 2 seconds, like "Thai chef," "Harvard student" or "25-year-old software engineer who sold his company," your brain doesn't stop to check whether that person is credible. It accepts the credential and decides the video is worth watching.

We're wired to pay attention to people we look up to and want to be like. A credential in the hook triggers that reflex before the viewer even notices.

That isn't manipulation. That's how media has always worked. You're just being intentional about it.

How we used it for a Japanese restaurant

One of the first accounts I ever grew was a Japanese restaurant. I was making cinematic videos for them. The shots were gorgeous, the music was nice, and it all looked like Food Network. They got maybe 200 or 300 views.

Then I found a format that was already going viral: someone walks up to a chef with an ingredient and asks, "Hey chef, can you make me something with this?" The chef's outfit and the professional kitchen became the credential.

The first video we made in that format did 1.8 million views, the second did 2 million, and the restaurant gained 300,000 followers in 3 months.

The food and the restaurant stayed exactly the same. The only thing that changed is that we gave the viewer a reason to trust us in the first 2 seconds.

Principle 5: People share what makes them look good

Getting someone to watch is half the battle. Getting them to share is a different game.

One of the biggest lessons from 3 billion views: people don't share what they enjoy most. They share what makes them look smart, funny or knowledgeable to their friends.

So when you design a piece of content, the question isn't "Will they like this?" The question is "Will sharing this make them look good?"

You're not trying to impress the viewer. You're trying to impress the viewer's friend.

Think of yourself as a wingman. Your job is to make the person who shares your video look like they have great taste, or like they found something cool before everyone else.

That comes down to 2 things:

1. Make your hook explainable in one sentence. If someone can't describe your video to a friend quickly, they won't share it.

2. Pick an emotion that spreads. Humor and surprise make people want to pass something along. Sadness and anger can get views, but they don't spread the same way.

Every time I make a piece of content now, I ask myself one question: what does the person who shares this get to say about themselves by sharing it?

Principle 6: Stories hijack the viewer's brain

When people are inside a story, they stop arguing with what they hear. Their critical thinking slows down, and emotion takes over. That's the most powerful state a viewer can be in when your brand shows up.

Every video I produce follows the same skeleton:

1. Hook

2. Problem

3. Story

4. Payoff

That structure works because it mirrors how the brain naturally takes in information. The viewer gets pulled in emotionally instead of sitting back and judging.

The same thinking runs through the edit. I only have 2 editing rules:

1. "If there's no new information, cut it." Every millisecond matters. The brain tunes out the moment a video stops giving it something new, and every cut resets that clock.

2. "Caption everything." When people take in visuals and audio at the same time, more of the brain is working, and they stay locked in.

I pulled up the timeline of a Buldak video that got 2.2 million views. Every clip was barely a few seconds long. Every clip delivered new information, and there was zero dead space.

How to tell which principle you broke

When a video underperforms, "the content didn't work" isn't a diagnosis. This is how my team reads every video we publish:

• No views: bad hook. Go back to Principles 2 and 4.

• Views, but no likes: the idea wasn't interesting enough. People watched, but they didn't care.

• No comments: you didn't make anyone feel anything.

• Low watch time: the edit has dead space, or the pacing dropped. Go back to Principle 6.

• No shares: it wasn't relatable. Nobody saw themselves in it. Go back to Principle 5.

• No saves: there was nothing worth coming back to.

Each one tells you exactly what to fix next time, so you never have to guess.

The product just happened to be there

Buldak didn't hit 900 million views because instant ramen is exciting. That Japanese restaurant didn't gain 300,000 followers because the food got better. We didn't get 20 million views for Stan's CEO because the software changed.

Every one of those results happened because we understood how people think, what catches their attention and what makes them share.

The rules

1. Start with a format people already know. The brain decides in under a second, and familiar wins.

2. Never put the product in the hook. The brain files it as an ad and scrolls.

3. Open the curiosity gap in the first 2 seconds. Close it too early, and they leave.

4. Make content about what the product means to people. That's the layer the brain cares about.

5. Put a credential in the first 2 seconds. Authority is the shortcut the brain takes.

6. Ask what the sharer gets to say about themselves. People share what makes them look good.

7. Follow the skeleton: hook, problem, story, payoff. Inside a story, people stop arguing with what they hear.

8. If there's no new information, cut it. Every millisecond matters.

9. Caption everything. It keeps the brain locked in.

If you understand people, you can make anything go viral.